Preparing for Digital Video Capture

The process of transferring video into your computer is often called capturing. Capturing digital video is pretty easy, but you should take some specific steps to ensure everything goes smoothly:

• Install your hardware. Your computer needs the right components to capture video — which means (among other things) having a FireWire or other capture card installed.
• Turn off unnecessary programs. If you are like most people, you probably have several different programs running on your computer right now. Video capture requires a lot of available memory and processor power, and every running program on your computer uses some of those resources. E-mail, Web browser, and MP3 jukebox? Close ’em down. Cute desktop schemes and screen savers? Disable those too. I even recommend that you temporarily disable your antivirus software during video capture. If you’re using Windows, take a look at the System Tray. (That’s the area in the lower right corner of your screen, next to the clock.) Every little icon you see down there is a running program. Right-click each icon and close or disable as many of them as possible. You don’t have to get rid of every single item, but do try to close or disable as many as possible. After all, it’s a temporary arrangement. You should also disable your Internet connection during video capture as well. You can reactivate System Tray items later— including your antivirus software— by simply restarting your computer. If you’re using a Macintosh, look at the OS X Dock to make sure your programs are closed To quit a program, click its icon in the Dock and press Ô+Q. The only icon you won’t be able to quit is the Finder, of course.
• Defragment your hard disk. When your computer’s operating system puts files on your hard disk, those files may wind up spread all over the place. This means that even if you have 60GB of free space, that 60GB might be broken up into little chunks here and there. This can cause trouble during video capture, especially with Windows machines, and most especially with version of Windows before Windows XP (such as Windows Me). Even if you have a Mac, it’s still a good regular computer maintenance practice, and if you experience dropped frames during video capture, defragmentation can only help. I recommend you defragment your hard disk monthly, or right before video capture if the disk hasn’t been defragmented recently. Defragmentation organizes the files on your hard disk so that the empty space will be in larger, more usable chunks. Some computer experts will probably tell you that defragmentation isn’t as important with modern operating systems like OS X and Windows XP, but that advice does not really apply when you’re working with video. Video is one of the few remaining tasks which still requires a defragmented hard disk. To defragment a hard disk in Windows, choose Start➪All Programs➪ Accessories➪System Tools➪Disk Defragmenter. Choose the hard disk you want to defragment, and click Defragment (Windows XP) or OK (Windows Me and earlier). The Macintosh OS doesn’t come with a built-in defragmenter, but you can use an aftermarket defragmentation utility such as Norton Disk-Doctor or Apple Disk First Aid.
• Make sure you have enough hard-disk space. Why is the process of transferring video to the hard disk called capturing instead of just copying? Even though the video is stored as digital data on your camcorder tape, that data must be turned into a computer file in order to be stored on your hard disk. Capturing is the process of turning video data into a computer file.