What? Macrovision hitch on firewire transfer from mini-DV to DVD? Huh?

[knowhow]

So what's going on here? I'd like very much to back up my mini-DV tapes (of my own creation; most start out with color bars, maybe that's what throwing the process off) by transferring via firewire to my DVD recorder. But I get the stupid Macrovision (this is the copyright-protection technology; I'm learning as I'm going along) message, and the recording halts dead in its tracks. (The message adds, "paused for copy protection.")

I am able to make, however, analog (the RCA red-white-yellow) transfers without the Macrovision butting in. But I want to go with the higher firewire quality.

What the heck to do? I looked into the gizmos that are available on the Internet to override Macrovision, but they all seem to work with RCA/S-Video connections.

If there is no way to neutralize Macrovision, would another DVD recorder succeed where mine is failing? But then the question would be... which one?

My DVD recorder is the Protron PD-DVR 100, and my mini-DV camcorder is the Sony DCR-HC38. I'd be embarrassingly grateful for your thoughts on this matter, so some thanks already go out in advance.

[aedipuss]

most people here use the cam -> firewire -> computer method of making dvds from their cams. import to computer with windv, import DVavi files to editor, encode to mpeg-2, author, burn.

[edDV]

These are tapes you shot yourself?
Where did the color bar come from?

A DV cam will refuse to record from a DVD player source but I didn't know of the reverse happening. It could be your DVD recorder is in a confused state. Unplug and restart it.

[edDV]

BTW, here's a DV format color bar generated by Vegas. Load it to your DV timeline in any editor.


Set monitor black to the "pluge" ---------------------------------------------------------------------^
Match pluge to second bar. Bar three should be slightly brighter.
Set white to taste.

[knowhow]

Thank you, Aedipuss; I'm aware I can go through the computer process, but I have many tapes, and wanted to avoid the hassle of going through a 'middleman' (or middlemachine).

And thank you very much for your responses, edDV. To answer your question about the origin of the color bars, the cameras I used were the Canon XL-1 and the Sony TRV-900, and both had the capacity (if I remember correctly; these tapes were produced a few years back. In the case of the Canon, definitely) to generate color bars. I did indeed unplug the DVD recorder to reset, but such did not alleviate the unit's confusion.

I have had success in transferring a few other mini-DV tapes to the DVD recorder, but the bulk are not going through. There must be something in the tapes that is mucking up the works, and I don't believe the culprit is the color bars.

[edDV]

I'm out of ideas. None of these camcorders generate copy protection.

[2Bdecided]

Teletext? CGMS-A? WSS? Or maybe the copy protect bit in the DV stream itself is set? That may explain why it works via analogue (which would also include, if present, Macrovision, CGMS-A, CC data, WSS etc! and so should also be blocked)

Cheers,
David.

[knowhow]

Thank you for your response, edDV; and thank you, as well, David.

I'm so impressed, David, that you are familiar with these terms and processes, perhaps to a greater extent as you'd be unimpressed they went over my head. Let me apologize for my ignorance. Is there, however, anything practical that you (or others) might suggest? (Like, maybe, buying another DVD recorder... but the question would then be, which one.)

Or should I accept the reality that transferring my mini-DV tapes directly to DVDs, via a DVD recorder, be a lost cause? (That is, is there something on my tapes, the way the camcorders -- principally the XL-1 -- performed the recording, that will bring up the Macrovision, regardless of the DVD recorder?)

My gratitude to you.