Problems with my HV10 and HDV capture....
 

I have about had it with my HV10. It is a great little camera to shoot with, but it handles poorly as a deck for HDV.

I shoot with my new A1 and I thought this would make an excellent deck. Well either I got a lemon or it really isn't a good deck.

I can easily ingest DV, but when I try to capture HDV footage it loses time code quite frequently causing a break in my clips. It never really happens in the same place, so I can go back and capture a 'bridge' piece, but this really sucks.

When I ingest the same tape with my A1, I have not had a single problem.

At first I thought it was the long GOP structure of HDV - as stated in other posts - but now I am not sure.

Can anybody offer insight? Is this a lemon or a common issue with this camera?

I use Panasonic AY-DVM63MQ tapes only.

What program are your capturing with? Spec of your PC and most importantly are you capturing to a fast HD seperate to your O/S?
Also I assume you have disabled your A/V software.

To me it sounds like your PC / Hard Drive is struggling to cope.

I do not believe it is my computer. I use a new Intel iMac 2.0, 2GB Ram, 500GB 7200 rpm drive, FCP 5.1.2.

If it was my computer, it would chug on the projects I have loaded with my A1. The HDV loads just fine from the A1.

Anybody with an HV10 capturing HDV having this trouble? If not, I guess I will send it in for repair.

I've had absolutely no problems capturing HDV from the HV10 in my Edius Pro editing program. The computer has 1 gig of ram and is a dual core AMD.

Do you use the same firewire cable for both cameras/capture sessions?
I had some problems losing video on my DV captures while ago, and turned out to be flaky firewire cable.

I haven't had any trouble capturing on my 2.8GHz P4-HT WinXP box, w/ Ulead MSpro... not the fastest editing, and it won't show the live video in the preview window during capture, but it hasn't lost anything. (MSpro captures raw m2t file, no transcoding/intermediate codec, so that helps.)

Very strange that the XH-A1 captures fine, but not the HV10... would seem to imply your computer is OK.
You might try capturing on a friend's computer?
Also, you could try dubbing from the A1 to HV10 via firewire, and vice versa, if you have a 4pin-4pin cable.. that might help confirm the HV10's firewire is messed up.

Cody, try and see if iMovie (free with your iMac) will capture from the HV10, if it captures fine this may indicate a HV10-FCP problem.

I have no trouble capturing HDV to FCP and iMovie from my HV10 on a G4 (800mhz) a G5 (Dual 2ghz) and my girlfriends new iMac (don't know the spec but it is the new 24" screen version).

Good luck.

Pleased to hear that someone else is using Edius, just means I shouldn't run into problems when I get to play with my cam at Christmas. Out of interest what settings are you capturing in and what is disk space like. I have already hinted to my partner that I may need a new HD lol.

Yeah Jonathan, I've used Edius since it came out and really like it. I've got a 500 gig HD and I don't recall what that gives you in HDV. I still use Edius primarily for DV work when I'm doing video professionally. The HDV is still for fun. But you should have no problems with Edius in HDV.

FCP handles HDV like a champ as well. I am convinced it is my camera now. My A1 still has no issues, but the HV10 will drop time code about 4-5 times in an hour's capture.

FYI: HDV = 13GB hr (approx)

Hey Cody, we're exeriencing this problem as well, about 3 times or so per tape, this was on a tape running continuous time code (free run time of day) The only issue I've had with HV-10 and record run time code is everytime the camera stops a new clip is made, which is pretty much to be expected.

Sorry, Cody about your camera dropping codes as you import HDV, I use iMovie 6 on a G5 1.8 Gz with only 500 ram to an external LaCie 7200 rpm and I have not had any problems, sure it never does real time but once the buffer is complete all of my movie is there ready to edit.

I also think you are wrong in your HDV/Hr. of disc space.
The amount you quoted is for DV. As I understand it, HDV is something, close to 4x that of DV........ so you're looking at close to 38-50 GB of disc space per hr. of HDV. (discussions.info.apple.com/)
Thank You
Luis

My raw m2t files are around 31.55 mb for 10 seconds. That comes out to around 12gb for 1 hour. Footage was captured on a PC using Vegas 7 s/w.

Anybody else?
 

Interesting. Any idea why it does it?

Does anybody else have similar experiences?

Hmmm. Well I could be wrong, but that is how big my HDV QT files are. HDV takes up about the same space as DV about 12-13GB per hour. You might be thinking about DVCPRO HD or something like that.

I think this reference is specific to the issue of broken or dropped time codes and it may help you directly on understanding your problem.

"iMovie HD 6 and iDVD 6" by Jeff Carlson. Peachpit Press.©2006
Specifically Chapter 2, pages 20-21.

"If you were shooting with the camera (any camera) and started at zero on the tape, if at any point you stopped and rewound the tape to review some footage, you inadvertently broke the time code. If you continue to record after the review, the camera starts over at zero again.

It also discusses time code in FCP vs iMovie Time code.

