I certainly agree with what jrazz said, and would echo and perhaps clarify a few things he said. As jrazz is pointing out, a #1 consideration is what exactly does your friend want?

If he is not very computer savvy and just wants some video that he doesn't wish to mess with, a DVD camcorder may be just the thing.

If the maximum amount of editing he would do is simply to cut some parts of the video out and put it on a disc, he may still be ok. Depending on how he does it and with what software, he may or may not suffer what we call "generation loss" that results from recompressing MPG2. (The only example I know of for a program that splices MPG2 segments together without generation loss is called "Womble." I never used it but it's mentioned in this forum.)

If he gets more serious into it and wants to do some real editing (like color correction, pan/crop, applying other effects, audio fixes, etc.), then he would need to step up and purchase a new, different camcorder like a mini-DV camcorder that allows transfer of the video in DV format instead of MPG.

If your friend thinks he would make discs simultaneously in both NTSC and PAL format, a DVD camcorder is NOT good for this.

..also the mini-DVD disc's only hold 1/2 hour of video...

Have your friend spend an evening scouring www.camcorderinfo.com. There are lots of DVD camcorders, but as I recall only one of them gives a really nice image, comparable to miniDV tape. It's one of the Sony models. The rest of the DVD camcorders really leave much to be desired from a quality viewpoint.

As for the utility value, I think putting things on a DVD directly is a very nice idea. When I was a kid, my dad would spend $20 (that's 1960 money; probably comparable to $50+ today) for a 3-minute 8mm movie reel of the family vacation or such. He never had the interest or time to carefully edit the results, he just showed the film on our movie projector twice a year. The DVD camcorder would be useful for just such a situation.

In the event your friend wants to edit, just bring the video into Vegas or its little brother, and in a worst case convert it into DV before editing. No big deal.

I just got through writing a long letter to a friend about which low-end camcorder to buy. Here's the section on the DVD camcorders. My strong advice to him -- and to your friend -- is to stay away from these.
====================

MiniDisc camcorder. Lots of people like this format, because disc has
many obvious advantages over tape. The biggest advantage is instant access
to each scene. The downside is that recording time per disc is MUCH less
than with tape. The standard MiniDV tape holds one hour (which can be
extended to 90 minutes, with absolutely no picture degradation, using the
slower LP speed). By contrast, the MiniDisc camcorder takes only 10 minutes
at the highest resolution. The video is compressed much more heavily than
miniDV and Digital8 (which both use the identical compression algorithm and
therefore produce identically the same quality video), and therefore doesn't
look as good. Finally, the compression format used makes it much more
difficult to edit the video in your computer. I am not a big fan of this
format, and would only use it if you plan on taking short video clips that
you then want to view or send over the Internet, without editing.

Just today my daughter brought home a mini-DVD shot yesterday. Won't play on anything because it has not been finalized which has to be done in the camera which is now several hours away.

While reading the Sony manual it mentions that finalizing can take minutes to hours. Is this true? If so it would be a tad inconvenient.

Larry

I've used one of those beasties once. The proud owner was so very very pleased with his technological purchase that i didn't dare point out the pitfalls of using in the project he wanted to get done. We shot about 12 minutes of video and then i selected the finalize option. I didn't time it, but i had to have taken over 10 minutes. He had DVD-RAM discs and i still haven't been able to open them or play them in anything other than the camcorder itself. I've heard that Nero 7 has the ability to convert these .VRO files into regular MPEG-2 files. I'll have to try it out someday.

A timely question - a chance to rant.....

Received 5 mini DVD discs shot on a Panasonic DVD camcorder. The shooter wants to sent the files but not the discs to Prague where a group of young people will edit them.

Not knowing their capabilities, I decided to transfer the VOB files to an external HD and also to convert them to mov files as they have some unknown software running on a Mac G5. (probably imovie or an FCP version)

Problem 1 - when trying to copy the VOB files, 3 of the 5 discs show CRC errors, usually on the second VOB, so I can't copy all the VOBs. This happens on two different computer DVD drives.

Problem 2 - decided to put the mini DVDs in a set top player and copy the analog out through an A/D converter. Disc hangs at almost every scene change, which seems to be a chapter point - suspect that every stop/start of the record button creates a chapter point. This happens on one sony player, another does a little better.

Solution - I'm sending the VOB files that were good, the avi files that I've captured and the mov files that I will generate. Fortunately, the content is shot mostly in poor light, so it will not matter much on the analog capture. Hopefully they will be able to salvage enough to make an edited version. (I see that the Czech Republic is PAL - another issue.... good thing I'm using VEGAS.

What's wrong with DVD camcorders? Most everything!!!

I feel better now...

RalphM

(edit: - tried looking at the DVDs in the camcorder that recorded them - it can't play them as well as the set top players I've tried. Hangs up for minutes at a time. May be this unit, but definitely not ready for prime time...)

dibbkd - I wanted to take some video on a family trip to Disney World last year, and wanted to replace my servicable, but enormous, Sony TRV-310 (a Digital-8mm model). I was looking for a combination of size and image quality, but recognizing that for home movies I edit about 1/100th of what I shoot, I chose to go with a DVD-camcorder over MiniDV. I got the Sony DVD403, which at the time was the top of the line consumer model - costing about $825 last June.

