DVD Firewire output on a PC query

[Trust_No_1]

Does anyone know if it is possible to send the video signal from a DVD playing on my PC to the firewire port?

The reason I am asking is because I want to do my own editing of some DVD movies and I want the best possible quality. If I can get the video data from the firewire port I can connect my miniDV camcorder and record onto miniDV tape. Then all I need to do is capture back into my PC and I can edit the captured footage.

I know that I can already get SVideo output by connecting my DVD player to my camcorder but this is analog - even though it's at a very high quality. This works fine but I was wondering if I could stay in the digital realm.

Any thoughts?

[Karate Media]

How much quality would you lose if you used an app such as Smart Ripper to create m2v files from the DVD, and then edited those files? That way the footage never even has to leave the computer (in a sense)

I have done this in Premiere 6.5, and from what I've read in the forums, TMPGEnc will also edit mpg2 files (I think, although I don't know if it accepts the m2v files that Smart Rippper creates). I would think that mpg2 video captured as DV .avi via a camcorder wouldn't be that much better than ripped m2v files converted into DV .avi within an application, so you would also have the option to convert to a DV format for editing that might be just as good as the DV format you are thinking of capturing via the camcorder.

In my situation, I was editing DVD footage that was headed for VHS, so I wasn't as concerned about keeping the absolute best quality, but you may want to try this approach before you start stringing wires and creating a Rube Goldberg-esque monstrosity.

Then again, after all that wind, I could be wrong about the quality of the final video, so it's just my 2 cents...