DVHScap 1.3 and Snow Leopard

[William Hohauser]

I haven't used this program since before 10.4 and while it's working, it crashes after finishing a capture of HDV. It also has errors if the time code breaks (one of the cameras was on "Free Run"). Are there any suggestions for an alternative m2t stream capture program?

[Robert Lane]

You mean other than using FCP?

[William Hohauser]

Absolutely. Even when capturing straight to ProRes, FCP's HDV capture is spotty at best. These are from a multi-camera shoot and I don't need the middle of a lengthy take to have a clip break that isn't really there. Previously I had been going straight from my HDV deck to a FireStore as a m2t file and then using ClipWrap to convert the files to HDV QuickTime, it's very efficient and trouble free workflow. Unfortunately the FireStore is having a problem that requires a trip back to Focus Enhancements.

There is a program called VirtualDVHS in the most recent FireWire SDK along with DVHSCap 1.3 but I couldn't get it to do anything. I'm not sure it's for capturing streams anyway.

[Robert Lane]

Well obviously one FCP station can't direct-capture a multi-cam session but we never had any problems capturing direct to an external FW HDD thru "capture now" FCP way back when the G4 Powerbooks were out and we were capturing from the HVX200, FX1 and even the JVC HD100.

A long time ago I posted a thread about setting up (then) PB for direct capture; if you used that same hardware/software setup you should be able to use FCP without issue.

There was also another direct-capture app (not sure if it's still around) that was similar to the Adobe direct-capture program (geez, can't remember the name!) and it did have multi-cam capture ability - but required a lot of bandwidth from the system.

[William Hohauser]

I'm not capturing multiple cameras at the same time (but that's a very interesting idea for the future), just each iso tape from the four cameras separately. It's concert with tunes lasting from 3 to 5 minutes long and it's a help that I get the entire tune from each camera in one piece so using multi-cam in FCP is as simple as possible.

I just edited a 2 1/2 hour three camera project from a conference that was shot iso in HDcamSR. On one tape somebody switched the VTR's time code from non-drop to drop-frame during recording and this drove the AJA IO HD box I was using batty. Fortunately I was able to capture the remainder of the tape separately and assigned it as camera four so as I switched in multi-cam mode I could continue the switch without stopping.

Anyway I am just finishing up the capture of the concert today and while DVHSCap crashing at the end of every capture is annoying, the resulting files are fine. I send the crash report to Apple each time but I have a feeling that it has something to do with Snow Leopard.

[Pete Cofrancesco]

Your reason for not using FCP to caputure doesn't make sense. If there is a drop frame its on the tape so no matter what program you use you'll get one. Dirty/old/warn camera heads also give drop frames. FCP doesn't add drop frames. In addition, ProRes for most HD editing is the way to go on the Mac, yet another reason to use FCP.

[William Hohauser]

I agree with you. The AJA made excellent ProRes files from the HDCam but as I said the time code switch made the capture unusable from that point on in the tape. Perhaps something more drastic happened on the recording that I didn't see as well, but recapturing after the time code switch was flawless. So that particular tape was captured in two pieces.

I have found over the years of using my JVC HD100 camera with a FireStore and FCP that I had problems in this order of lessening severity:

Shooting:
Shooting HDV tape only (I've had more more severe problems with HDV tape than DV)
Shooting DV tape only
Shooting FireStore only (only did that once, it was nerve wracking)
Shooting any tape plus the FireStore set to QuickTime HDV (the Firestore very rarely messes up the QuickTime wrapper resulting in a useless file)
Shooting on any tape plus the FireStore set to HDV m2t file streams (the FireStore has never messed up these files)

Capturing:
Capturing as HDV in FCP (clip breaks in the middle of takes are the worst problem)
Capturing as ProRes in FCP (fewer unwanted clip breaks but it still happens)
Capturing in DVHSCap and converting with ClipWrap (usually flawless but timecode breaks can befuddle ClipWrap)
Transferring files from the FireStore either directly or thru ClipWrap

This most recent multi camera shoot didn't have multiple FireStores so everything went to tape.

[David W. Jones]

William, I do not use Snow Leopard on any of our edit machines, still too many bugs for our working environment, but I know exactly what you are talking about. There always seems like one in every crowd that decides to flip the time code mode during recording, go figure.
In those cases we generally still use the AJA Kona, or IO-HD in your case, but use capture now since your time code is kaput, and then reselect your starting point in multi-cam.

All the Best!

[William Hohauser]

Good suggestion. A question, does the Kona or IO-HD have a problem if the tape runs beyond the recoded signal if you are using Capture Now? In some cases with other equipment the entire capture is ruined.

[David Knaggs]

Originally Posted by William Hohauser

I haven't used this program since before 10.4 and while it's working, it crashes after finishing a capture of HDV. It also has errors if the time code breaks (one of the cameras was on "Free Run"). Are there any suggestions for an alternative m2t stream capture program?

Hi William.

Gee, this topic makes me all nostalgic for the "good old days" of trying to capture HDV1 using FCP.

Believe me, Pete. FCP will perceive a "data break" when there isn't one and only capture part of a clip. There is no drop-out, but it perceives a data break anyway. Then you try again and it might now capture that portion fine but perceive a data break later in the clip. Then you try again and it might capture the whole clip perfectly! That's why a lot of people turned to things like capturing with ProRes, using capture cards, etc.

And it's why Tim Dashwood kept "pestering" Mike Woodworth until Mike developed and released "ClipWrap" which finally solved the problem of getting HDV1 captured natively and working in a native timeline with FCP.

And I guess the FCP capturing problems are why, in the end, JVC abandoned HDV1 utterly (HDV1 is 720p footage captured to Mini DV tape) and why their latest models (HM100 and HM700) now capture to solid state media using XDCAM codec which is already wrapped in a .mov wrapper. Just drag the files into the Browser and edit away in FCP!

However, capturing HDV1 from the tape using DVHSCap Version 1.0 and then turning it into an HDV720p .mov file with ClipWrap is pretty much a no-brainer these days. I captured a project this way two weeks ago and it went smoothly and perfectly (ClipWrap can also convert to ProRes. etc., if you like). But it's always a good idea to stop DVHSCap from capturing before you get to the data break when you stopped recording at the end of each take. ClipWrap will also preserve timecode.

So William, my first advice to you would be to trash Version 1.3 and install Version 1.0 of DVHSCap and see if you get a better result with that.

I captured two weeks ago using OS 10.5.8, but I picked up a new MacBook Pro with Snow Leopard straight after that and one of the first things I did was install DVHSCap Version 1.0 on it. I haven't had any new footage to capture using the MBP yet, but there was NO WAY I was going to install Version 1.3 on the MBP because I've heard of glitches using versions of DVHSCap later than 1.0. Version 1.0 has always been rock-solid.

So if you download the developer kit SDK 20 and install version 1.0 my hunch is that you'll get a better result.

If that doesn't work, try HDVxDV. This is a paid application but they might have a free trial.

[William Hohauser]

DVHSCap 1.0 it will be! Thanks for the help.

[Anmol Mishra]

Is there a utility that can process the files imported via DVHSCap and splits them into scenes ?
Just don't want to go into an hour worth of footage to look for a single shot.