I have many tapes, how do I know what's on them?
This is the first of a series of How-To notes, describing how to perform various common logging tasks.
CatDV is designed to help you pull together all the information you have about what's on a tape to make it easier to manage your tape library and find scenes again. It will also manage low resolution previews to show you the contents of a tape even when it's not currently captured to disk.
- First you need to load the information into CatDV:
- If you have previously edited any projects containing material from your tapes then you can import those projects into CatDV (perhaps via a batch list or similar intermediate file) to avoid retyping previously logged clip names.
- If you have logged your tapes by hand (or using another application) you can import text files or EDLs.
- If you have already captured the contents of your tape to disk you can simply import the media files.
- If your DV tapes have not been captured or logged yet, use the Live Capture Plus application to scan a tape, detecting scenes and capturing previews in one operation (alternatively, capture the tape to disk in your editing application and import the media files).
- To find clips on a tape it's important that the correct tape identifier is entered for all your clips. Use the editing commands within CatDV to correct any mistakes or missing data. (For example, you could use the Search dialog to find all the clips from a particular project, then group by tape and drag the selected clips onto the correct tape name or use the Bulk Edit command.)
- Once your clips are in a CatDV catalog there are lots of things you can do to help you find those of interest. For example, you could:
- group clips according to the tape they are on,
- search for a keyword in the notes field,
- print out a single page index print to file with each tape,
- display the DV date & time of recording of each scene,
- create preview versions of your movies to use even when the media is offline,
- share a catalog containing thumbnails with clients or friends, even if they don't have access to the original movies.
- To build previews for a tape that is currently online (i.e. that has been captured to disk), select all the clips for that tape, ensuring they have the correct tape name, then use Build Preview Movies. Use the Preferences options to determine the size and quality of previews.
(If your main interest is in cataloging physical tapes on a library shelf, rather than logging media down to the clip level, then please refer to tape library management features provided by the Enterprise Server.)