What kind of cable to connect video-camera to PowerBook?

[diehldun]

I just came back from Europe and Hawaii, and I plan on putting all the photos and footage from video camera/normal camera to the PowerBook via iPhoto/iMovie/iDVD. What kind of cable do I need to connect the VIDEO camera to the PowerBook?

I remember once (long time ago), I could edit scenes from the video camera by playing it, and later, the Mac would collect all of it, and I could change things around.

Is it something called the "Apple Video Adapter"? It's $19.00

As for photos, I am having them developed at Ralphs (supermarket), and it's supposed to come in a CD, and then I guess I will put them in iPhoto and then iMovie for a slideshow and then all in iDVD.

Can you have seperate showing in one DVD on iDVD; Click "A" for the Movie; "B" for the slideshow? Or is everything all in one?

Sorry for all the questions!
(A) What kind of cable to connect video camera to PowerBook?
(B) Can you have seperate "shows" on one DVD when using iDVD?
(C) I have a 1.33 GHz PowerBook 17". What kind of DVD-R do I need? (on Apple Store, it has either 4x or 8x)

Thank you SO much.

 

[Horrortaxi]

If you have a DV camera then you just need a special Firewire cable. If it's VHS, 8mm, or anything else then you need hardware to plug the camera into. Somebody can tell you the names--there are a couple popular bridges out there but I'm spacing on the names.

 

[OutThere]

Ok, here goes:

A)

1)If you have plugs on your camera that look like this:

then you will need special hardware to put your video on your computer. (http://www.synchrotech.com/product-1394/analog-dv-converter_02.html)

2) If you have a plug on your camera that looks like this:

then you will simply need something like this: http://www.technowarehousellc.com/4to6pinfirca.html

B) Yes. Its really easy to do.

C) 4x, Powerbooks have 4x DVD burners.

 

[diehldun]

Ok...

I got the "Thin Firewire cable" from Apple Store.

So far so good.

The only problem: when I import, it makes the tape into really little clips. The tape is two hours, and about 3 min in to it, I alreayd have 44 clips! each one is about 3 seconds. so, the video recorder starts and stops, and I have to click "import" about every 4 seconds.

is this normal?????? am I doing something wrong here??????
I don't think I'm doing something right.

 

[OutThere]

I got the "Thin Firewire cable" from Apple Store.

So far so good.

The only problem: when I import, it makes the tape into really little clips. The tape is two hours, and about 3 min in to it, I alreayd have 44 clips! each one is about 3 seconds. so, the video recorder starts and stops, and I have to click "import" about every 4 seconds.

is this normal?????? am I doing something wrong here??????
I don't think I'm doing something right.

Are you using iMovie? This really isn't normal behavior. It should break down the clips into parts from when you started and stopped recording, not randomly every 3 seconds.

 

[Macmaniac]

Go into your iMovie prefs and look for the import options, their is an option that breaks the clips up whenever there is a scene change IE you press start and stop. Deselect this option and they will come in big chunks, iMovie only can do 10 minute clips so you will get a few clips but thats the way a consumer program is.

 

[Horrortaxi]

Save your movie outside of your home folder if you have FileVault turned on.

Did you post another thread about this or are there a lot of people using iMovie + FileVault?