Panasonic MiniDV - Firewire woes?

[BovDesign]

I'm baffled. I've been using my Panasonic GS50 miniDV camera successfully for over a year. I even made a movie in iMovie with clips from my daughter's first year . . . and made an iDVD of it. No problems.

The other day I was transferring a clip from the camera to iMovie via Firewire and everything goes haywire. iMovie only detects a weird pulsing image showing my keyboard (which is what my camera happens to be pointing at prior to switching the camera to VCR mode) and now I can't even play back any clips -- past or present -- on my camera VCR playback mode (while not connected to my mac).

After 'letting the camera sit' overnight, 'resetting' the camer, re-charging the battery, and fast-forwarding and rewinding the tape I was able to view past footage through the camera. But as soon as I tried to offload the footage to iMovie things went haywire again and haven't recovered.

I've called Panasonic and they advised using a dry head cleaner and if that doesn't work -- send it in for service. I'm not keen on sending it away but am not ready to give up.

Any ideas? I'd appreciate anything.

Andrea

 

[VanMac]

Try to narrow down the problem a bit....
Try another cable.
Try it to another computer.
Try with another tape.

Hope you figure it out....

 

[imann]

PANASONIC GS150 & iMOVIE

I'm writing to this post since you're an experienced panasonic user - i just purchased a panasonic gs150 mini dv camcorder. Imovie is not seeing the camera for importing of footage with the USB cable. Do I need to purchase a firewire cable to get imovie to recognize the camera? Panasonic is not on the compatible list, but i've seen posts from people like you who seem to be using it successfully - is there anything I need to know? (i'm getting kinda nervous since i spent a decent amoutn of money on the camera that i can't use it with my mac...)
any input from anyone in the know would be appreciated!

I'm baffled. I've been using my Panasonic GS50 miniDV camera successfully for over a year. I even made a movie in iMovie with clips from my daughter's first year . . . and made an iDVD of it. No problems.

The other day I was transferring a clip from the camera to iMovie via Firewire and everything goes haywire. iMovie only detects a weird pulsing image showing my keyboard (which is what my camera happens to be pointing at prior to switching the camera to VCR mode) and now I can't even play back any clips -- past or present -- on my camera VCR playback mode (while not connected to my mac).

After 'letting the camera sit' overnight, 'resetting' the camer, re-charging the battery, and fast-forwarding and rewinding the tape I was able to view past footage through the camera. But as soon as I tried to offload the footage to iMovie things went haywire again and haven't recovered.

I've called Panasonic and they advised using a dry head cleaner and if that doesn't work -- send it in for service. I'm not keen on sending it away but am not ready to give up.

Any ideas? I'd appreciate anything.

Andrea

 

[Espnetboy3]

I have the panasonic pvgs120 and it has worked flawlessly for over a year now. I use a firewire cable and have used adobe premiere, final cut pro and imovie.