Help with multicam solution

[CaptRR]

First of all let me tell you what I am doing. I record video of little league baseball games for a small non-profit radio stations. We put the radio audio in the audio of the video to make a nice little DVD that the league then sells to raise money. We use two cameras (Cannon HV-30 and Sony DCR-SR47) to record it. The radio audio is laid over the Cannons audio track. After the game I have to take the two recordings, get them into my computer, edit, and then render them out. This takes a very long time, sometimes days, if the source is bad, and if I am stupid enough to record in high def, when its going to end up on a dvd anyways.

I would rather record live to dvd, using vidblaster as the video switcher. I DL'ed the demo, and fired it up, but hit some major snags. The Cannon video is delayed by a good 1 1/2 seconds, so it doesn't line up with the audio coming into the system, not to mention the other camera is delays by even more, so its off too. The cannon is on a fire wire and the sony is on a cheap video capture card.

Would getting two good video capture cards solve this problem? If so what low cost cards should I get, we are not going to be doing high def for a while, but I want to make sure the dvd's look as good as possible, especially in todays world of big screen tv's and upscalers.

Finnally, I want to record right to dvd, that way I don't have to wait for Vidblaster to save a huge file. Anyone know a decent dvd recorder that can record dvd's that can be played in ANY dvd player.

Thanks for everyone help if advanced, if I can pull this off it will save me untold hours of post processing.

[Mike]

Delay times like that can only mean your PC is not keeping up. For your setup I recommend an Intel i7 (see system requirements). Also search the forum , I think Allan is doing something similar incl. capturing to DVD. He should be able to give some good tips. In fact, we should get him to do a making-of video ;D

[CaptRR]

I should have specified my system I am using better. The PC I am using is an i7, with 3 gigs of Ram. The video capture card is an old Hauppage PVR-150, and like I said the Cannon is coming through on the firewire port.

I figure the delay on the Cannon is probably being caused by the firewire buffer, and the delay coming off the Sony is the cause of a cheap capture card. Also the capture card is coming in on composite so the vid quality is pretty bad.

What I was thinking of doing is this. Getting 2 osprey-100's and using the svideo input. I hope that would eliminate the delay factor.

What worries me is video quality. Has anyone has experience with these osprey-100 cards?

I will see if I can contact Allen, and see what kind of dvd recorder he is using, though if anyone else has suggestions I would be happy to hear them :)

[Mike]

Delay is not price related, e.g. the 50$ USB devices I recommend are very fast. No idea about PVR-150. Firewire should be a few frames, nothing near your 1.5 s, so something's very wrong there. Assuming you have a direct firewire connection without hubs or repeaters, all I can think of is that your camera introduces the delay which would be a first to me. And I know a couple users on the forum that have the HV-30, so I would have heard if this was the case. That leaves your system, some weird conflict or something's eating away CPU time. I'd figure that out first, before investing any money.

[CaptRR]

Well I guess if video wasn't tricky then everyone would be doing it :), I begin to see why allot of people opt for a prebuilt system instead of going the DIY route. But in the end, I still believe the money savings are worth it.

I did a little research and apparently their is a delay in PVR-150's, their are some ways to fix it, but I am not very happy with the vid quality coming off that card anyways, so a replacement is definitely in order on that one.

I also found a rouge process that was eating up some cycles on the system. I got the delay down considerable, now its only 1/8 - 1/4 of a second through the firewire. The delay is better, but if you are looking at someone speaking its going to look like an English dubbing of godzilla, with the mouth being slightly out of sync with the video.

Mike I want to say thanks for your help on this one, its helped out allot, and I appreciate you taking time out of your Sunday to respond.

[CaptRR]

I just thought of something that would solve allot of my problems (well the audio anyways). Can vidblaster use the audio coming off the firewire port (i.e. input the audio into the firewire camera)? This would sync the audio up with the main picture. The second camera can be off 1/16 - 1/8 of a second if thats the case.

[Mike]

No, besides then audio would be out of sync with other cameras that come in through e.g. the fast frame grabbers. Suggest you read this (http://vidblaster.com/forum/index.php?topic=153.0) as well as the Help about Cameras.

[CaptRR]

Seems like the more research I do the deeper into the rabbit hole i sink. I was lookng at the USB2821's like you mentioned in the thread but I really hate to buy something like that and then have the same delay problems I have now. In many ways that's why I am leaning towards the osprey cards, I figure since they are professional grade, the delay would be nill.

[Mike]

I have years of practical experience with USB2821 and as I write in the Help, it has minimal delay. Theoretically the Osprey will perform even better, but I cannot speak from experience. I know others on the forum use it.

[CaptRR]

Thanks mike, I really want to buy the USB2821. Really I do, can I ask a quick question. How is the audio and video sync when the camera is facing someone who is speaking? Is the delay noticable?

[Mike]

If you PC is fast enough, I say no. But there are who say yes as they already find a 3 frame delay unacceptable. Note you can always decide to delay your audio (which you'll already do when you use a USB mixer). Most of the recordings in my show Testing123 are done through the USB2821. Here's an episode (http://m.podshow.com/media/2256/episodes/101873/testing123-101873-02-29-2008.wmv)where I even show I am using them. Notice I am using a (very) underpowered machine here, so there is some additional delay.

[CaptRR]

A 3 frame delay would be very, very acceptable. You say you are using a usb mixer to to delay your audio? What kind of mixer are you using? My mixer is a pure analog one, its an older zircom that was given to me a by a radio station years ago, it sounds good, but its from a time before digital, though I am not appose to replacing it with a usb one as long as I don't have to mortgage my house to pay for it.

Also I noticed that the video was pretty smooth, mine to seemed to lose allot of its smoothness once I turned on de-interlacing. Since I am recording baseball, I want it to be as smooth as possible, but since I am going into a dvd recorder (I finally got one btw) I am not sure I will need to deinterlace the video.