My first deliberate foray in to the Digital Video jungle happened this weekend, after our Seemandham (Hindu Baby Shower). Thanksfully, I didn't have to go through the agony of having to decide which Camcoder to buy - thanks to my brother's wedding gift 4 years ago, which is surprisingly still not obsolete.
I spent a few hours googling and reading internet forums and tutorials, and learnt a bit. But it is still a very confusing jungle to navigate, especially if your attention span is not good. And since my memory is not very good either, I thought I'll record my new-found knowledge here before it slowly evoporated away.
Some basic facts:
1. all camcoders today are digital - they store the video and audio data in digital format, in a miniDV tape, mini DVD, a hard-disk or a flash memory.
2a. miniDV is a magnetic tape medium, on which data is stored digitally. the data rate is roughly 25 mbps. intra-frame compression is used, but not inter-frame compression (not sure about this)
2b. mini DVD is the same format as a regular DVD, just a smaller size (so less capacity?). the data in a DVD is stored using the MPEG-2 format, with bitrates in the range 5 to 10 mbps. intra and inter-frame compression are used.
3. video transfer from a miniDV camcoder to a PC (over USB or FireWire) is a real-time "capture". so, unless the transfer interface (USB/FireWire) has enough bandwidth and the PC is fast enough, data-loss can occur (mostly in the form of dropped frames). this is not like transferring files from a CD to a hard drive, where slower interface/hardware just results in longer time of transfer. put differently, transferring 60 minutes of video from a miniDV camcoder to a PC takes exactly 60 minutes - no matter how fast or slow the hardware is.
