Capturing DV from HDR-HC3 crashes FCE

When I import HD video from my Sony HDR-HC3 into FCE (version 3.5 running on OSX 10.4.6 on a 12-inch 1.33 GHz Powerbook with 768 MB RAM) it works fine.
When I try to import DV (using the i.link conv feature on the HC3 and setting easy setup to DV-NTSC Anamorphic), it warns "Unable to locate the following external devices: Apple Firewire NTSC (720 x 480)". If I continue and try to capture video despite this warning, FCE crashes.
I have tried various other easy setup settings with the same results. (I don't know if it's significant or not, but the warning always says "Apple firewire" even for easy-setup "Basic" setting.)
Also, when FCE crashes it does not put up the usual "report to Apple" dialog. It just quits.
As an aside, I once tried checking the "Do not warn again" box, at which point the warnings, of course, went away but the crashes didn't. Since the "Do not warn again" check box was in the warning dialog, which never appears again once you check it, it seems that there is no way to turn these warnings back on once they are turned off (short of deleting the FCE prefs file, which seems rather inelegant).
Mac OS X (10.4.6)

HDV features require 1GHz or faster processor and 1GB
of RAM (2GB recommended)
I see I am not making myself clear.
I am NOT trying to capture HDV (though that actually DOES work).
I am trying to capture HDV that is being downconverted to regular DV by the camera.
Note that I CAN get this to work on my Mac Mini, which has an identical setup (same processor, same software, same memory).
Summary: capturing HD works fine on my mini and my powerbook.
Capturing standard (non-HD) DV works on my mini but NOT on my powerbook, despite the fact that the software configurations on both machines are the same as far as I can tell.

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Best HD Capture Settings - Sony HDR-HC3

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Thank you!

Capture what you shot at. Match the settings.

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Hi Tumnus,
Welcome to the Apple Forums.
Yes it could very likely be your processor speed or how much RAM you have. The baseline for HD importing, editing and exporting is 1GH and 512MB RAM. Also there are other factors involved like is the camera fully supported in iMovie (altho I have a Sony HDR-HC1E and it imports fine).
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Capturing video from DAC 100 to FCE - HD

For the life of me I can not get this to work!! I can capture video through the DAC100 to iMovie no problem... But when I go to FCE-HD it does not even recognize the device?! I click on the FCE - HD in the dock and the EXTERNAL A/V window pops up Apple Firewire NTS (720 x 480) and states Your system configuration may have changed, or your deck/camera may be disconnected or turned off (which it is not). Please check your connections and click "Check Again" (nothing happens), or click "Continue" to set external device selection to None (not sure what this means but I can not find the external device selection in order to change it to none.
So I get into the project and click "Easy Set Up" and Setup For: DV-NTSC DV Converter and that EXTERNAL A/V window pops up again, I click on "Check Again" and get nothing, I click on "Continue" and then go top FILE -> Capture and it the Capture screen pops up but it reads PREVIEW DISABLED - NO COMMUNICATION. I then click the NOW button and a pop up comes up reading : Attempt to capture video without device selected. Please select a video device in your capture presets and try again. Well I can not find the "capture presets"??? Any help on this would be awesome!
Thanks in Advance.
Sean

Hey guys - Thanks for answering so quick...
Al - G'Day -
"When you start FCE this way the firewire connection is disabled.
Make sure View>Video>Firewire is active before capturing.
You may even have to have the Converter attached and powered on before opening FCE to get the Firewire connection active."
I went to VIEW (on FCE-HD) but do not see VIDEO>FIREWIRE? Am I looking in the wrong place? I have the converter attached and powered on and also have already tried what Tom suggested and shutdown the computer - disconnected everything (including my two Lacie ext. harddrives), powered back up and still no recognition? The DAC 100 doesn't have a DV out mode - I have the 3 input audio video plugged in and attached to my VCR...
Tom,
If this is the case where do I find the correct DV Converter settings? Also, I have never seen this device on my desk top or anywhere for that matter (which I thought was odd) but yet like I mentioned before, iMovies recognizes it with know problem and the video transfer to an iMovie Project. The problem with this is if there's any curruption on the videos they skip frames (audio & video) for split seconds, and I'm left without complete footage.
I had Final Cut Express 2 previously and at one point was able to capture footage, but somewhere along the line, this process got disabled. I recently Upgraded to Tiger and bought the FCE- HD update. I thought I had checked all the updates... What do you guys suggest?
Thanks again.
Sean

