Advice Please - Multitrack Recording and DV

dvdude wrote on 3/14/2004, 2:55 PM

I'm cross posting this in the AC-3 forum as it kinda applies to both:

I'm looking for some advice on how best to record multitrack audio and have it stay in sync with video recorded on Mini-DV. The goal is to capture multiple channels with a view to generating a DD 5.1 soundtrack in post. I figured this would be easy as both my camcorders output timecode over firewire during recording, so all I needed to find was a multitrack recorder that would use this timecode instead of it's internally generated one. Despite several extensive searches, I can't find a unit that will definitely take this timecode!! All the specs I've read seem to dance around the subject, with vague claims such as "The alesis hd24 can be synced to an external timecode via a BRC" and so forth. I'm sure some of you guys have already walked down this road??

TIA

Andy

Comments

TheHappyFriar wrote on 3/14/2004, 3:40 PM

Since you're recording digital on the camera and on your computer, you can just make a sync clap at the start if recording and at the end. It should all be good. Then it doesn't matter what the timecode is because you could sync them all up with the clap.

Don't forget to NOT record the .1 channel. :)

dvdude wrote on 3/14/2004, 5:47 PM

The problem with that approach is that the clocks aren't locked. Even with the two cameras from the same manufacturer, if I sync on a flash, they drift about 1 frame every two minutes. I could do it visually based on the waveforms, but that gets kinda tedious after a while.

I figured I could perhaps pick up a used ADAT and a sync module, for instance, a Tascam DA-88 with an SY-88 card. The SY-88 won't (as far as I can tell) accept a timecode over firewire and I don't know of any convertors that'll make this work.

PeterWright wrote on 3/14/2004, 6:29 PM

I really wouldn't worry about spending money on all those fancy sync machines. It's so easy in Vegas to synch tracks together. If it drifts one frame every two minutes, you can either use Ctrl Drag to stretch or squeeze, or, and this is a better way I think - if an audio track is one or more frame(s) out, split it at a quiet spot and move.

I've just done a 2 1/2 hour program with two totally different cameras and mini disc audio - six different DV tapes and a long audio track - took a couple of minutes and all three were synched.