Adding DV Time Code to Video Clips

Angel

Newbie Location: Spain Joined: Jun 19, 2008 14:00 Messages: 21 Offline

Solved by

Jul 28, 2008 04:55

In my readings through the forum I've seen some questions about how to add the DV Time Code to Video clips.
Since I've have had the same problem I want to share the solution I've founf with all forum members.

Lets say upfront that I've used a comercial solution. However the cost its so low ($19,50) that I think its an excellent investment. Don't have any comercial interest in this software. I just purchased the solution and I think is pretty simpe to use, it solves a common problem, works well and deserve the money you've paid for.

- DV tapes have the time code embeded in the video recording. The time code data is transferred to the DV-AVI file when you capture the video clip to you PC, providing you do the capture in DV. If you capture in mpeg-2, mpeg-4 or whatever other system, this data is lost, and is not recoerable unless you do the capture again.

- I've found a software called vDTS, that is able to take the captured DV-AVI file and add the time code information over the image. Please note that you have to run this utility before doing any editing and/or rerendering of the file.

- Very offen we decide not to add time and/or date while recording with the camcorder. If we do that we can't remove it afterwords. With this solution you can avoid that problem because you can always add date/time later.

- vDTS give us the option to add this information selectively after capturing the clip. You can choose if adding time and or date (multilanguage, even in Chinesse), the position in the screen, the font, size, color. As well you can choose if adding date/time in all video footage, or just for a few seconds after each time change, scene change, or randomly... It's highly configurable. After adding it you can use the genrated output (still DV-AVI) in your PD or PP application.

If somebody needs it, I can send you a PM with the URL (or just use google). There is a trial version that allows you to test the tool, ut includes a "Trial" watermak.

Hope this is useful and of interest for some forum members.If you have any additional question, post it

Best Regards

Georg (VI)

Senior Contributor Location: Korschenbroich / Deutschland Joined: Mar 18, 2007 09:27 Messages: 1309 Offline

Jul 28, 2008 10:50

If you captured your DV-clip with PD7 and put the clip in the timeline, there is a new button to adding the timecode to the clip. So I think, you do not need a seperate program - but it works only by capturing with PD7 and not with other dv-avi-clips on the harddisc Viele Gruesse Georg

Angel

Newbie Location: Spain Joined: Jun 19, 2008 14:00 Messages: 21 Offline

Jul 28, 2008 12:54

Hi Georg,

What you say is true.

But this tool gives you much more control on WHEN date is included, HOW (font, color size,...) and WHERE (position of date over the clip....

Youa heve the additional benefit that you can apply despite how you capture the DV clip.

In my case I had old captures wich I didn't remember the extact date. Since you apply the tool to the captured file you can use it whith old captures, as I did, to recover the date information

Best Regards