Premiere Pro CS6 won't capture HDR-HC3 properly

In HDV capture mode it wants to assign an mp3 extension.
Doesn't capture in native M2t format.
Tried reinstalling. Haven't had this problem with previous versions.
ver. 6.01

I've used numerous programs over the years so on the off chance I'm mistaken about whether Premiere Pro captures Sony HDV in m2t or mpeg, I'll take your word for it. However, you're not addressing the real problem which is that it won't capture my Sony HDR HC3 video, period, in any format. It wants to create a file with an mp3 extension and won't import the files it captures even if the extension has been changed to m2t, mpg, or mpeg. I may not be sure about the extension previous versions have captured in, but I'm 100% certain that it did capture it.

Not able to capture HD content from Sony HDR-HC3

I recently purchased Final Cut Express 4, after successfully using iMovie HD for the past year. I successfully captured some DV content (non-HD) from my Sony HDR-HC3 for a project. However, when trying to capture HD footage for a 2nd project, I'm not getting anything. Here's the info:
* I made the change in "Easy Setup..." to set the format to HD using Apple Intermediate Codec 1080i60.
* The footage was shot at 1080i on my HDR-HC3.
* The camera is plugged in via FireWire.
* When I choose "Capture", the the HDV Capture dialog comes up asking me for a file name. Once I give it a file name and click the Capture button, the tape starts playing and I get a black window with "Final Cut Express" in the middle (and the Apple logo). At the bottom, it says "CUEING TAPE (press 'esc' to stop)". When I press 'esc', the tape stops and the black capture window goes away.
* I never see a preview in the capture window, but I see the footage fine in my camera's LCD screen.
* A folder is created in the Capture Scratch folder, with the name I gave in the HDV Capture dialog, but nothing is ever written to this folder. It's empty.
I'm not sure what I'm doing wrong...I just don't seem to be capturing any video...FCE is seeing my camera and is taking control (starting and stopping) but nothing is actually being captured.

Ok, I figured it out on my own. Operator error.
When I had captured non HD content using my camera, I had to set the iLink (FireWire) conversion to "On - HDV-->DV" in the camera in order for it to work. I forgot to set it back to "Off", so the camera was downconverting to DV when output through FireWire. Once I turned off the conversion, I was able to capture in HD.

Unable to properly capture HD video from miniDV tape in FCE

unable to capture HD video from miniDV tape
When I connect my Sony HDR-HC3 miniDV HDV camcorder to my iMac via firewire cable and use Final Cut Express to capture the video from the tape, I do not get a Capture window that allows me to specify in and out points, I just get a playback window that immediately starts capturing and the only option I have in this window is hit ESC to stop capturing. If I let this capture window continue to capture the video from the camera with miniDV HD tape, then the entire tape would be captured as one massive single video clip.
QUESTION: Is there something I change or do to make the proper capture window appear where I can specify in and out points to capture from tape for each clip?
NOTE: using same camera and tape with iMovie with automatic capture enabled, all the clips get captured properly. I also tried to use the manual setting in iMovie and it worked too.
More details(read only if you want more information)
I have a several miniDV tapes containing HD video created on a Sony Sony HDR-HC5 and Sony HDR-HC7. Unfortunately, both these camera were stolen, and I have since moved to a camera that uses flash memory, not tape. However, I need to get the video footage off these tapes, so I bought a used Sony HDR-HC3, it plays the HD miniDV tapes just fine and iMovie reads the video from this camera just fine, but Final Cut Express does not.
When I setup Final Cut Express, I used the Easy Setup and specified:
Format: HD
Rate: 29.97 fps
Use: HDV-Apple Intermediate Codec 1080i60
These setting match those of the camera and recorded tape. If I use any other settings but these, then Final Cut Express never sees the camera and never opens any capture window at all. Using Quicktime 10 movie inspector on the clips captured by iMovie from same camera, all the clips match this setting too.
Final Cut Express version 4.0.1
iMovie 09 Version 8.0.2 (821)
iMac 2.93 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo with 4GB 1067 MHz DDR3 running
Mac OS X Version 10.6.4
My Final Cut Express scratch disk is a Seagate 2TB external USB 2.0 Hard Drive that has been formatted to be Mac OS Extended (Journaled). This external disk is also where iMovie successfully captured all the video from the same camera.

