I have 19 mini dv tapes I want to convert to digital and do some editing. Nothing fancy. We already have an iMac so I figured a mini hooked up to my tv would be a good idea, especially when we want to watch the videos. I figured the basic mini- M4 chip and 16gb ram along with iMovie is all I would need. But that comes 256gb of storage. I don't really want to spend the money if I don't have to, does anyone have any idea if this machine would be good enough for the project or do I need something better, especially storage wise. That's my big concern, we may add more video later (from iPhones and an older digital camera) so I'd like some left over storage room.
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Mac advice for home video project
- Thread starter Walkingdead
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256 GB can get a bit cramped. You could spend $200 upgrading to 512 GB or you could buy a 1 TB external SSD to plug into it for... maybe $150?
Why are you not just doing this on your iMac, by the way? If you're just looking for a way to put video onto your TV there are cheaper ways to do that than a $600+ Mac Mini. My preferred way is to send it to the Apple TV I have connected, either via AirPlay or through Home Sharing. If you don't own one of those already, they cost about $130, or less if you find a refurbished or used one.
Why are you not just doing this on your iMac, by the way? If you're just looking for a way to put video onto your TV there are cheaper ways to do that than a $600+ Mac Mini. My preferred way is to send it to the Apple TV I have connected, either via AirPlay or through Home Sharing. If you don't own one of those already, they cost about $130, or less if you find a refurbished or used one.
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DV on tape is 13GB an hour so the raw footage transferred to a SSD will be about 250GB, more if they are long tapes.
To edit you are going to need at least double that.
Any computer since iMovie v1 in the original iMac days will cope with DV files, better than a modern AS Mac.
Getting the footage off the original tapes into the computer is the problem these days.
Do know what you are doing?
To edit you are going to need at least double that.
Any computer since iMovie v1 in the original iMac days will cope with DV files, better than a modern AS Mac.
Getting the footage off the original tapes into the computer is the problem these days.
Do know what you are doing?
I did something similar about twenty years ago. I found a very simple and easy solution; I had a VHS/DVD player/recorder, and plugged the video camera into it - played back all the tapes while recording in realtime to DVDs. Then it was easy to import from the DVDs and edit on the old mac I had at the time.
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It's really my wife's computer and it doesn't have the storage either and she does all her teaching stuff on it so it's usually tied up, too.
Yes my wife didn't want to send it in to a company to do so I ordered a package deal on Amazon that has a video camera for playback and a bunch of other stuff so it can be hooked up to a computer.
Connect your DV camera's iLink port to a Firewire cable directly into the iMac DV SE model's Firewire port, bring the DV footage directly into the Mac, edit, and view.
Everything was pre-organised for you, everything was easy.
It remained that way until 2012, when Apple obsoleted Firewire ports.
Since then you have to have the knowledge from someone from my era to know how to even get DV footage into the current editing software....
Good luck!
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@Walkingdead "so I ordered a package deal on Amazon that has a video camera for playback and a bunch of other stuff so it can be hooked up to a computer."
Good luck with that. Come back here and tell us how it goes...
i.e When you run into problems and find it doesn't look good, then ask here.
Good luck with that. Come back here and tell us how it goes...
i.e When you run into problems and find it doesn't look good, then ask here.
Ok. The ONLY way to transfer miniDV footage is via a Firewire(IEEE1394) cable. The video camera will require a socket that takes the small plug on this cable:
World of Data 2m Firewire Cable (9-4) - 9-pin to 4-pin - IEEE1394 - Video - Camcorder - DV - 800 - Male to Male
World of Data 2m Firewire Cable (9-4) - 9-pin to 4-pin - IEEE1394 - Video - Camcorder - DV - 800 - Male to Male
www.amazon.co.uk
You will then need one of these to connect to your Mini:
Thunderbolt to FireWire Adapter - Apple Repair Station
Easily connect your Thunderbolt-equipped Mac to a FireWire device with the Apple Thunderbolt to FireWire Adapter. Small and compact, it connects to the Thunderbolt port on your Mac computer, giving you a FireWire 800 port that supplies up to 7W for bus-powered peripherals like hard drives and...
applerepairstation.co.uk
TY. It comes with a FireWire cable so I'll just have to get that adaptor. It also has a different usb cable that hooks up to the camera's RCA (I think that's what they are) portsOk. The ONLY way to transfer miniDV footage is via a Firewire(IEEE1394) cable. The video camera will require a socket that takes the small plug on this cable:
World of Data 2m Firewire Cable (9-4) - 9-pin to 4-pin - IEEE1394 - Video - Camcorder - DV - 800 - Male to Male
World of Data 2m Firewire Cable (9-4) - 9-pin to 4-pin - IEEE1394 - Video - Camcorder - DV - 800 - Male to Malewww.amazon.co.uk
You will then need one of these to connect to your Mini:
Thunderbolt to FireWire Adapter - Apple Repair Station
Easily connect your Thunderbolt-equipped Mac to a FireWire device with the Apple Thunderbolt to FireWire Adapter. Small and compact, it connects to the Thunderbolt port on your Mac computer, giving you a FireWire 800 port that supplies up to 7W for bus-powered peripherals like hard drives and...
