Problems converting 8mm videocassette to MiniDV?

Question

I hooked up my old 8mm video cassette camera to my relatively new MiniDV digital in order to convert. Although it worked, the quality of the transferred digital picture was so poor it was difficult to see the picture. Any suggestions for what I did wrong? or do I just need to send these off to a professional to get it done right?

Answer 1

can you hook up the 8mm directly to the tv and see it ok?  if so, then the connection to minidv should work ok too.

it is a pretty simple connection, maybe the 8mm tape or player is bad.  Connect direct to tv and report back.

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Well, it does sound like you are doing the correct thing.  

One idea - i wonder if you have to set the digital camera to a certain mode to do this?  maybe to tell it to use that connection as an input and not an output?  did you read the manual about how to do this?

To go direct to the tv, yes you need the rca connections on both the 8mm camera side and on the tv side.

You can use just the red/white audio cables from any audio connection you might be making in a stereo system or from your DVD player to the tv or some such.

Plug white or red into the yellow video port on the camera, and plug the same color into the yellow video-in port on the tv.

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Hey, i just had another idea: are you certain you are connecting the correct rca plugs to the correct places on the camera?  Yellow is most often the video connection.  If you cross connect audio with video, you can still make a recording but it will be very weird and crappy.  No recognizable video.

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And yet another thought - the digital camera to rca cable may be bad.  Connect the digital camera to the TV and see if you can see a good picture.

Answer 2

Can you give some more detail of how you did the conversion?  I'm assuming you connected the camcorders via the AV sockets, but what else did you do?

Answer 3

You may use the best software I have seen AVS Video Tools. It can convert to/from all key format, upload video or DVD directly to key portables like iPod, Sony PSP, Archos, Zen Creative, and mobiles.

It can capture video from DV or webcams, TV tuners, DVB-T, DVB-S, transfer VHS tapes to DVD, remove commercials, edit video, copy and burn DVDs and video files: AVI (DivX, XviD, etc.), MP4, WMV, 3GP, 3G2, QuickTime (MOV, QT), SWF, DVD, VOB, VRO, MPEG 1,2,4, MPG, DAT, VCD, SVCD, ASF, H.263, H.264, RM, DVR-MS.

There is the free download link:

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There is the tutorial that how to rip DVD or convert among all key video formats

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Also, you may search some other useful information:

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Answer 4

Any time to change analog (8mm) to digital (minidv) you will lose quality. Even if you send it off they are going to have the same problem.