[MacDV] Best way of saving large quantity of interviews

[Tim Selander]

It sounds like you've already started the project, so the 
following advice will only help you in the future.

As I understand it from your post, for these student interviews 
you need
1) Orignal tapes, to fill grant requirement to keep record of 
each interview
2) DVDs of interviews to use in workshops
3) Computer files of interviews so research can be done on 
individual as well as whole-class progress, not for editing 
(student name, class name, etc., can be recorded on white 
board/slate at top of each interview.)

To my way of thinking, staff time is the most expensive part of 
your project. Assuming these interviews are all happening within 
one school building, I would create an AV cart that contains:

1) MiniDV camera and tripod, (which you already have)
2) Stand alone DVD recorder, with DV input.
<http://www.amazon.com/Panasonic-DMR-ES15S-DVD-Recorder-Input/dp/B000F4C2AM/sr=1-1/qid=1171628904/ref=sr_1_1/105-6620053-5685241?ie=UTF8&s=electronics>

3) Computer, laptop or desktop, with MPEG2 encoder, and external 
hard drive.

MPEG encoder, for Mac
<http://www.elgato.com/index.php?file=products_eyetv250>

for PC
<http://www.hauppauge.com/pages/products/data_pvrusb2.html>


Your camera almost assuredly has both analog (video and stereo 
audio) outputs and DV outputs. Some cameras may not output to 
both analog and DV at the same time, so you'll want to verify 
that yours does.

Set up the camera to record interviews. Run a DV cable from the 
camera to the DVD recorder. Run analog cables from the camera to 
the MPEG encoder, which in turn is attached to your computer by 
USB. You may want to purchase longer than normal DV and analog 
cables. If your camera will not put out both DV and analog at the 
same time, then cable the DV to the DVD recorder, and take the 
DVD recorder's analog line out to the MPEG encoder.

Then hit record on the computer, DVD deck and camera, and away 
you go. When the interview is over, stop the computer recording 
software, stop and DVD deck and stop the camera. You've got the 
interview on tape, on DVD and in the computer with no time wasted 
later feeding tapes into the computer and burning DVDs.

At thirty minutes per interview, you get two per tape, 4 per DVD, 
and maybe 100 on an external hard disk, depending on the size of 
the disk and the compression rate of your mpeg. You will need 
time in the process to change and label tapes every two 
interviews, and Finalize and label a DVD every 4 interviews, and 
will need to save each interview's mpeg on the computer -- 
perhaps making one copy as well -- putting one copy in the 
student's folder, and another in the class' folder.

Finally, for every external hard disk you use to store the 
computer files on, you absolutely should have a second to hold a 
back up. Some time in the course of this project you will loose a 
hard disk, so make sure everything is backed up at least once.

If you must have the video in the computer in a DV format, then 
run the DV cable to the computer and capture with iMovie or 
similar. Run the analog cables to the DVD recorder, and record 
from the Line 1 inputs. You don't need to buy the MPEG encoder. 
But if you capture DV to the computer you will need _much_ more 
hard disk space. Two hours of DV will take 26 GB, two hours of 
DVD quality MPEG would be less than 5 GB.

I have not personally used the gear from the links above -- they 
are just suggestions to get you started.

Tim Selander
Tokyo, Japan

P.S. If you cannot do this and must instead copy tapes into the 
computer after the fact, then instead of a deck I would 
recommend, as have others, that you buy a second camera. Cheaper 
than a deck, can do double duty as a camera if needed. MiniDV 
decks use essentially the same mechanisms as miniDV cameras, so 
you don't get much more in the way of reliability with a deck.




Susan Weiss wrote:

 >
 > Thank you for your responce.  I did not give you enough 
information because each person gave me a different purpose.  You 
were correct that the interviews are for saving for two purposes. 
  One purpose is for the teacher to see how well a child has 
improved from year to year.  Another purpose is for research to 
see how the grade is progressing and the level the students. 
The files are suppose to be for each child and also for the 
class.   The files have to be transferred from the tapes.   I am 
looking for the best and easiest and fastest way to transfer them 
off the tape.   Also the interviews will be used in workshops so 
that is why they need to be on dvds. Also the program was part of 
a grant.  The grant requires we keep records of each interview. 
By the way we have been using the idea of white board with the 
child's name.
 > Susan
 >