How do I create a stop motion video with a camcorder alone ? (JVC MiniDV GR-D750U?

Question

How do I create a stop motion video with a camcorder alone ? (JVC MiniDV GR-D750U?

Answer 1

has never been done.

in the old days of analog tape, a time code signal was put down as part of the recording. then an edit controller could rewind the tape for the necessary 5 seconds of pre-roll before the next frame to be recorded. then the process repeated. very heavy duty tape had to be used because obviously it took more than 150 passes over each frame of tape.  the recorders also were the heavy studio type that could hold up to the repeated winding. the making of one feature length stop motion production would certainly totally wear out the recorder heads.

miniDV camcorders are not made to record a frame at a time. it too has to backup to pre-roll before recording although only 2 seconds or so. you will notice that there is no menu position on the GRD750 that allows you to set the timecode frame to start the next recording. There is no 9-pin edit control port either.  if you try and do it by guess and golly then you will be inconsistant in the number of frames recorded, sometimes one, sometimes 3, sometimes you will record over a previous frame in error. it will be a mess.

Because of the severe limitations of miniDV to do linear editing, Sony made DVCam and Panasonic DVCpro variants. Both of these move the tape faster than miniDV to enable reliable frame accurate editing in studio recorders. However neither of these system consider the DV tape to be heavy enough for the repeated passes needed for stop motion recording.

Answer 2

As far as I know,  Lare is right. It cannot be done alone, since the majority of cancorders are unable to shoot single frames. You would need to hook up your camcorder to your computer via USB or firewire and use a stop motion frame capture program in order to take single frame images. For more information, read the Camcorder section of this webpage:

http://www.stopmotionanimation.com/handb...

To actually frame-grab and compile the movie, I'd suggest using Monkeyjam if you're on a PC. It's free.

http://www.giantscreamingrobotmonkeys.co...

AnimatorDV: Simple+ became freeware.

http://www.animatordv.com/download7

If you're on a Mac, you could try Framethief or FramebyFrame.

http://www.framethief.com/

http://web.mac.com/philipp.brendel/Softw...