Digital technology is gradually replacing analog. And this is understandable: it is much more convenient to shoot a video and immediately transfer it to a computer. But if you have been filming for a long time, you probably have a lot of old cassettes, and some of them would be nice to digitize. This can be done using the same analog camera that you used to shoot movies. To do this, it must be connected to a computer. In addition, the analog camera can be used as a webcam.
It is necessary
- Camera
- A computer
- Video capture card
- Connecting wires
- A set of computer programs for capturing and processing images
Instructions
Step 1
Select the type of video card. It depends on what type of camcorder you have. The video card must match the card in connection type (composite connector, full TV signal, S-Video connector). If your camera has an output in the form of a full television high-frequency signal through any of the channels, then to capture and digitize such a signal, you will need not a video card, but a TV tuner. Typically, tuners already have software for compressing images into some common digital format.
Step 2
Most commonly, analog cameras have a composite video output (VHS) or S-Video. In this case, a video capture card with the necessary inputs and the corresponding software for it (drivers, utilities) are preinstalled on the computer. It should be noted that most of the capture cards with composite input do not support the audio signal, and the audio from the camera should be fed with a separate cable to the line-in of the sound card.
Step 3
If the video capture card software package includes any on-the-fly image compression program, then you should use it. Generally, all capture cards can handle the DV format. This is a virtually uncompressed video signal that takes up a lot of disk space. If you have difficulty with disk space, you can use a video editor with a capture and video compression function.
Step 4
Analog video cameras, except for the SVHS and Hi8 formats, have a low resolution, therefore, for digitizing, you can apply compression to the VCD format (MPEG1). To do this, it is enough to have a P2 600 MHz computer. To digitize the SVHS format, you can use a higher resolution, in which case you will need a P4 computer and at least 1 GB of RAM. The operating system can be Windows 98 (for P2) or Windows XP (for P4).
Step 5
There are usually two main analog picture formats: PAL or NTSC. This must be taken into account when capturing an image, and the parameters of these formats must be set both for the video capture card and for the editor program, if it is used simultaneously with the capture.
Step 6
If the video capture card software package includes any on-the-fly image compression program, then you should use it. Generally, all capture cards can handle the DV format. This is a virtually uncompressed video signal that takes up a lot of disk space. If you have difficulty with disk space, you can use a video editor with a capture and video compression function.
