Output to DV Tape

After you've completed your project, you should output to DV tape to create an archival copy of the finished video or to dub your video to other formats such as VHS or Hi8. Outputting to tape requires the same hardware setup as video capture: connect your camcorder to your computer and turn it to VCR mode. From there, locate the appropriate menu command ("Output to Tape" or "Print to Tape") and follow the onscreen directions. A typical example is shown in Figure 7.7, a screen from Microsoft's Movie Maker 2.

Figure 7.7. Typically, writing to DV tape is simple; here's the one-step Wizard from Movie Maker 2.

Under the hood, programs handle the write-to-tape function in different ways. Some programs use the files you originally captured or imported into the program as the starting point, and render separate "temporary" files for each effect added to your production. For example, if you added a transition between two clips on the timeline, the editor would render that transition into a temporary DV file on your hard disk.

After rendering all necessary temporary files, the program will output the entire production to the camera, reading from both the original captured files and the newly created temporary files. Other programs render a completely new DV file containing the entire project from start to finish.

Either way, producing these files can be time-consuming, easily an hour or more for every hour of video in your project. After rendering, the editor starts writing to tape in real time, so an hour of video would take an hour to write.

Writing to tape is a demanding process; if the video editor can't retrieve the necessary data from your hard disk, it will stop and display an error message. For this reason, don't store your temporary files on a network drive, and don't use your computer for other tasks while writing to tape.

Once you've finished writing to tape, you can delete all the temporary files to restore disk space, but you'll likely have to find and delete the files manually, since few programs have a function that does this on command. When you write to tape, you overwrite any previous content on the DV tape, so check the tape's contents before starting the process.