Can't capture from HDV tape!

[frlane]

Hi All,

I shot a local business profile today, and when I got back and began to play back the tape, nothing is there for the first 7 minutes. I noticed that if I hit 'stop' during that forst 7 minutes, the timecode will appear. However, if I hit play, the timecode does not change until I hit 'stop' again. Also, I see no image, just a blue screen. Occasionally, an image from the shoot will appear, but then go back to blue.

Does anyone have any idea how I could recover this footage?

[minidv2dvd]

are you saying it won't play on the camera's lcd that shot the video?

sounds like the video heads got gummed up. try a head cleaning tape, but only as directed on the package.

it's quite possible the heads cleared up after the first 7 minutes by themselves and there is nothing on that part of the tape.

after you clean the heads, only use one brand/model of tape from now on. changing types of tape mixes dry lube with wet lube and makes a mess on the heads.

[frlane]

No, It's definitely something with that tape itself. In fact, during those first part of the tape, if I lift the tape guard, I can see that the mylar looks wrong (crinckled at the bottom).

I did do a cleaning just in case, but no luck. At about the seven minute mark, it plays and captures fine.

[minidv2dvd]

crinkled tape sections are cut out to make a repair splice, no one tries to "fix" crinkled tape. it didn't run through the guides and over the head properly, and there won't be any way to align the tape to the head if it could be "fixed".

[Snakebyte1]

If I understand that the tape is physically damaged, it indicates that it may not have spooled correctly on the camera's recording head for those first 7 minutes. If that's the case then its not that you lost the footage, but that the first 7 minutes was never recorded or only small portions were recorded.

If you do a preview/search scan forward or reverse, do you see the footage?

[frlane]

Occasionally I see an image, and the timecode seems to be ther. But for the most part, I just see the 'ol blue screen. Oddly, however, I was able to capture a couple minutes this morning that didn't work last night.....but not too much.

[Snakebyte1]

If you can't play it but see the footage when scanned, it would mean there is something there. Sadly, in this case it looks like most of the footage never made it to tape.

I hope you can reschedule a re-shoot.

[minidv2dvd]

back a few years before i got too lazy, i'd pre-spool every tape, full length fast foward/rewind to make sure they were all spooled at the correct tension. now.... not so often. i do pre-roll HDV longer than DVavi, for 30 seconds or so to allow the mpeg2 compression to even out.

each time you rewind over the crinkled section it may flatten out some. until the really weak spot breaks. it may get you some more recovered. you can try playing it in reverse also over the bad section.

you might use the tape cleaner again afterward when you're finished, to remove any pieces of magnetic material that come loose.

[frlane]

Fortunately, this is for a 60 second web spot, and I have over an hour of footage to choose from.