Best Process for VHS into FCP

J

jrod81

Veteran
Hey guys,
I have about 40 VHS tapes that my dad wants me to put onto DVDs for him. I was thinking it might be a good way to make a bit of money on the side too and offer that service locally to people. Could someone tell me the easiest process to do this? What unit should I buy that allows VHS to be controlled by FCP? I have FCP 7 with a MacBook Pro i7.
Also I have some cassette tapes that he wants on CD... any suggestions on that too.
thanks
jared
 
what's the budget, and how much control do you want over the vhs. don't you just want to capture the footage digitally, and then play with it. (you don't really need a vhs deck or anything similar)

if you already have some kind of relatively new computer that you use with fcp, you could look into something from blackmagic-design.com + a regular vhs player (maybe wipe/clean the head every now and again).

some solutions would convert straight to h264, and it would not require any more additional cost other than a regular computer and the device that does the conversion.

other devices may require faster computer and really fast hard-drives (ssds or raid setup)
 
you could use something like a digital recorder if you already own or planing on owning a ki pro mini or a similar recorder, it has hmdi in, but probably you can't get a hdmi out vhs player.

so whatever the vhs player can signal out to hdmi converter, to a digital recorder.

and you can use the digital recorder later in your film/tv kit.

not sure how much money your planning to get out of it, doesn't seem to be a very profitable plan.
 
I have a Sony VRD-MC6 that does a great job with this sort of thing. You can hook up anything with composite hookups and it looks better than it has a right to. I used it a few times out of my DSR-300a over BNC to composite to do dailies that were recorded in real time and they always looked great. I even patched it and burn AVCHD files onto a DVD now to watch stuff that I shot on my A33.
 
If you're looking at pretty much a straight transfer without adding effects or transitions, I'd check out the Elgato EyeTV HD for hooking up a VHS deck and converting to H.264. It includes a simple editing utility. Then use Toast to burn the DVDs.

But the EyeTV HD does a lot more - encoding VHS tapes is just one of the features. It's also a pretty slick full-featured DVR which you can connect to a cable box or other DVR like a Tivo for streaming live TV to your Mac or recording it. Plus it can simultaneously encode versions for the iPhone and the iPad. So you could most likely get use out of it when you weren't using it for VHS tape transfer. I'm using it to watch live HD TV on my iPad and the image quality is top-notch with a rock-solid frame rate.

http://www.elgato.com/elgato/na/mainmenu/products/EyeTV-HD/product1.en.html

http://www.amazon.com/Elgato-EyeTV-...YTBU/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1307791613&sr=8-1
 
kgimedia said:
Almost any DV camera will allow you to do A/D conversion.
Click to expand...

Agree with this suggestion. You want an easy (and inexpensive) way to do a transfer, and for the footage to still look good. Get a new or used DV camera. Plug the camera's A/V cable into the "out" composite connection on the back of a decent VCR. Then set the camera on AV-DV in VTR mode, set FCP with DV NTSC, then in the log and capture window, set device control to "non-controllable device", otherwise FCP will try to control the camera in VTR mode when you capture. I always use my little DV camera as a deck for A/D transfers and it works every time.
 
Personally, we've been using a Pyro A/V Link by ADS Tech for over 5 years now, and it works great. Set FCP to capture from non-controllable device, to DV-NTSC, you're set.
 
BenB said:
Personally, we've been using a Pyro A/V Link by ADS Tech for over 5 years now, and it works great. Set FCP to capture from non-controllable device, to DV-NTSC, you're set.
Click to expand...


I too also use a Pyro A/V.
 
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