What damages MiniDV tapes?

J

JonathonH

New member
I bought some brand new MiniDV tapes from a local electronics store. We shot on 2 tapes over two days. After I captured the video to my laptop for editing the sound was full of static and cutting in and out. The second tape dropped 355 frames in one minute. We tested all our recording configurations and the only thing that made the problem go away was when we changed to a different tape not purchased from the store.

So we know that its a problem with the tapes. We just don't know whats wrong with them. We don't know if they were sold to us damaged or if we damaged them somehow. Anyone have any ideas? What can damage tapes? Cell phones? Batteries? Is there anything we should definitely keep them away from? Even in the short term?

My other question is will damaged tapes damage the recording head?

Any help would be great. Thanks!
 
JonathonH said:
........ What can damage tapes? Cell phones? Batteries? Is there anything we should definitely keep them away from? Even in the short term?
My other question is will damaged tapes damage the recording head?
Any help would be great. Thanks!
Click to expand...

First thing that comes to mind is magnetism. Did you store your tapes next to your headphones?
Never let your tapes get next to anything magnetic or electromagnetic.
Other thing is x-rays. Go through any security checkpoints with those tapes?
As far as tapes damaging tape heads, not likely.
 
No x-rays.

The tapes were stored in the camera case, away from headphones. Do the batteries give off a magnetic field?
 
Batteries do not produce a magnetic field per se but they obviously do store an electric charge. There would be a very, very weak electromagnetic field between your (+) and (- ) terminals. I would guess that having large batteries next to a magnetically susceptible recording tape cannot do anything good to it. I think your batteries could be one possible answer. Other possibility might be the tape stock itself.
One way to find out would be to take one of those tapes and record some random footage; play it back to confirm it, then put the tape next to your battery(ies) same as they were stored in the case----for the same length of time. If the tape is corrupted after that, then you know why. If not, then something else would be the culprit.
 
I'm flying to Colorado Springs soon to shoot a phase of a documentary. Shipping my pair of A-1's but will planned on carrying the tapes before and after the shoot, with me on the plane. Would I be better off to just ship the tapes back to my studio after the shoot, rather than carrying them on the plane? Do the carry-on x-rays hurt the tapes?
 
Carry on type x-ray machines are "not supposed to" erase magnetically stored data which is what your mini DV tapes have.
We have one those x-ray machines at the entrance of my office building and it totally erased a report from a floppy disc in my bag. Four hours of time out the window. I'll never repeat that mistake again.
Shipping those tapes with a tracking number might be a better option.
 
I know what happened. You cannot mix Panasonic tapes with other brands since they have different lubrication systems. One is wet and the others are dry. You must use a tape head cleaner before you use a different tape. It happened to me on a rental camera that had used Panasonic tapes previously and I was using Sony tapes. To save the important footage, I had to have a dub made where a rental house used a high end panasonic deck which could playback both SD and HD tape and it solved it but I learned my lesson when I got the bill. Cheers, Jim.
 
AY-DVM80XJ are 80 min tapes, thinner than the standard 63 min tapes. It is most likely that your camera tape mechanism "does not like" them, so the problem you have happened during taping, not after. Did you play them on the same camera? If not, try to use the same camera. I doubt you could damage them using any source of magnetic field unless it was really close and very strong, like bulk demagnetizes specifically made for that purpose. On the side note, I had an instance of my cell phone next to my hotel room key in the shirt pocket. The room key was wiped out and did not open the room anymore. I made the same mistake one more time, different hotel, same result :-(
 
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