The pros and cons of the format are very well known. The pros include ease of playback of uneditied video, size, and speed of access (you can just copy dvd to CPU rather than capture it in realtime). The cons are a degradation in quality and the 30 minute limit for recording.

Overall, a year later, I'm very happy with my purchase. Despite concerns of artifacting and poor quality of the MPEG2 format, I find the video I shoot with my DVD403 is just as clear after editing as any DV video shot with midrange camcorders. I was prepared to be disappointed viewing it on my 60" HDTV, but I found the image was very sharp and very evently coloured. I don't think I'd use it for a "professional" application, but for home movies or budget projects, it is certainly usable. The 30 minute limit is a bit of a pain, but Mini-DVDs are reasonably priced now if purchased online, and frankly, the ease of being able to pop out a DVD and throw it on the set top for the kids to enjoy outweight the inconvenience of replacing DVDs.

Make sure your friend understands there are certain tradeoffs, but I find that the bulk of the vociferous "Anti DVD" crowd are people who have never actually used both formats. I have, and for my purposes, it works great. I expect in a year or two, once we Blu-Ray or HD-DVD becomes the de facto standard (allowing a much greater capture capacity), this will become the defacto standard for consumer use.

Make sure your friend understands there are certain tradeoffs, but I find that the bulk of the vociferous "Anti DVD" crowd are people who have never actually used both formats.

=========================================================

We've certainly used both formats and I respectfully suggest that 90% of those posting here have also. In fact we bought TWO Sony DVD camcorders. We no longer have them.


What'd concern me even more is the longevity of those little disks. MiniDV tapes will last oh, 30 years at least, certainly the 15 hours of Video8 shot 20 years ago I just transferred looks much the same as the day it was shot, some seems to show signs of tape wear (it was very cheap tape to start with). Cannot say the same for a DVD with disk rot, they're just pretty much gone bye byes and that can happen after 5 to 10 years.

Also to the best of my knowledge there's no plans to use BluRay disks in consummer camcorders. The ones used in Sony's current XDCAM are large and expensive and come in a caddy and for good reasons.

Bob.

How do you initialize/finalize with a DVD camcorder riding on a boat? A plane? A car? Standing in a crowd of people? Walking? Elevator? Foul weather?

JJK

Yup, I think it's the Sony DVD403 that Camcorderinfo talks about. Again, different strokes for different folks, but I would not hesitate to shoot home video with that model, based on the review.

As for disk rot and such, I don't see any issues there. Many DVD vendors claim their media will be stable for many decades, which is more than I would expect from tape. One thing about burned DVD media, though: don't let sunlight get to the bottom of the disk, or the dye will bleach out in a matter of days, making the disk unreadable.

One other nice thing about that specific camera is that it uses a large CCD imager chip, and the low light performance is remarkably good when compared to most camcorders of any type.

Again, I don't know about all the other brands, but everything I've read about the DVD403 says that you simply shoot, finalize, and play, and the video looks very good.

riredale - I don't know if the DVD403 is the specific model he was referencing, but I know when I bought mine last year, it was the only DVD model to be highly rated by that site. If you decide the DVD format works for you, I feel confident saying the Sony top-end model is as good as youre going to get.

As for the longevity of media, I can personally testify that my experience with Mini-DV is that it is just as subject to corruption and bad reads as any other tape media. I would be shocked if it were any more reliable in 30 years than playing my old cassette tapes are now. As for mini-DVD, I at least like to immediately back up all tapes onto my backup drives. I've got a terabyte to spare, so it's no loss ... and copying the data can be done in seconds via Explorer ... just like copying data off any other form of optical media.

I completely acknowledge there are trade offs with the format, but I am looking at it from the standpoint of a home user who doesn't edit 95 % of their home movies. For that, the format is very appealing ... and what I'm saying is that if you are forced to edit, the compression alogorithm used by the Sony model, at least, is sufficiently tight that you can edit that video and it looks just as good as most consumer grade Mini-DV tapes I've seen.

Aren't there DVDs that are made specifically for archival purposes to have longer life? Or is that just marketing hype? Or are they not worth the additional cost (whatever that might be)?

With a mini-DV tape, I usually capture it once and I play it once or twice and that's about all the use it gets. Maybe that's paranoia or overkill, but I don't want the wear and tear on the camera or the tapes! So my mini-DVs are not getting stressed like the analog music cassettes that we used to buy before CDs came out. Any degradation would be just the physics and limitations of the materials.

I can personally testify that my experience with Mini-DV is that it is just as subject to corruption and bad reads as any other tape media. I would be shocked if it were any more reliable in 30 years than playing my old cassette tapes are now.

