Controlling the Camera

Controlling the camera

When a DV camera is connected and powered up you can use the tape transport controls to rewind or fast forward the tape to the portion you want to capture. You can also play the tape and preview the picture in the Camera window.

To mark a designated portion of the tape for capture you can use the Set In and Set Out buttons. Conversely, you can check the In and Out points by using the Goto In or Goto Out buttons to seek the tape to those points. You can also rapidly seek to any given timecode position on the tape by clicking on the timecode field and typing in a new value.

In most cases you won’t need to manually control the tape using the transport controls. Once you have chosen your desired capture settings simply press the Start Capture button and the tape is controlled automatically to ensure a successful capture.

Once you start capturing the tape deck is under program control and the transport controls are greyed out until the capture completes (either normally, when the end of the tape or the programmed OUT point is reached, or due to an error). You can also press the Stop Capture button at any time to stop the tape and abort the capture early (in which case you are given the option whether to abort immediately or wait until the end of the current scene to stop at a “clean” boundary).