HPX170 Recorded to DV deck using DVCPRO setting.... not good

S

Stuart Ferrier

Member
I'm using a canon Elura 100 as my tape deck to record 480i/24pa DV footage from my HPX170 via 1394 firewire. This works fine for a two camera shoot where the second camera is a DVX100b. It had been working well with the HPX set to 480i REC MODE: DV. For some reason it seemed like a good idea to try DVCPRO. The Elura seemed to behave fine with the image on screen, timecode and record functions working. But when I try to play back, the elura gives an error message "Incorrect Tape Specification...". What's interesting is that the first frame of video does play back, and so does the timecode.

Does anyone have an idea whether these tapes could possibly be read by a DVCPRO deck? And if so what model can accept mini-DV tapes? Does the Panasonic AJ-CS455 Mini-DV to DVCPRO Cassette Adapter work? Is it even possible for the Elura to record DVCPRO? Of course, there's data on these tapes that I sorta would like to have.
 
So you're saying that you recorded DVCPRO onto the P2 cards? And are then trying to dub it over to the Elura?

How did you record anything -- you're saying you tried to record a live DVCPRO stream onto a DV camcorder? Hmmm... I don't know if those will play back or not. DVCPRO is a different tape standard, 18 micron instead of 10 micron, etc. But I believe there's an adapter that lets DVCPRO decks play back DV tapes, so indeed maybe that would work.
 
I guess just try the tapes in any other DV camcorder too. Canons can be a little finicky, but try a Panasonic, it's entirely possible that a Panasonic camera will handle whatever odd format you may have recorded... try playing 'em back on that DVX100B, for example. Might work.
 
I set up the camera to output to 1394 Device and recorded to the Canon Elura. It works perfectly in DV mode. Yeah, I don't know what I was thinking other than DVCPRO would be better, right? Of course not leaving well enough alone. I'm curious how different the codecs are, DV vs DVCPRO?

Yes, I already tried the DVX100b. It has more trouble than the Canon.

I'll have to try and find a DVCPRO deck and adapter to see if this will work.

Actually, I'm wondering if anyone reading this has a DVCPRO deck, can either duplicate the setup or possibly I can send the tapes to try?
 
DV vs DVCPRO, in the USA, are identical (codec-wise). There are some different flags in the data stream that identify it as DVCPRO.

DV vs DVCPRO, in Europe, is 4:1:1 vs. 4:2:0. Big advantage when shooting interlaced, not so much when shooting progressive.
 
Very interesting! I once tried a similar setup, using a cheap Panasonic as the recording device, and it wouldn't recognize the DVCPro stream... no image in the camera until I switched the HVX into DV....
 
The whole reason I ended up here is because I'm waiting for my two 32GB "E" P2 cards from B&H. I thought they'd be shipping by now. Then I would've had enough time on the cards for a 2-hr performance. I'm OK on the gig though because the real shoot is next Thursday, and I was just getting some extra shots to add another camera angle to the final edit.

I'm glad to hear that the only difference in codec are some flags. I think I might have a chance of recovering the files.
 
OK, so to follow up on this one, I did take the tapes into a studio who have a large selection of decks that we could try. The tapes did not play in a few of them, but finally did play in a DVCPRO deck using a tape adapter. I didn't catch the model number since I was dealing with the front desk person. Of course I neglected to inform them that I had shot in 24pa, so after ingesting the tapes into FCP I then opened the files in Cinema tools to remove the pulldown (After some playing with the settings I was finally successful)
 
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