Hope this helps.
Luis

Having problems with the HV-10 capture into FCP too. The camera is recognized and logs fine but drops TC on import. I am using a MacBook Pro 2.33 Duo core, 2gigs of ram and 7200 fire wire drive. I am using the HDV 1080 60i easy setup. The device control defaults to Sony HDV Firewire. Is this the problem? Any help would be appreciated.
Thanks, Mike

Sounds like this might be the first possible defect to be documented for the HV10
 

That makes three of us having trouble importing HDV into FCP 5.1.2 and having similar problems.

Sounds like either there is a bug, or we are three very unlucky HV10 owners. Anybody else?

Forgot to mention that it will capture directly into FCP using Capture Now. Problems with TC occur using Batch Capture. Any ideas?
Thanks, Mike

I found that if you don't give yourself several seconds between logged clips, the HV10 stutters and fails. Moving the points a few seconds fixed this on my end.

HV10 Issue tested....
 

I put my HV10 up against my A1 for capturing 3 tapes of Ambient footage (about 35 minutes each).

I can tell you hands down that the A1 never missed a beat, but the HV10 failed on every tape. Usually 3-5 times during a 'catpure now' the HV10 lost timecode and started a new clip. Usually with longer files. When repeated, the breaks occured at different places.

Now I am left to wonder if the tape transport in my HV10 is defective or is this tiny little camera not all that cracked up to be a deck.

Anybody have any thoughts on this?

Well I'm going to be using the HV10 with a MBP 2.33 myself so as soon as I get the HV I'll run some tests myself. You've got me a little worried as I've had problems with transports in cheap DV cams when trying to do batch captures over FW, especially times where there weren't too many frames between the end point of 1 clip and the start point of the next. There use to be a preroll adjustment but I don't remember if that actually affected capture control or just when laying back to tape.

Got the HV10 yesterday and did a little experimentation in FCP. I used the easy setup and my first few attempts to batch capture had numerous abortions. I changed the device preset from Sony HDV to firewire basic HDV and batch capture worked flawlessly. This was on a MBP 2.33.

Yeap, Firewire basic is the way to go.
Mike on post #16 of this thread, mentions that it defaults to Sony HDV (at least on the Mac), it should be changed to Firewire Basic.
I use FCExpress and had the same problem. I think Apple needs a software upgrade on BOTH programs for this camera.
Thanks Rich!!!
Luis

I have been using Firewire BASIC as well.

I also thought I'd mention that I have a FW800 Graid that I'm capturing to and the camera is daisy chained on to the FW400 port (along with some other drives). Maybe that's got nothing to do with the issues some of you guys are having though.

FCP doesn't seem as snappy working with HDV as it did with DVCPro HD but I kind of expected that.

I'm looking at some similar footage shot with an HVX200 (outdoors -both in 1080i) and I have to say the HV10's looks pretty good when compared. Sure the color isn't as good but the detail sure is.

I owned an HV10 for a weekend back in November along with an XH-A1. Using Cineform HDlink capture software, I could not capture a complete tape without all kinds of timecode problems. The tape had 1 big 55 minute clip on it with no breaks in it. However the camera would stop intermittently during capture. And I mean stop. The transport would shut down and I'd have to manually restart it. This was a tape recorded in the HV10. I also tried with an A1 recorded tape and it had the same issues.

I finally resorted to having to use the A1 to acquire the footage. This worked better but there was still a few clips that got broken up into different captures. But at least the camera didn't actually stop playing.

I sent both back and bought a used H1. FWIW I was not happy with the A1 ergonomics and design already....these capture issues only sealed the deal on sending both cameras back.

I hold out hope that getting another A1 or HV10 down the road will yield better results for me.

Peace!

Still no help.
 

I've been rabidly searching the internet for some answer to this problem of capturing to FCP 5.1.2 or iMovieHD 6.0.3 - NADA! I've tried all the above configurations - to no avail. I agree that maybe my camera is defective, too!

Here's the kicker! It captured PERFECTLY onto FCP 5.1.2 for the first several gigs! Weird, huh? Anyone who still cares about this issue and can help us few HV10 misfits, I'd be much obliged!

HV10 is a failure...
 

HV10 is a failure as far as using it as an HDV deck. It performs fine as an HDV camera and SD deck, but it consistantly fails as an HDV deck.

I would highly recommend anybody considering purchasing the HV10 as a deck think twice and prepare for major disappointment if they go ahead.

History!
 

Since I'm considering one of these cameras I would like some more definitive answers.

When the camera arrived, did you clean the heads with a cleaning tape?

What brands of tapes are you all using?

Has anyone sent their camera in for servicing? It's under warranty right? It does have a year like the rest of the Canon line?

If you have cleaned it, are you putting the bad tape back in, or retrying with new tape?

Does this seems to be an issue with certain software or just the camera itself?

How many of you are having this problem?

Anyone using PPro and CineForm and having problems?

Is anyone capturing without issue and if so with what?


Thanks in advance for your help.

Mike

When the camera arrived, did you clean the heads with a cleaning tape?
***Yes. Brand new cleaning tape.

What brands of tapes are you all using?
***Panasonic AMQ63 only

Has anyone sent their camera in for servicing? It's under warranty right? It does have a year like the rest of the Canon line?
***Still trying to acertain if it is defective or just cheap mechanics.

