Dealing with time code breaks on the source tape

Question

Some of my source tapes have broken time code, because of "empty space" between recordings. What's the best way to deal with that if you want to be able to automatically recapture video from a tape?
Thanks.

Answer 1

There are a few possible solutions depending on what you need from the tapes.
You can dupe the whole tape onto another camera or deck (via firewire), or use capture now to grab the whole tape. You'll need to edit the preferences to only warn on timecode breaks, and not create new clips at breaks.
You could also set the FCP capture controls to be a 'non-controllable device', this means you need to hit play on the deck and use 'capture now' in the log and capture window. The only problem with this is that the timecode is not from the tapes, it is generated by FCP to fix the breaks, so batch re-capturing won't work (bad news if the breaks mash up the audio etc).
Duping the tapes can be done by using just one camera and your mac. Capture via the 'non controllable' device method above. Then drop the footage into a sequence and then print that to tape. Then use this tape to capture from & you have footage that will recapture at a later date if needed.
Timecode is a real pain if you have many breaks, duping is often the easiest solution.
There are more posts on this topic on this site, try the using the search.
Drew