Capturing MiniDV as a background operation

[defaulta5r6kjkr0zbs]

Hello everyone,

I wanted to know if there was a way, when capturing video footage from a camera, to let the recording work in the background. As it is now, I literally have to watch the footage being recorded in that capture window - any click outside it will force the recording (and camera) to stop.

If this was intentional, what would be the reason behind this?

Thanks for your help,

Chris

[Ann Bens]

Alas, no background process. That is way it has been designed.

You cannot do anything else during capture.

If its HDV you can use HDVSplit and use Premiere meanwhile.

[defaulta5r6kjkr0zbs]

So, you also believe it is not the preferable way to a well-managed and efficient workflow. 
What could be the reasoning behind this apparent design flaw? I am just curious to such decisions that do not make any sense at all. There is nothing productive I could think off, when capturing hours of footage and not being able to multi-task around it.

I am a software developer myself and need to know the thought behind this decision, to possibly improve myself.

[defaulta5r6kjkr0zbs]

Edit: I just realized, this makes capturing footage (literally) impossible with Premiere. Nobody could wait hours after hours and just sit there, stopping any work that should be done, because one has to wait. It is insane if you think about it. 

[Ann Bens]

If its preferable or not that is how it works (for several decades).

So does other capture software.

Guessing you never had to capture tapes in the past.

Get a separate machine to do the capture.

For DV you can use WinDV  (windows only, but you dont say which OS).

[Jeff Bellune]

You can't capture and edit with Pr. You can't capture and edit with Final Cut Pro X. FCPX won't even let you click outside the import window until you tell it to stop capturing. I assume the same is true for other NLEs, but I have no first-hand knowledge. 

You can, however, capture with one program and edit with another. I capture with FCPX and edit with Pr because Pr on a Mac can't capture footage via FireWire any more. So far it's been stable doing both at the same time.

I've also used Lifeflix, but it has huge issues with time/date stamps if you manage the footage outside of Lifeflix. And it's not as robust as FCPX when you have to recover from tape dropouts.

[Rag and Bone]

I have no idea how well this works, but, if you're on a Mac, you could try out lifeflix —they offer a free trial.

Perhaps its footprint is small enough to allow you to run it while doing other things.

[Ann Bens]

As I understand OP wants to edit and capture at the same time with Premiere.....

You can capture with Premiere and do something else with another program (but I would advise against it to avoid capture misstakes).

[defaulta5r6kjkr0zbs]

Thanks. This is what I want to know how to do. Whenever I start capturing, I am not allowed to minimize or put that capture window into the background. The recording will immediately come to a halt. How can I do it like you proposed?

[Oscar30784380ldos]

I got capture working on background by diable all previews will capturing, It's worth a try. The only bad thing is that you can't monitor while it's capturing. You'll have to wait untill the capture is done to check the saved file.

[Peru Bob]

Note to all using capture in Premiere Pro:

2023 is the last version supporting capture.

You can use these programs for capture:

WinDV   WinDV

HDVSplit   HDVSplit 0.77 beta