http://www.freehomepages.com/shawnyelle/edits/Dirty%20heads.mov
http://i63.photobucket.com/albums/h155/GL1man/dirtyheat.jpg

I've had frame dropouts a lot lately and yesterday this happened.
i figured it was dirty heads, but i just want to make sure,

i guess there too dirty for a regular heads cleaner?

I'd put more money on it being a very slightly crinkled tape. Dropouts come with very obvious grey bars across the picture, but what you show is something quite different.

I'd certailny use the head cleaning tape (10 secs tops) but was the tape new or were you recycling it for the umpteenth time? If you can afford to erase that shot you could try recording over it again just to check it out.

tom.

Do Tom's suggestion first. And try a "test" to see if this is improved. But other than that, and I have had this look too, meant I needed a session at the Canon Garage. Thankfully, at that time, both of mine were either under warranty OR covered by a service agreement, so no repair bill.

But looking at your footage, I would NOT be surprised if this doesn't repeat at some time. But then you again you MAY be fortunate with a tape clean. My further advice? Don't re-use tapes with this camera. If you want further proof do a search on this forum and stand WELL back!!

Happy Christmas . . .

Tom makes a good point, it is not a single head clog by the look of it, could well be a tape defect or imperfection.

I'm having a sortlike problem, so I decided to post it in the same thread.

A framegrab from the video:

http://img247.imageshack.us/img247/2788/videoheadstz8.jpg

I've always used the same tape brand (Fuji) and the camera is about 4 months old. I've shot about 6-7 full 60 mins mini-DV tapes with it so far.
Weird thing was: I shot about 30 mins of a tape without a single scratch, then I lost about 2-3 mins of footage going blank (blue screen on the playback), then I got the image back as seen in the screen above. This took about a minute or so, then the rest of the tape was normal again?!?

The first 30 mins were shot outside on a rainy day, but the camera was protected by plastic bag + umbrella. It was however the first time I shot in Frame Mode. But I suppose this can't cause the problem. I already went to the store to get a cleaning tape (since the manual shows an exact problem, p.139 PAL version, and says it's dirty heads) hoping this will diminish the problem.

Please persuade me I'm pulling the right ends here.

greetz,

Merlin

Your frame grab (I assume it was limited to a single frame) looks to me to be an 'over-write' condition more than a head clog problem. It's where you've rewound an already recorded tape and started recording again. The first swing of the tape drum only erases half of the last frame. All perfectly normanl.

tom.

Merlin: Did you have several seconds of the issue, which looks like part new video, part previously recorded video that is being recorded over (as discussed by Tom but more than a single frame). If so, that looks like a transient head clog while recording where one of the two heads was not able to erase and record on the tape. Probably caused by some dust or other particle floating around inside the camcorder tape mechanism, possibly a stray fragment form the tape.

The slightly abrasive nature of the tape cleared the clog over time.

Merlin: Did you have several seconds of the issue, which looks like part new video, part previously recorded video that is being recorded over (as discussed by Tom but more than a single frame). If so, that looks like a transient head clog while recording where one of the two heads was not able to erase and record on the tape. Probably caused by some dust or other particle floating around inside the camcorder tape mechanism, possibly a stray fragment form the tape.

The slightly abrasive nature of the tape cleared the clog over time.

I indeed had the problem about a minute or so, then suddenly saw some mosaic-artifacts and the problem dissappeared.

Today, I cleaned the deck using a sony brand cleaning tape (dry ofcourse) and went abroad again. I shot about 45 mins on a new tape and no sign of this 'banding' whatsoever. (I found a link calling it banding: http://www.adamwilt.com/pix-defects.html)

strange... I hope it doesn't occur again. I'll clean the deck more regularly using the tape in hopes to prevent.

Greetz,

Merlin