DVCam PAL to NTSC DVD Transfers - Can it be done ?

[Richard Alvarez]

Here's the situation. A friend has twenty or so DVCam tapes she shot in Africa - She THINKS they are PAL - I'll know when I get them this weekend.

She wants some straight dubs to NTSC DVD's so she can show them to some people.

I have a Sony DSR11, so I can play the DVCam PAL tapes, no problem. I can import them into my AvidXpress. No problem. I can send them to Sorneson and have IT compress them as Mpeg2 NTSC and burn to disc... No problem. So I have ONE workable solution. (At least I think so, haven't done it yet)

I am ALSO looking into a second possible solution. Since all she wants is straight dubs, no editing. Can I output from the DSR 11 straight into a DVD RECORDER (I'm looking at the Sony RDR-GX330) and have it record in NTSC format??? IF so, would it be via firewire or s-video?

I realize the DSR 11 is going to be outputting a PAL signal while playing the PAL tapes... I'm just wondering if the SONY recorder (or some other model someone knows about???) Will convert in the recording process? The research I've done online doesn't really say one way or another.

Anyone have any experience with this workflow?

Thanks

[Matt Schulze]

I don't think it can be done, your first route, importing the PAL into some NLE and then converting it to NTSC is a surefire way of getting the job done. I don't think that standalone DVD recorders convert video formats on the fly. I know you are trying to save time and money but I think you will have to go through all the steps.
Matt

[Boyd Ostroff]

I haven't seen a DVD recorder that will do this, but I haven't looked for one either :-) I know that my Sony RDR-GX7 won't do it. If you send it PAL over firewire you just get an out of sync mess on the screen (I tried last year when doing a PAL project).

However, we have a dual format VHS VCR at work which can convert on the fly; have used it to dub PAL VHS tapes when Euorpean companies sometimes send. So perhaps someone is making a DVD version of the same kind of thing? I think you can also buy a box which would do the conversion in hardware, and use the analog out from your deck to feed through it to the DVD recorder.

[Richard Alvarez]

Yeah, I'm thinking I'm going to have to go through Avid and Sorenson. I do have a Canopus ADVC100 somewhere... maybe that'll do the trick via analogue... let me go dig it up.

[Derek Prestegard]

PAL -> NTSC is tricky. It can be done.

Generally the best way is to slow down the footage from 25fps to 24fps (film speed).

Then you can apply 3:2 pulldown to losslessly convert 24 to 29.97.

Not sure about the specifics. I'm sure AviSynth can do it, but it's easier said than done.

Read up on forum.doom9.org for more information :)

-Derek Prestegard

[Richard Alvarez]

DVFIlm from Atlantis does it, quite well. Only problem is it does it at a 10 to 1 transfer ratio. So with 15 one hour tapes, it would be 150 hours to transcode, and then anothe fifteen or so to burn. SO I'm going with a hardware solution.

Thanks team.

[Derek Prestegard]

To quote Didee from doom9:

"Dedicated processing takes time"

If you want good results, you've gotta wait. The hardware box will probably get it done, but with only decent quality, and costing a lot more :)

Of course, sometimes its gotta work RIGHT NOW, and when it does, hardware all the way!

-Derek

[Sharyn Ferrick]

It will be far far cheaper to just get a dvd pal player that will convert the output to ntsc. There are lots of them around, and they are under 75 dollars each.
The other thing you can do is to play the dvd's on a pc with tv out,
this will take the screen image and re scale it
Sharyn