OT: Emergency! Corrupt tape???

Patryk Rebisz wrote on 4/2/2009, 7:24 PM
I was on a paid shoot where we ended up using my Canon HV20 where we shot HDV 24p (inside 60i). During the shoot we previewed the footage a few times for the performance and all was fine. Now at home i put one of the tapes inside the camera and when i press play it just shows the blue screen with time-code not moving... But when i press fast forward i see the pixelated verison (as it usually does when fast forwarding) of the scene moving. So on one hand the footage seems to be there but i can't play it. Some tapes play just fine, some exhibit this behavior.

Anyone experienced it before? And if so what's the remedy?

Comments

FrigidNDEditing wrote on 4/2/2009, 7:29 PM
if you mean that the camera itself is showing a blue screen, I dunno, if you mean the built in vegas capture tool, i had this problem with a different camera not long ago, and the solution was to start it playing, then tell it to reconnect, and then you can capture problem free.

no clue what caused it, but it was very frustrating till I figured that out, should have posted here.

Dave
Patryk Rebisz wrote on 4/2/2009, 8:13 PM
NO, it's inside the camera...
FrigidNDEditing wrote on 4/2/2009, 8:15 PM
Head cleaner tape is best suggestion then, or try a different deck.

Dave
corug7 wrote on 4/2/2009, 8:49 PM
Definately sounds like it could be a dirty head, and I echo Dave's suggestions. Sounds very unlikely that it is the tape itself.
daryl wrote on 4/3/2009, 7:42 AM
You might try fast forwarding to the end then rewind, sometimes the tape path gets out of whack. FF/REW has saved me several times.
John_Cline wrote on 4/3/2009, 11:20 AM
I had the exact same thing happen to me on a four-camera, live HDV shoot a couple of years ago. I tried playing the tape in multiple cameras and none of them could play it back. It was particularly frustrating because, like you, I could fast search the tape and see that the image was there, but I just couldn't play it at normal speed on anything. The tapes that this particular camera recorded before and after this one tape were fine. I never did get it to play.
Patryk Rebisz wrote on 4/3/2009, 2:34 PM
This is very confusing. A tape that was not playing yesterday plays fine today but a tape that was fine yesterday is messed up today.
Jeff9329 wrote on 4/6/2009, 11:09 AM
Pat:

Did you try & play back the tape in another camera?

If so, you most likely wiped out some metadata and the tape is done for.

That's what it sounds like.

Jeff
BRC wrote on 4/6/2009, 11:33 AM
Just a thought but were you recording in HD or SD?

If the former have you checked that the camera your are playing back from is set to SD output - or the other way round if shot in SD are you now playing back in HD?

This has happened to me on occasion and simply changing the out put to the correct format has resolved the matter.
Patryk Rebisz wrote on 4/6/2009, 8:52 PM
Went through every permutation possible.

Tried to play the tape in many different Canon camera - incuding some high-end one - nothing.

Tried to record some footage on the defective tape and play it back to see if the tape is OK. Recorded and played it back no problem.

At this moment we are looking at some kind of data recovery service, as to re-shoot it wold cost us about $4000.

At the same time not knowing what caused the problem makes me very scary of bringing the camera to the next shoot.
GlennChan wrote on 4/6/2009, 11:50 PM
You might try finding a post house with a high end HDV deck and maybe it will be able to play it back???
e.g. http://www.zotzdigital.com/item.php?pid=1838&cid=437
HVR-1500 That might be the highest end model.

2- To state the obvious... you tried using the camera that shot the tape right?
Spot|DSE wrote on 4/7/2009, 12:22 AM
Patryk, try to get your hands on an M35 U. If you can't, let me know...
This deck plays almost anything.
Jeff9329 wrote on 4/7/2009, 9:52 AM
Pat:

I see you tried to play the tape back on "many" different cameras.

That is clearly the problem.

That causes a multitude of problems with the tape including metadata loss and tape rolling.

Lots of cameras are compatable for playback, but when you hit an incompatable one, the tape is destroyed giving the exact results you describe.