Thanks for the answer. It makes me sad. I thought using Final Cut Express would be an upgrade to a more robust editing system from iMovie, yet iMovie does a superior job of logging and capturing video from HDV video on miniDV tape in comparison to FCE. Not only does iMovie capture each clip on the tape into it's own video file automatically, it also includes timestamp information in the filename indicating when the clip was originally recorded, which appears to be something that is missing from Final Cut Express. Now I realize that HDV miniDV cameras had a relatively short life span in the consumer marketplace and have since all been replaced by flash and hard drive based AVCHD cameras, but from circa 2004 to 2007, miniDV HDV camcorders were very popular and I am sure there are lots of consumers that must be super frustrated by Final Cut Express limited ability to log and capture clips properly from these cameras.
Assuming I do not want to make a rough cut of video in iMovie and prefer to begin my editing project in Final Cut Express (not doing XML export of iMovie project), I need to determine the best way to get clips captured via iMovie into Final Cut Express and determine if there is anything inferior in the iMovie captured clips that I need to be aware of. So far it appears that both iMovie and Final Cut Express reduce the 5.1 surround sound captured on the HDV miniDV tapes to stereo sound, which is not a big lose given the 5.1 sound was recorded from camera's built-in microphone, but it makes me wonder if the video is reduced in any way by the iMovie import process, examining the video in quicktime's inspector window the video appears to be the same in both iMovie and FCE, but I'll research the answers to these questions elsewhere on this forum and post additional questions if I do not find the information I need.

Advantages of FCE HD over iMovie HD (with Sony HDR HC3)?

Hi!
I'm new to the digital Video world. Sadly I'm always a bit crazy and thought to buy a camera which will be a bit more future proof and decided to go for a Sony HDR HC3. I was using iMovie 6 HD with it and can import movies fine (ok not full speed on my 2Ghz iMac G5 but I can live with that), I can cut them but I can't realy render them as normal movies out of iMovie. Actually I can't do anything with them it always turns out to be a very bad jerky output format. So reading the iMovie forum, it seems thats normal behavior. People say it needs to be sent back on camera tape and get it converted by the camera to DV and then use it. Actually importing DV and then writing a DVD or encoding it to an other fileformat really works well.
So my question is, can FCE HD handle HDV better? Like export it to normal DVD? Meaning like rendering the 1440 x 1080 interlaced to the DVD non interlaced resolution?
iMovie shows me the Project is 1080i-25 (yes I'm using PAL). So I asume it merges the two half pictures to one 1080 and that results in 25 frames/sec...
Any experiance with FCE and Sony HC3 here? Roughly 300 Euros/$300 is a bit too much to buy it and it turns out to be not much of a difference then iMovie (for exporting and handling HDV).
Thanks for your help and feedback!
Holger

Hi!
The reason why I ask is some weired behavior I have with IMovie 6 HD/Quicktime 7 on the latest Tiger release:
I can import HDV from my Sony HC3 perfectly, and also export every unedited material to the camera perfectly. But when the HD material needs to recoded for use on DVD or as quicktime movie or just when you add titles effects etc. Output is getting very jerky.
To test I did the following. I recorded a 360 degrees turn in a room in HDV. It shows perfectly smooth on the camera screen when playbacked, smooth on TV etc. Smooth means as you see it when turning your head..
So now I import it in HDV into iMovie. If i take the unedited film and want it to export it to any other format like DVD or an MPEG4 movie, things get jerky, the 360 degrees turn doesn't look nice anymore.
I read in other forums, that thats in issue with HDV and you should let the camera convert it to DV, so the cuted material needs to be transfered back to the camera, and then let it convert it to DV.
OK, so if I import HDV converted by the camera to DV its perfectly smooth, also on DVD on quicktime movies etc.
When I import HDV in iMovie, and put a title text in the movie for like 10 secs out of the 20. iMovie will split the clip to two 10 sec ones and render the text in the first block. If I record it back as HDV on the camera tape and then reimport it with beeing converted as DV the following happens:
The first 10 secs with the title are jerky, the second 10 secs are smooth as before.
This needs to be related with the IMovie/Quicktime encoding, not with the camera (I have two of it to see if its not the hardware). So I'm really thinking It's either an iMovie problem an Quicktime problem or both together...
So if FCE would handle the rendering process different... It would be worth to get it...
Any ideas?
Holger

