New tapes, or not???

millsee · #1 (**permalink**) 10-20-2004, 08:01 PM

Okay people, this is probably as basic as it gets. Should/can you reuse your mini-dv camcorder tapes? If so, do you just rewind them and record again or do you need to somehow wipe them. I ask this as I reused one recently and the quality of the footage doesn't seem too clever the second time around. Any advice?

Marc Peters · #2 (**permalink**) 10-20-2004, 08:18 PM

I have loads of the little bugers on my shelves as I never re-use them. I'm a quality freak.

millsee · #3 (**permalink**) 10-20-2004, 08:20 PM

Me too, that's why I wondered. So is that the problem then? Does reusing them reduce the quality?

Alan Mills · #4 (**permalink**) 10-21-2004, 09:25 AM

My tapes get used exactly twice. The first use is to stripe the tape (i.e. leave th elens cap on and hit record to put black across the tape and get a continuous timecode). The second is me actually using the tape.

I do not re-use tapes. I'm sure there is a quality issue but that's not the driver for me. I use the tapes as backup. A one hour MiniDV tape is the equivalent of 12Gb of HDD space. When I finish a project I do not have to archive 12Gb of HDD when I can just archive the capture logs and rerun them at a later date - as long as I preserve the original tapes.

Plus, I'm a a hoarder and I hate the idea that I might re-use a tape and then one day want the original recording from it for soem reason or another.

I spend less on tapes than I do on golf balls so video editing is considerd a cheap hobby on my house and I don't sweat the extra cost of tapes by using them only once.

Marc Peters · #5 (**permalink**) 10-21-2004, 09:40 AM

My tapes get used exactly twice. The first use is to stripe the tape (i.e. leave th elens cap on and hit record to put black across the tape and get a continuous timecode). The second is me actually using the tape.

What is the real advantage of this? I've never done this. Ever. And I've never run into any problems by not doing it. Seems to me to be a bit of a waste of time - and by definition puts twice the amount of strain on your cam heads as every second of video shot actually uses two seconds of record time (assuming the tape is onlt used once after 'striping').

Mike Thorpe · #6 (**permalink**) 10-21-2004, 09:43 AM

When I've not recorded the time code onto the tape, after recording one scene, if i leave a pause before recordings, then there will be a gap and the time code will reset to zero.

Marc Peters · #7 (**permalink**) 10-21-2004, 09:48 AM

So I pressume your concerned about batch capture then? An easy way around this is just to rewind the tape to where you left each time

Mike Thorpe · #8 (**permalink**) 10-21-2004, 09:49 AM

Well I do that now. :P

Marc Peters · #9 (**permalink**) 10-21-2004, 09:51 AM

So we're all agreed that it's not worth stiping a tape, you can use tapes again without degredation (but excessive use stretches the tape), and most people archive footage so don't record over it.

Alan Mills · #10 (**permalink**) 10-21-2004, 11:18 AM

Originally Posted by Marc Peters

So we're all agreed that it's not worth stiping a tape

Not all. I'd have to disagree with this. I certainly accept that it's not necessary but 'not worth' -- I'd have to disagree.

I always use batch capture becuase of the way I archive i.e. by not archiving captured footage but being able to recapture it exactly. As such I want to make sure there really is no chance of a gap in the timecode - hence my desire to 'stripe'.

All (and I do mean all) publications and books I've read on the subject all make a point of suggesting this is good practise and I adopted the practise early on and it works for me. The only time I didn't stripe I got a break in the timecode. Fortunately it was the very first tape I recorded onto, trying out the new camera so no harm done.

... or am I going to get shot down in flames again?