None.

A drop in quality and no timecode. Apart from that it's al you need to do is make sure you haven't got the DV controls within Vidcap, let the VHS roll and hit capture within VidCap.

He is actually converting DV>VHS tape and sending you the VHS tape? Wow . .that's a new one on me. Maybe he's scared of loosing the masters. In which have the DV copied to DV and have the DV sent to you. Digital to Digital can't be any no quality drop?

Interesting -

Grazie

Maybe his Pannie can't capture to tape anymore? - Strange. ..

Grazie

Thanks for the input! What I found out is the speaker will be using
a lapel mic and the camera man does not know how to
capture audio from his mixer into his DV Camcorder. So, he's
using a VCR to record both audio and video.

I'm not a camera person, I edit. But this sounds strange to me!

Thanks!

Good Lord Almighty. I would hope that this "camera man" is a nice enough volunteer who is not getting paid for his services.

There are several ways to capture audio, even if you had to sync it to video in post that would be preferable to going anywhere near VHS during the shoot.

<edit> to put a finer point on it, first look for an aux input on the camera, one that would accept mic or line. Coming out of a mixer you probably want line. If you don't have that, you could record the audio to a separate recorder such as a minidisc, Edirol, iRiver, etc. and sync it up in Vegas.

I guess you've figured out that using VHS is going to give some issues quality wise but if all the guy has is a MiniDV camcorder then his choices might not be entirely dumb.
After all VHS tapes can run for 3 hours and the inputs to the VCR are line level and they do have AGC (shudder). So with a little bit of luck what'll get recorded will be not so good but fairly disaster proof.
The alternative would be for him to use a DVCAM deck like the DSR-11, that'll give you 4.5 hours record time in DV and I doubt anyone will talk non stop for that long.

From my experience when you get a client that seems to want to do something really dumb don't try too hard to talk them out of it. If you succeed and it all goes south it's on your head. If you let them do it their way and it goes south you come up smelling of roses.

Bob.

Tell him to record on both: use the camcorder tape for video, with the audio from the on-camera mic as a guide track. Use audio from the VHS tape and sync it up on the timeline, then mute the audio from the camcorder tape.

If the camcorder has only a mic-level input, you might be able to find a line level to mic level adapter at radio shack or some other electronics store. It goes from an RCA connector to a male 1/8" mini and drops the audio level from line level (-10db) to mic level (about -50db) so the audio won't be distorted.

I've used mine plenty of times when shooting event videos

http://www.radioshack.com/product/index.jsp?productId=2103858&cp=2032058&pg=19&f=Taxonomy%2FRSK%2F2032058&categoryId=2032058&kwCatId=2032058&kw=adapter&parentPage=search

$4.99

I would pass on this job. If they can't do it right then they shouldn't do it at all. Just not worth all the BS.
Some times you just have to say noway!!

Terry

The Panny model is not mentioned, it may be an older VHS camcorder of prosumer quality. I walked into a meeting the other day where the committee had hired a camera to record the speeches.
It looked very impressive sitting ther on its tripod. No one had a clue how to work it so 'muggins' volunteered with about two minutes to start time to 'have a go'. Converted to digital the footage was really quite good, better than a digi camcorder in the available light.
Incidently the battery went flat about two minutes from the end of the main speech, I grabbed my Kodak still cam and took movies. given that the whole thing was just to be a farewell momento for the speaker the Kodak saved the day. The audio was acceptable and the pics ok and the panny battery recovered eneough to get the vote of thanks.