Capturing TV through camcorder?

[AarontheRipper]

I'm looking to get a camcorder, and right now it looks like it's going to be the Sony DCR-TRV33 (miniDV). It has A/V ins and outs, and so I was wondering if it would be possible to capture something off of the TV onto the DV of the camcorder and then to my computer?

Also, would I have to record it to DV, or could I simultaneously route it on to my computer without recording to DV.

Finally, has anyone done this and been successful (quality)? I'd like to not have to get a capture card and just use a firewire card to transfer the video. However, if the quality is crap doing it through the camcorder, then I'll probably just kick down the cash for a capture card. Thanks.

[turk690]

I have a similar DCRTRV22K. It has an A-to-D pass through mode so you can set its analogue inputs to your, say, VHS VCR outputs and the DV data is simultaneously avaliable via FireWire, onto your HDD. Premiere is used to capture and as the VHS plays, capturing is as easy as pie with the camcorder just sitting there in its E-to-E mode. To avoid any filesize problems (it's not easy to predict when to capture whatnot when a live TV show is involved) best that XP (with NTFS) is used so that even with big files (1hr of DV AVI=13GB) straight up there are no hassles. I see no quality issues and have never encountered any. I have always captured analogue this way, also having used a D8 DCRTRV120K, and a PAL Panasonic NVDS25. The FireWire card is ADSTech Pyro Platinum Pro (that comes bundled with a FULL version of Premiere 6.5); that bunch is $250 from Videoguys, and even if I add the $600 TRV22 to act as the A-to-D converter (in its pass through mode it is not being mechanically taxed because there is NO tape) the cumulative cost is lower than many other prosumer capture cards ALONE out there from Matrox, Pinnacle, & Canopus (and you still DON'T have a camcorder at that). As for real-time, with P4 2.4 GHz and above and all Premiere 6.5 IS capable of displaying your transitions and effects real-time (within certain limits).

[AarontheRipper]

Thanks for the help. That should save me quite a bit of cash since I have to get a camcorder anyway.

[spectroelectro]

Turk69- is dead right that the crucial issue in any digicam you get is ANALOG PASS-THROUGH. Some digicams have it, others don't. It's vital because otherwise you will put untold hours on your digicam and probably wear the heads out.
The cheapest digicam with analog pass-through AFAIK is the Canon ZR-60: available for < $400, yet has aV IN/OUt, analog pass-through, the whole nine yards. Here's a URL for a Canon ZR-60 at $353 (with rebate):
http://www.pricegrabber.com/search_getprod.php/masterid=697072/search=canon%2520ZR-60/...f0e087586b3049
You can find tons of similar prices at www.pricegrabber.com
The added advantage of using a digicam to capture video is that you run across troublesome VHS tapes (always hard to capture w/o dropped frames) you can pop a mini DV tape into the digicam and record the VHS tape to mini DV, then play it back into the capture via fireware, and voila! The dropped frames/jitter problems will be gone since all digicams nowadays feature built-in time base correctors.

[yg1968]

The dropped frames/jitter problems will be gone since all digicams nowadays feature built-in time base correctors.

Actually, most DV camcorders don't have time base correctors. But something else seems to be stabilizing the video because it does seem to improve bad video signals.

[indolikaa]

The DV passthru of my Sony Digital8 camcorder IS my capture card. I've been using it pretty solid for the last six weeks and I am very happy with the results. Everything from Satellite TV to very old VHS recordings to LaserDisc transfers.

I use WinDV to capture, Virtualdub to edit, TMPGEnc to convert and DVD-lab and/or VCDEasy to author.

.indolikaa.