I do all manner of restoration, more or less as a living (although I don't always get paid). My experience with audio tape from the early 1950s through the present is that it does a remarkable job of holding the signal. I have had a few problems with some of the early, cheap VHS tapes from the late 1970s and early 1980s. I've had problems with DV tape from other people that was recorded on head-clogged cameras, but I have never once had a tape fail to play -- or play in a degraded manner -- that I had successfully played at an earlier time. However, I've only had five year's experience with the format, and that is not enough time to compare to the audio and videotape from other formats. It would be surprising, given all the other formats survival rate, if DV wasn't similarly well-behaved.

As for discs, while everyone I know personally who has a disc camcorder absolutely HATES the thing, I also find it hard to believe that longevity is likely to be any bigger problem there than with other disc formats. The only reflective circular media that I know for certain had a problem was one manufacturing facility that produced laserdiscs using bad glue to join the two sides. This produces "laser rot." Since CDs and DVDs, both the manufactured versions and recordable versions, use entirely different materials and manufacturing, I have never heard, read, or experienced anything that makes me believe these are likely to have a problem lasting for many, many decades. In fact, most scientific testing suggests that they should last as long as most other media, including film (I just transferred a 90-year old 16mm film yesterday and it looked just like I suspect it looked in 1915). There have been lots of reports of CDs and DVDs dying when left in the sun, but I can show you some prints that have been in the sun for a few days, where only one of the dyes is left. Very nice green and white print. And of course there are the 8-track cartridges left in the glove box in Phoenix in the summer that turned to goo ...

If you store these things sensibly, they will far outlast you.

This study is fairly extensive and there's a few more studies around. None of the studies give me any indication that normal burnt optical media is going to be around for very long.

If you use genuine archival grade media (i.e. gold and phthalocyanine) then with proper storage yes, the media is good for a lifetime or more. Finding anything that could access the media would be more of a challenge than anything else.

The good news is it does seem high grade media is available for DVD Handycams designed to address this very issue. One of the downsides of phthalocyanine is it's harder to burn than Azo however given the low write speeds of DVD Handycams that shouldn't be an issue.

Bob.

This study is fairly extensive and there's a few more studies around. None of the studies give me any indication that normal burnt optical media is going to be around for very long.

Bob, I think I read that study before -- maybe it was you that posted it. I'm not sure quite how to read it. They never actually try to make the connection between the accelerated aging and how those numbers would translate into actual aging if the media was stored in reasonably decent conditions.

For those that don't read the study, the discs were subjected to various cycles where the temperature was increased to between 60 and 90 degrees Celsius (i.e, near the boiling point of water), with the humidity between 70 and 90 percent. Some media started to breakdown within a few hours; other media held up for several hundred hours before degrading below the minimal spec for CDs (DVDs were also tested, but not as extensively). What would be interesting is to see what would be left of film stock or magnetic tape if subjected to similar conditions. I have certainly seen tape stretch at high heat, far less than these temperatures.

However, the test is certainly valid, because this is how you have to approximate what will happen over time, and attempt to get the aging to happen sooner. Nonetheless, I would like to see other attempts at aging, such as high-pressure, pure oxygen, with a fan to circulate the oxygen over the surface.

The study also tested the impact of high-intensity light. This I do not consider valid, because if you store ANY media in an area subject to bright light, pretty much everything will break down, and quickly. Since it is so simple to store media in a completely dark environment, light exposure should never enter into the equation.

What would be interesting is to find someone who really knows this stuff to answer the question as to what actually causes these dyes to break down. Is it osmosis of oxygen through the plastic that then attacks the dye? Or is it an interaction between the plastic and the dye? Or, even absent any interaction, does the dye simply somehow interact with itself and break down? It would be useful information because if the problem is mostly due to interaction with the atmosphere, it would be extremely easy to vacuum pack the disks (I have a nice little vacuum packager) or to fill a container containing the disks with inert gas.

Same thoughts have pretty much been through my head, what can we do to slow down the deterioration. We can only act if we know the failure modes and as you said no one seems to be saying much.
The effect of oxygen on an Al reflective layer is obvious enough but how does the 02 get to it? I guess gases can permeate through many solids and CDs are more at risk than DVDs as DVDs have the reflective layer fully encased.
As for the light test, well yes, easy enough to keep them in the dark however playing them involves shining a laser onto them. Does that mean anything? Don't know.

Also I think the view of things from an archivists point of view is different to the rest of us. It seems typically they keep an archive copy in very secure locations and from that makes copies that are available to the public. Also they regularly test their archives, create new copies etc.

For me the answer is pretty simple, I've not got an army of workers to do these things so for anything that goes to our national archives I put it on the same media that they use. It costs a lot more per disk, per job though the cost is very minor. I've certainly gained a few points for making the effort.

As for the longevity of tape. I think if not played modern ME tapes are very good although unlike old analogue tapes failures are way more dramatic. Then again I've had horrible problems with some UMatic tapes and some 2" stock did have major problems but hopefully the manufacturers have learnt.

Bob.

Thanks for all the replies guys, very helpful.

I wasn't sure if it was a decent question or not, but judging by the number of replies it looks like it's obviously something folks have already thought about.