FCE: Capturing footage from my Canon XL1

Got FCE and when capturing footage from my Canon XL1 I get the video however there is no audio!
Tried capturing footage via iMovies and works no problem!
Not sure if this has anything to do with it but I'm using a external mic. on my XL1 into one ch. on the audio inputs. Also scratch disks is on a external 1TB WD drive. Finally tried virtually all the set-ups on the 'easy set-up' but still no joy.
Can anyone throw me a life line on this one?!

sorry I should have made myself abit clearer.....when the tape is played back in my XL1 I can hear audio when my headphones are pluged into the camera also the camera has audio monitors which I can see movement verifying there is audio. However in FCE I don't see any audio level movement.
In terms of equip. I just have a external WD 1TB drive (USB), firewire cable for video camera and the USB cable for the keyboard & mouse.
Additional application: Flip video s/w (however had fce issue prior to installing this).

Blocky video importing from a Sony HDR-HC3

I have been using my Son HDR-HC3 with my PC, Windows XP, and Sony Vegas Movie Studio for over a year without any problems. Recently I upgraded my mac to a new 20" iMac.
Upon importing either video off tape or live video from my camcorder I get periodic errors in the video, macroblocking. This only happens with HDV, not DV.
This happens in iMovie 7.1 but Apple also had be install iMovie 6 HD - same issues in both.
Since I know the camcorder and 1394 cable are good and iMovie can import DV without any issues I strongly suspect that iMovie (or the QuickTime CODECs that it is using) are not too happy with the format of the compressed HDV coming from the HDR-HC3.
A call to Apple has them telling me to take my camcorder to an Apple Store (an hour drive for me) to see if the same issue exists on one of their macs. If so, it's a software issue and they'll make a note and, at some point, maybe fix it. If I don't see the problem on one of the store macs then it's a hardware problem with my mac.
Either way, I'm not a happy camper since HDV editing is the primary reason for upgrading from my stable, yet slow G4 to this new iMac.
Has anyone else experienced this problem? Have you found a software/configuration work-around?

Welcome to the  Discussion Forums.
With all due respect the offer from  to test your equipment is the best you can hope for, you are unlikely to get the same level of help through forum messages as you are from physical testing.

IMovie not importing from a HDR-HC3

When I plug my HDR-HC3, iMovie can control the camera, but it cannot import the video clips. When I tried using Final Cut Pro, it records it fine.

I've just purchased the same camcorder. In fact, I had just purchased Sony's new HDR-SR1 (HDV to 30GB hard disk), but found out that it's definitely not compatible with Mac (what a bummer!). I've now exchanged it for the HDR-HC3 and my Mac doesn't recognize it (no icon on desktop). System Profiler sees the camera connected under Firewire, so I'm not sure what the issue is.
When I launch iMovie HD and attempt to change the setting to capture HDV, I get an error stating that iMovie is missing a QuickTime component.
Do you see the camera on your desktop?

HDR-HC3 DV capture

Okay, so I have had this camera and have been forced to film in DV only because my previous version of final cut HD did not support HD. I found no problems in capturing video from this camera in Final Cut HD. I have recently uploaded an upgrade to Final Cut Studio 5.1.4 and wanted to import some of my old DV tapes to finish a project I am currently doing. For some reason, Final Cut does not recognize the camera. What settings do I need to put my camera and preferences do I need for Final Cut 5.1.4??? I need to finish this project quickly and haven't been able to see this covered in the discussions. Please help me :)!

