DV cam to ??? (mpeg 4) software recomendation?

[spreadahead]

sorry if this is in the wrong forum. i'll move it if so..

I has been awhile since I've played w/ video, but the band I work with has been recording some songs and I'd like to put them on youtube etc..

I will be doing a proper capture when i have the time (i hope) but now I need a recommendation for a piece of software (freeware?)
that I can use to transfer these clips from my DV cam to my computer, with decent quality, and with smallest size of file possible

is mpeg 4 the right file type to be using for the small file size I'm looking for?

thanks in advance!
Tim

[daamon]

I need a recommendation for a piece of software (freeware?)
that I can use to transfer these clips from my DV cam to my computer, with decent quality, and with smallest size of file possible

This will have to be a two part process:

1) Because it's a DV cam, the footage on the tape will be using a DV codec. The process of getting from cam to PC is transferring, much like transferring a file from a CD to your hard-drive. It's a direct copy. Because of this, you'll end up with a DV AVI file.

Use WinDV for this. It's great and it's free.

In WinDV, if you want one large AVI file of everything on the tape, click "Config..." and set the "Discontinuity threshold (sec)" to 0 (zero) and the "Max AVI size" to 1,000,000 (no commas though).

If you want seperate files for each seperate clip taken, set the "Discontinuity threshold (sec)" to 1. Same "Max AVI size".

2) Then encode to a different codec of your choice. VirtualDub would be good for this. Also free.

is mpeg 4 the right file type to be using for the small file size I'm looking for?

I'm not sure, as I've never uploaded to YouTube. However, I do know that whatever format you upload, it gets converted to the format they want. So uploading a smaller file makes sense, so I guess Mpeg4 will be OK. Are there any guidelines on the YouTube site?

[spreadahead]

thank you for the info on winDV


just what i needed

[Baldrick]

WinDV and then convert to divx,xvid (mpeg4) with AutoGK or Dr.Divx. Use a low resolution like 320x240 and high video bitrate and it should look okey after you uploaded to youtube. But don't expect any good quality on youtube as they are not using the best converting methods for flash.