How do you view the dvdcamcorder content in a PC?

Answer 1

DVD camcorders present a difficult situation for the consumer. The product is marketed towards consumers who want to view the recorded DVD on a home DVD player. Editing DVD camcorder video is not the intent of the manufacturers, despite the growing popularity of home video editing. A mini-DV tape based camcorder records video to the DV format, or codec. DV is the standard video format used in standard definition home video. DVCAM and DVCPRO are the professional versions of DV. All formats are recorded to digital video tape, although newer cameras can record to flash media. To edit DV, the video is transferred to a computer via IEE-1394, also known as firewire or in Sony nomenclature, i-Link. The resulting file on a computer is a DV file - AVI on a PC or Quicktime on a Macintosh, and is a direct copy of the video on the tape. Editing DV using any of a variety of software is straighforward. DVD camcorders on the other hand record video directly to mini-DVD discs, using the standard DVD video format, MPEG-2. MPEG-2 video is how DVD movies are encoded. MPEG-2 is also used by satellite broadcasting and digital cable. MPEG-2 is, however, a delivery format in this case. Thus, DVD MPEG-2 is not designed to be edited. MPEG-2 video can indeed be edited. If the DVD has a Video TS folder, this contains your recorded video clips. Copy the clips to your computer's hard drive, and change the .VOB extension to .mpg. Some DVD camcorders come with proprietary video editing software. Newer video editing software such as Adobe Premiere, Final Cut Pro, iMovie and Vegas can edit MPEG-2 video, however it requires a faster computer to accomplish this. The reason is that MPEG-2 uses a long GOP structure. This confusing term means that there are a lot of frames of partial data between frames with complete data. In other words, when you watch a DVD movie or a camcorder DVD in real-time, the player is able to create smooth playback based upon the available data. However to edit this format of video, each individual frame needs to be created on the fly from available data, this a faster computer processor and more RAM is required for smooth playback and accurate editing. In addition, the amount of image compression used in DVD MPEG-2, that is, the amount of data which is discarded in order to fit more video on a DVD disc, is higher than digital video tape. In other words, a 1 hour digital videotape includes a more accurate representation of the recorded images than a 1 hour camcorder DVD. While the video on a camcorder DVD may in fact look very good, it is a playback format. Professionals use digital video tape for a very good reason - it is designed for editing. DVD MPEG-2, while it can be edited, is not a professional approach to video production.