The problem using the RCA output from the camera (instead of the Firewire/iLink output) is that DV footage is 'interlaced', so intended for viewing in a TV.
TVs were always designed to show interlaced video to give the best results.
Computers don't handle the interlacing well, and you will probably get both interlaced 'fields' combined into one frame when you digitise using this method.
For DV footage which doesn't contain lots of movement this method might look OK, but movement will look very blurred if both fields are displayed at the same time.
Apple video editing software, iMovie/FCP, has settings to handle the conversion from interlaced fields to progressive frames for viewing in a computer so that it looks its best.
But to do this you have to capture the DV footage through the Firewire port, and the adapters - first to Thunderbolt 2, then TB2 to TB3, as @Dave Braine explains in the earlier post.
TVs were always designed to show interlaced video to give the best results.
Computers don't handle the interlacing well, and you will probably get both interlaced 'fields' combined into one frame when you digitise using this method.
For DV footage which doesn't contain lots of movement this method might look OK, but movement will look very blurred if both fields are displayed at the same time.
Apple video editing software, iMovie/FCP, has settings to handle the conversion from interlaced fields to progressive frames for viewing in a computer so that it looks its best.
But to do this you have to capture the DV footage through the Firewire port, and the adapters - first to Thunderbolt 2, then TB2 to TB3, as @Dave Braine explains in the earlier post.
Import into iMovie on Mac from tape-based cameras
Import video into iMovie on your Mac from a connected tape-based camera.
support.apple.com
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OP wrote:
"It comes with a FireWire cable so I'll just have to get that adaptor. It also has a different usb cable that hooks up to the camera's RCA (I think that's what they are) ports"
You didn't tell us WHICH YEAR the iMac was made.
That will determine whether or not it has tbolt2 or tbolt3 ports.
If it has tbolt3 ports:
I believe you're going to need TWO adapter cables:
- tbolt 3 to tbolt2 adapter
connects to
- tbolt2 to firewire adapter
connects to
- firewire cable from camcorder.
Even then, you MIGHT still have trouble.
No way to know until you try it.
Suggestion:
Don't buy "new" cables (I'm thinking Apple may not even sell them "new" any more).
Look on ebay for slightly used or "new old stock".
Will cost you about half as much, or even less.
"It comes with a FireWire cable so I'll just have to get that adaptor. It also has a different usb cable that hooks up to the camera's RCA (I think that's what they are) ports"
You didn't tell us WHICH YEAR the iMac was made.
That will determine whether or not it has tbolt2 or tbolt3 ports.
If it has tbolt3 ports:
I believe you're going to need TWO adapter cables:
- tbolt 3 to tbolt2 adapter
connects to
- tbolt2 to firewire adapter
connects to
- firewire cable from camcorder.
Even then, you MIGHT still have trouble.
No way to know until you try it.
Suggestion:
Don't buy "new" cables (I'm thinking Apple may not even sell them "new" any more).
Look on ebay for slightly used or "new old stock".
Will cost you about half as much, or even less.
Ok will do. Just curious though, why do I need an adaptor for T2/T3? I just assumed the thunderbolts are all compatible which each other like USBC ports are backwards compatible.
What is the purpose of the iMac? Are you going to use it for video conversion and editing? Even an older iMac can handle Mini DV video. But from what I read above you are going to trash the iMac (or maybe recycle it?). In any case it does not matter, you end up with just one computer. the new Mac Mini base model will work well for this
If the Mini's only job is to show videos on the TV. You would be better off with an "Apple TV".
Yes you need storage but for playing back video it does not need to be fast SSD storage. Buy an 8TB hard disk and connect it to your current computer.
I don't see a need for a second Mac, unless two people need to use a Mac at the same time. Apple TV is the best way to connect the TV and use an external 8TB disk for the videos and maybe one more 8TB drive for Time Machine backup
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The iMac is my wife's computer that she uses for her school work, she's a teacher, and to store all our photos. She's just on it a lot so I figured I can get myself my own Mac and would be able to use it whenever. We do have an Apple TV already so maybe we will just go with your suggestion and use hers for the videos, too. TY.
If you need two computers for some unrelated reason then, you need two computers. But STILL I would buy an external disk for the videos and another disk for Time Machine backups. The AppleTV can access media that is stored on either of the two Macs.
One other thing, as soon as you have two computers there can be a problem is the data you want is on eht other computer. so, you use the network to "share" the external drive and it then is effectively on both computers. If possible, Eithernet works best for this but WiFi is good enough.