Converted 8mm movies

Question

My son had our entire collection of 8mm movies converted to dv and has passed them on to me for the daunting task of editing and adding commentary. Each clip contains 6 movie rolls and the files are huge. I'm importing one clip at the time and tried, unsuccessfully, to break the clips up into separate events corresponding to each movie roll. I also have imovie hd and in a few days will have Final Cut Express 4 on a new iMac.
Also, while the quality of the movies is not bad, the speed is off, jumps from normal to fast.
Any suggestions as to what would be a reasonable first approach would be appreciated.

Answer 1

Any suggestions as to what would be a reasonable first approach would be appreciated.
With regard to trimming the file content, either QT Pro ($30) or MPEG Streamclip (free) can easily handle this. Just load a file, Set "in" and "out" points usint the "i" and 'O' keys, use the "Trim to Selection" Edit menu option to isolate the content you wish to save as an independent files, and save the file using the File menu "Save As..." option in either application. Repeat as many times as needed. Files are nor re-compressed, but simply save to the generic MOV file container still as DV compressed file content. If you come across content your definitely do not plan to keep or use, simply exclude it from your saved file to save time and storage space when importing/editing later.
As to speed problem, this could be more problematic. First step is to determine if this is a playback problem independent of the file or in the file itself. I.e., does it always occur at the same place in the file or is it random or only when played back in certain media players? Is it a relatively slow "jump" in speed or does it occur over one or two frames? Not an enviable task in either case but if consistent, may allow you to segment the files during editing and make fine adjustments as possible. Still, it is not a task I would want to take on under normal conditions.