I also learned this lesson the hard way on a wedding shoot. Totally lost the wedding.
Patryk Rebisz wrote on 4/7/2009, 10:18 AM
Well, we played it on Canon HV20 (the one that recorded the tape), Canon HV30 from a friend, Canon XH G1 and Canin XL H1. Obvious we played only small portion and when found out the the cams are not playing the footage we popped the tape out.

We'll try Spots suggestion on the deck before sending the tapes out to data recovery facility.


bakerja wrote on 4/7/2009, 10:51 AM
If you use different brands of mini-dv tape, head clogs are more likely. Some brands use a dry lubricant, others a wet lubricant. One is not necessarily better than the other, but when mixed, the result is like glue that clogs heads easily. I used several different tape brands in my first minidv machine and had head clogs routinely. Then I found out about this phenomenon and use SONY tape exclusively (because you can find SONY tape everywhere) and have not had a problem since. I keep and old minidv camera around when I get a clients tape that is not sony and use it for digitizing.
teaktart wrote on 4/7/2009, 12:55 PM
I've had my Canon HV10 in the repair shop twice when it all of a sudden stopped playback function. It would record just fine, and thankfully I could play back the tape in another camera for capture.

The repair report claimed 'dirty heads' which is questionable since I am very careful with my cameras. But when it refused to play back after only 4 tapes - I sent it back to the repair facility and got it returned with the same "dirty heads" claim.

Several months later and maybe another 4-5 tapes run through it, it happened for a third time. I tried the 'reset' button, no help. There was a flash of a code on the screen claiming 'dirty heads' so I ran my tape cleaning tape in the 'record' position for 10 sec. and dang if that didn't bring it back to functioning in playback mode.
I think something is haywire inside and if this is the solution I'm glad its a cheap solution although at this point I don't much trust the camera anymore....even though I've used the hell out of it and stuck with only one tape brand.

Eileen
richard-amirault wrote on 4/7/2009, 7:15 PM
Some brands use a dry lubricant, others a wet lubricant. One is not necessarily better than the other, but when mixed, the result is like glue that clogs heads easily. I used several different tape brands in my first minidv machine and had head clogs routinely. Then I found out about this phenomenon and use SONY tape exclusively

When was this? It's my understanding that this was true .. in the past .. but is no longer an issue with current tapes.
Jeff9329 wrote on 4/8/2009, 7:52 AM
Will your insurance cover the cost of re-shooting?

I would also suggest going tapeless.
Patryk Rebisz wrote on 4/8/2009, 6:04 PM
Going with one of the high end decks mentioned above didn't help...
mountainman wrote on 4/8/2009, 8:34 PM
If I recall correctly, it sounds like a clogged record head. I think most cameras are still helical scan. Info is laid down diagonally on the tape by the rotating head. If one head is clogged only every other scan is laid to tape. When you fast forward, the playback head is only seeing every other stripe of information, thus playback. Hate to say it but I think the tape may be useless. Perhaps a recovery service can help, not sure about that. JM
bakerja wrote on 4/9/2009, 8:19 AM
"When was this? It's my understanding that this was true .. in the past .. but is no longer an issue with current tapes. "

Brighterside, I had not heard anything to the contrary. If tape manufacturers have decided on a "standard", that sure would be cool but that fact is still under debate. Here's what wikipedia says about it:

There is controversy over whether or not using tapes from different manufacturers can lead to dropouts.[9][10][11] The problem theoretically occurs when incompatible lubricants on tapes of different types combine to become tacky and deposit on tape heads. This problem was supposedly fixed in 1997 when manufacturers reformulated their lubricants, but users still report problems several years later. Much of the evidence relating to this issue is anecdotal or hearsay. In one case, a representative of a manufacturer (unintentionally) provided incorrect information about their tape products, stating that one of their tape lines used "wet" lubricant instead of "dry" lubricant.[12] The issue is complicated by OEM arrangements: a single manufacturer may make tape for several different brands, and a brand may switch manufacturers.

It is unclear whether or not this issue is still relevant, but as a general rule many DV experts recommend sticking with one brand of tape.