Hi,
make sure you have DV not HDV selected in your camera menu when trying to capture DV.
However, in the link below there are some pre-capture settings listed for your camera.
Although the OP is concerned with capturing with a different software you may want to
read the thread through:
http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?messageID=5609952&#5609952
Best,
Gogi

FCS 5.1: Detecting camcorder issues (Sony HDV HDR-HC3)

Hi I just got FCS 5.1 and it doesn't seem to want to detect my camcorder (Sony HDV HDR-HC3). iMovie detects it just fine, but in FCP I have no control over my camcorder when I go to 'Log and Capture', nor am I able to preview anything. My camera is set up properly I'm sure. Is there something I'm doing wrong? A setting I don't know about? Any help would be appreciated.

Salvador, what settings did you find? I presume you're importing HDV, not DV, otherwise what's the point of an HDV camera... I must be dumb, too, because my FCE HD (current version) doesn't capture from my HDV HDR-HC3. My camcorder is set for VCR = HDV and iLink conversion is off, per the manual. I tried setting up projects for both Apple Intermediate Codec 1080i50 and 1080i60, then doing Cmd-8 (capture). First it prompted me for a clip name, then I got a black screen saying it was cuing the tape and the tape automatically started playing. It said press Esc to stop, but when I pressed Esc it said the capture was aborted and there was no clip. I've been capturing and editing standard DV on my older Sony DV Handycam for years, and it worked great with no hassle. This baffles me.
iMovie recognizes the camera, and controls the rewind, etc., but no picture and no import.
I'm using the same FireWire cable I used with my older Handycam. Do I need a special Sony iLink cable?
Any suggestions would be very much appreciated.

Sony HDR-HC3 to FCP to Color to FCP to Mac Mini

Hi,
My objective is to play our edited family videos using our Mac Mini(2.0 GHz Core 2) on a Sony 52" LCD at full 1080 resolution. The video is stored on a Firewire attached 1 TB LaCie external disk.
I use a Sony HDR-HC3 video camera (HDV 1440x1080i 25 fps) and use FCP 6.0.4 for editing. I have recently been learning Color for grading.
1. Currently reading footage into FCP as ProRes 422. Footage comes in with the following profile:
Sequence Preset: Apple ProRes 422 1440x1080 50i 58 kHz
Capture Preset: HDV-Apple ProRes 422
Current captured footage I'm working with has a data rate of 12.5 MB
2. Once editing is complete, I "Send To" Color and perform the grading
3. From Color, I "Send to FCP". (It asks "Change graded FCP seq. to match the QT export codec?" not sure whether I click Yes or No here)
4. After selecting Yes, the footage returned back to a new sequence in FCP now has the following profile:
Apple ProRes 422 (HQ)
1920x1080
21.6 MB/sec
From reading the Apple documentation, I was expecting something funny to happen coming back from Color.
5. I then send this sequence to Compressor where I select the "Apple | Formats | Quicktime | H.264" preset in the hope that I can render out an H.264 1920x1080 file to play on the Mac Mini. It renders it but the Mini can't play the video smoothly.
As I am still learning, I would appreciate any suggestions on an alternative workflow that can lead me to a 1080 video file that can play smoothly on the Mac Mini.
The Apple TV preset renders a video that works smoothly on the Mini, but I'm hoping for the full resolution.
Regards, Tony

Hi Shane,
Thanks so much for responding. Great tutorial also. And I wasn't conscious of any 'drone'...
Yes, I've tried to have the Log and Transfer recognize the card (through both the card reader and lately, by using the camera as a deck but without luck).The card reader and camera mount on my desktop as NO NAME and when I ADD VOLUME I scroll down to devices and click on NO NAME but L&T doesn't recogize the source and nothing happens. That's why I went in to see if the AVCHD folder might be recognized and got that invalid directory message. Following your tutorial I went into preferences button on the right hand upper corner of the L&T interface and selected the AVCHD - Apple Prores LT path in case that made a difference, but no go. Any other suggestions/thoughts?
Cheers, Mark

Help with hdr-hc3

I just upgraded to fdc HD. and now i can't caputure non HD footage from my camera Sony HDR-HC3.. and it also fce hd also wont see that my camera is connected. ive tryied changing the easy setup but that do no help.. So if anyone could help that would be great. Thanks

OK, so you've trashed your preferences and the cameras connected and your start the application. Does it see the camera or not? If it doesn't there' no point in continuing. Check the connections. Try a different cable. Any other devices connected to the computer? How's everything connected?

Capturing DV from HDR-HC3 crashes FCE

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