> Does it seem conceivable that my DV tapes should begin to suffer from > "stiction" after about a year and a half? I thought at first my tape > playback problem was due to a worn or misaligned video head, but it turns > out the tapes play badly on other DV machines as well. The older the tape, > the worse the artifacts (portions of the picture lagging behind, timecode > stopping every few seconds and then suddenly catching up.) These sound like severe dropout problems, not stiction: yes, the pix stick, due to the frame buffer, but the tape keeps on rollin' > If I make a fresh recording over the seemingly faulty tapes, those newly > recorded sections play back fine. Does that make sense? Yes. It implies the existing recordings are going bad (due to different tracking or alignment on the original recorder; dropout and shedding; demagnetization; tape stretch or distortion; who knows?) but that the tape itself is still usable. The question is, what happens if you try to play back today's recordings in 18 months? What are your storage conditions like? Cheers, Adam Wilt
Hi, Tony! > Unreal Films makes long-form documentaries, sometimes feature length. They > are observational, so in editing we tend to have to wade through TONS of > material, and cut through numerous versions until we get where we need to > get... both me and my editor are experienced using Avids... We are now > considering a replacement.... Here's the options we're considering at the > moment:- > 1. DV Raptor and Premiere More stable, yes. But the lagginess in long-form is a known Premiere problem that Raptor doesn't affect. > 2. RT2000 and Premiere Still Premiere. There may be a future version of certain other excellent editors supported on this platform if rumors are to be believed (I'm not sure if the plans are public, so I can't say more). > 3. DV Raptor and Edit DV Great for long form; fast even with many hours and thousands of cuts in the timeline (DO claims slowdowns are detectable with 800 or so edits but no user I've spoken to has seen this, even with 2000 edits in the show!). It's operationally very fast but some things require a bit of manual intervention (like moving filters around when rippling edits) and only one timeline per project is allowed. It's a very stable system, too. EditDV with DO's own hardware is also work a look. > 4. DV Master Pro and Speed Razor Older, yes, and the stability of SR gets mixed reviews... but I have no personal experience to offer. > 5. Avid Xpress DV, Edit* etc Haven't worked with Xpress DV yet but it looks a nice way to go if you're Avid-centric and need the media-sharing capabilities of Avid. Edit* is rather nice but quite expensive. Doesn't it require DigiSuite-level hardware? Also consider Final Cut Pro on the Mac (if you can tolerate that "other" platform). So far very stable (I've only had it lock up once, just last night) and quite fast to edit with, though I find EditDV to be a bit faster for assembly. Fine for long form with little if any slowdowns. Multiple sequences within a project makes it easy to try out variations or to cut shows in "chapters", something you won't get in EditDV. All these NLEs have very different personalities, so I'd suggest getting opinions but then sitting down with the top candidates and seeing if they work the way your brain works. I tend to be technologically ambidextrous and work with Premiere, EditDV, and FCP, and ALL of them are in turns wonderful and frustrating in very different ways. Cheers, Adam Wilt