If you have cleaned it, are you putting the bad tape back in, or retrying with new tape?
***I have no 'bad' tapes. Read the other threads on this.

Does this seems to be an issue with certain software or just the camera itself?
***In my professional opinion, it is the camera.

How many of you are having this problem?
***I would like to know that also.

Is anyone capturing without issue and if so with what?
***My XH A1 has not ever dropped a single frame.

I hope this helps. I was really hoping this would meet my deck needs for HDV and Canon 'F', but I am very unhappy and just wanted to warn others of the unresolved issues. This camera is problematic.

Cheers!

Cody

Not at all true. I'm using Canopus' Edius Pro and haven't had any problems at all with the HV10 as a deck. I think it depends on the editing program you use. It appears that FCP has issues that other programs may not.

Mike, I have been capturing approx 4 hours from the HV10 without any issues so far! Note that I do not doing any batch capture (lots of start and stop), but straight capture from the camera to the NLE.

Technical data:
Cam: Canon HV10
Tape: Sony HDV 63min (PHDVM-63DM)
NLE: Avid Liquid 7.1
PC: Dell Dimension 9150, Dual 3.4 GHz, 4GB ram, Ati Radeon X1900 512MB, 1TB disk Raid 0

I have not used any tape cleaner yet, but I'm using the same tape stock ALL the time.

I have little doubt this is an issue with a given editing program and not the camera. It seems that Apple needs to develop a patch for this issue with FCP.

I would have to disagree with you that it is FCP, because I have had zero failures with my XH A1.

I will concede, however, that I may have a defective camera.

I've captured 1hr+30mins straight on MediaStudioPro8 (two sep tapes), winXP sp2, on a P4-HT 2.8GHz Dell (eg relatively slow for HD), and got no glitches/drops. This was again just a full capture, not batch/jump around.
MSPro8 uses HDV native but converts to MPG program stream instead of m2t TS, so is some small processing.

Is this the "real native" HD FCP, not the intermediate codec, correct?

I've run this little camera thru the "ringer" so to speak with FCP 5.1.2 on a MBP 2.33 over the last week. I've batch captured short clips, long clips, overlapping clips. I captured a 50+ minute long clip that I'm doing a time laspe with without so much as a hiccup. In fact I even use FW control in FCP to control the cam when I'm playing back to my video monitor because it's so much more responsive then the remote.

If there was an inherent flaw in FCP regarding this camera I think I would have seen it by now. Based on everyone's experiences I'd have to think the problems may be with the different units themselves or possibly with the connection to the computer. I capture to a Graid connected to the FW800 bus while the camera is on the FW400 bus. One thing that's really jumped out at me with HDV is how much more it stresses the system overall over footage from my HVX200.

Yup. This is why anyone must be careful before condemning an entire series of cameras. It seems most people are having great success with the HV10 in a variety of editing programs. I agree that it could be a bad unit or something else in the editing chain, but it's not the camera line itself.

Cody: You may indeed have a bad camera, but, remember that because FCP supports one camera, or dozens for that matter, doesn't mean it supports all of them. What version of FCP do use? Rich Dykmans uses FCP 5.1.2, and he said he has no problem.

To all, it may be an issue with Apple supporting the camera, as most that have had no issues seem to use a PC.

I hope that this problem gets straigtened out, but at least at this time I have a PC, and I hope that it will work.

Has anyone captured with PPro? I'm curious about that too.

I am not desparately worried about using my XLH1 for capture, because I think it will hold up well, for years! But, the size makes it take up more room, and when you are accustomed to using a small deck, it just seems huge. I would like a second camera too, so the HV10 seems the perfect solution. One last point on it as a deck, since it is an under $1,000 camera, a MACK 4 year warranty on it is very inexpensive, and would give me peace of mind. Sorry MACK, I do take care of my stuff and have never had to have a camera fixed yet, but I like the insurance if I use it to capture.

One last point to all you camera makers out there, Canon, Sony, JVC, PANY, a small simple HDV deck that we could use to capture on "WOULD SURE SELL GREAT RIGHT NOW!"

Still interested in hearing others stories.

Thanks in advance---Mike

I just batched about 30 minutes of footage - 14 clips and this time captured to a portable bus powered FW400 notebook drive (4200 rpm) with the camera daisy chained thru the drive. The drive already had 60 gigs of other stuff on it.

Again nary a hiccup. (I thought maybe the problem others are having might be due to throughput issues since I have, until this point, captured to a FW800 Graid.)

For me batch capturing over the years via FW with FCP has always been one of those "hold your breath and pray" scenarios when capturing from the different mini DV cameras I've owned (VX1000, PD150, TRV900, PC101 and DVX100). I've watched the process with trepidation as the computer would sometimes struggle to hit the correct frame during the process, they just never had that solid feel like a good DV deck. I have to say the transports in this camera seem as close to deck-like as any based on my experience so far. Canon is touting the HV10 as a deck solution for H1/A1/G1 owners and it appears (to me anyway) they have put transports worthy of that into this cam.