Ulrich Baier
Joined: 21 Apr 2006
Posts: 1
Location: Germany
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 Posted:
Fri Apr 21, 2006 12:50 pm Post subject:
is there any new information on this |
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Hello everybody,
meanwhle I read twice the lengthy discussion about the RC timecode, which was posted about a year ago.
Has anybody new information on that? I have got the same problem Mark has and I cannot imagine, that there is no solution for such a simple problem: Reading out the analog timecode from a Hi8 tape and store it scene by scene on a computer for editing purposes. Is there really no way to retrieve it from an old Hi8 device, for instance through the Ctrl-L jack?
To Mark:
How did you proceed with this in the meantime?
regards
Ulrich |
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walterd8
Joined: 21 Dec 2006
Posts: 1
Location: Toronto, Ontario, Canada
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Fri Dec 22, 2006 5:06 pm Post subject:
Hi8DateTime preserves Hi8 RC Timecode & Date/Time(Dateco |
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| Ulrich Baier wrote: | Has anybody new information on that? I have got the same problem Mark has and I cannot imagine, that there is no solution for such a simple problem: Reading out the analog timecode from a Hi8 tape and store it scene by scene on a computer for editing purposes. Is there really no way to retrieve it from an old Hi8 device, for instance through the Ctrl-L jack?
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Hi Ulrich
Here is some new information. Over the past year (2006), I have produced a tool, Hi8DateTime, that reads out the Hi8 time code (RC Timecode) together with the Datacode (Date and Time) and produces a list of scenes.
Unfortunately, only SOME high-end Hi8 camcorders, put out by Sony in the 1990's, have the RC Time Code and Data Code feature. This prosumer feature enabled these handycams to display the video date and time on the TV screen, when the Data Code or the DATE(+) or TIME(NEXT) button was pressed. In fact, I have been able to find 26 Sony NTSC and PAL Hi8 camcorders that have the RC Timecode and Data Code feature. There is more information about RC Timecode and a list of Hi8 camcorders with RC Timecode at:
http://www.octochron.com/faqSonyHi8RcTimeCodeDataCode.htm
However, Sony never provided a means to extract the date and time from Hi8 tapes to other media other than by burning in the date/time on the dub. Initially, I tried to "capture" the time and datecode from a Hi8 tape using a PC-controlled LANC cable (ie the Ctrl-L protocol jack). However, even though the LANC protocol defines date and time values, these were set to zero on the LANC bus when Hi8 tapes were played back on a CCD-TR101 Hi8 camcorder and also on a Digital-8 DCR-TRV320 camcorder.
These results confirm Steve McDonald's earlier observations:
| Steve McDonald wrote: | The R.C. timecode that is recorded by some Hi-8 camcorders and VCRs, is not transfered to a digital recording, such as on DV or Digital8 or to a stand-alone DVD recorder. The same is true of any datacode information that is ordinarily hidden in the Hi-8 recordings.
The only way to transfer this information electronically, is to call it onscreen during playback from a Hi-8 machine and then it would be
permanently part of the visible picture-...
If you play back a Hi-8 recorded tape in a Digital8 machine, it will not display or transfer the original Hi-8 timecode or datacode. Nor will either be re-recorded along with the audio and video on a Digital8 or DV recorder, if you transfer the signal to them by wire from a Hi-8 machine. |
The problem was solved in Hi8DateTime by OCR ing the dates and times on the screen while the camcorder is on fast forward to produce a list of scenes, their start and end timecodes (HH:MM:SS), their recording date, and the start and end time of day in under 15 minutes elapsed time (at 8x speed). A subtitle file in .SAMi format with recording date and times that you can optionally turn on and off when viewed with Windows Media Player is also produced. For the FAQ that describes how its done:
http://www.octochron.com/faqProduct.htm
I am sure that it would not be hard to take the Hi8DateTime SAMI output or the scene list file and transform it to some other format for editing purposes.
Sincerely,
Walter Berndl |
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