File Formats

[Dan K]

I am just starting to capture video to edit. I have captured about 30 hours of MiniDV tapes so far, from years of family events, All the video is on my PC as .AVI files. Each tape is more than a DVD can hold, and I don't need all the video on DVD anyway. A couple clips I have published to .WMV files for viewing on my PC. Do I need to save the original .AVI files as well since these files are hard disk hogs? Will I be able to burn DVDs from the .WMV files??? My assumption is that the tapes will at some point degrade so I want to make sure I have video archived in a format that allows me to do other things with it when the tapes are gone.
Thx,
Dan

[filmboss80]

No, no, no! Avoid wmv like the plague. It will compress your video to ugliness. Stay in the DV-AVI realm, and then encode directly to mpeg2 for DVD using one of the programs listed here:

https://www.videohelp.com/tools/sections/video-encoders-mpg-dvd

ConvertXtoDVD may be your easiest solution.

And NEVER erase your original recordings. MiniDV tapes tend to last much longer than harddrives and DVD-R discs.