Which format to capture in ?

[BeachNut]

I'm using a firewire card to capture DV and wondered which format I should save the captured video in before I start to edit it. Eventually it will go to DVD but does it make a difference (quality) if I save the files as .avi or .mpeg straight after capture ? Thanks.

[vettesea]

I have been advised in the past to capture in avi format prior to editing. The downside to this is the enormous file size however the quality is very good. I have lost a little quality in latter stages when converting to MPEG2 using TMPGEnc, which I am currently working on resolving, however overall it is very good.

[FT Shark]

You should capture to AVI if you plan on doing any extensive editing. If all you will be doing is cutting and joining then capturing to mpeg should be fine. Be aware that frames may be lost during real-time capture to mpeg; it all depends on your computer. Also, encoding with a program such as TMPGEnc or CCE should create better quality mpeg's that real-time mpeg capture. It all depends on what you want speed or high quality.

[2man]

in DV "backup2 by firewire you don´t capture just copy the file in DV tape to HD
the quality always the same and the format of file.AVI is type DV-1 or
DV-2
you only have to capture if your source is analog or your are using an analog method
if then you encode for VCD/SVCD then you will lose quality so
try to encode to DVD format or XSVCD (CQ-VBR at 4000kbps) to get good quality.