How much Video Should You Use?
Mixing in video is like spicing your food, a little bit goes a long way. Where 3-4 seconds is the right amount of time for a still photo, 5-10 seconds is more than enough for video. Anything longer than 10 seconds will seem like an eternity, your audience will thank you for brevity.
I like to mix in three types of images: straight still photos (50%), still images with pans - where it appears that the "camera" is panning from side to side over a photo, or zooming in/out (30%), and video clips (20%). This means that half of the images will have movement, and half will be static. This gives the viewers' eyes a rest, but keeps them engaged. Once you are at the level of mixing in video, panning still shots is a must. Not all packages support panning/cropping, but both the entry level Sony Vegas Movie Studio + DVD and the professional Sony Vegas + DVD do.
Video Formats
Before we go any further, a quick primer on source formats. There are three main types of media (and several formats for each) in which your videos are likely to be.
Film
8mm
Super 8mm
Videotape
VHS
VHS-C
S-VHS
Video 8
Video Hi-8
Digital Tape
Mini-DV
Transferring video to DVD or digital
Local camera stores are urging people to use their reseller products like YesDVD to transfer all of your old movies and videos to DVD. There are four issues with this.
Shelf Life
DVDs should last longer than VHS tape, but there is considerable debate about the longevity of DVDs. Many practitioners believe that metal particle DV tape is a far more stable medium. Also, formats will change, and DVDs will become old technology some day.
Boredom
Let's face it - one of the main motivators for transferring those video tapes to DVD in the first place is so you do something without having to actually watch them. If you haven't watched those 20 hours of deadly birthday party videos yet, transferring them to DVD won't make you view them more often, it will just (maybe) preserve the images longer for you to not watch them later. You will need to do some basic triage; cutting a meaningful 20 second clip from a deadly 5 minute sequence is a good thing. It will also save you time and money at the other end. You are not likely to use anything longer than a 15 second clip in any montage anyway, so you might as well take care of it now.
Cost
Transferring video and film is expensive. YesDVD charges $25/tape in retail stores. If you do your editing up front, you can significantly reduce the amount of original footage you need to transfer.
Ability to use later
If all you are going to do is plop down and watch the transferred video end to end, transferring to DVD is fine. However, if you are going to want to use it in small pieces to create montages and other edited work, you will need it in a form that is easy to transfer to your computer and drop into your video editing software.
You have two choices: mini-DV tape or an MPEG-2 data file stored on a DVD-R data disc. The mini-DV tape is the same vehicle as your current digital video camera. The information is stored without compression on the tape, and when transferred to the computer, it is saved in an (also very large, uncompressed) AVI file. The MPEG-2 file is the already compressed audio/video on the DVD. The DVD just wraps some additional stuff, like menus and chapters, around it. But once your video is saved as an AVI or MPEG-2 file, it is very easy to drop it on the editing line in your video editor. It can be difficult to extract the video from a DVD disc if you want to edit it later.
I would suggest that you transfer (when possible) to DV tape, not DVD. DV tape has much higher resolution than DVD, and is a cinch to incorporate into your projects. Granted, the picture quality of the original VHS tape may be so lousy that you won't be able to tell the difference, but I would try and do it anyway. Here is a good primer on these issues.
Editing down your videos, and transferring
Film
If your source material is 8mm or Super 8 film (pre-video days), you'll need to use a vendor to transfer to digital. A three inch reel holds 50 feet, or 3.7 minutes of film. A 7 inch reel holds 400 feet, or 30 minutes of film. YesVideo at your local photo store charges $50 for the first 250 feet, then 10 cents a foot, or around $85 for a 7 inch, 30 minute reel. HomeMovieDepot.com is a flat 9 cents/foot, or $36 for the same 7 inch reel. If your splicing skills are good, you may want to edit down the film before transfer to save some transfer costs. However, if your splices are sloppy, this can result in additional charges at the lab. I have not used either of these two labs, so I don't have an opinion on their quality. There are many more transfer labs on the web.
Videotape
You can send your videotape off to a transfer lab, but it is fairly easy, and much more affordable, to make the transfers yourself.
If mini-DV tape is your destination, you have two choices. Some DV cameras (such as the Canon ZR-700 (priced less than $350 at Amazon) have an analog line-in converter. This means you can simply plug the line out from your VHS or High-8 video camera or player into the analog in of the camera, and either record to a mini-DV tape, or pass the signal directly to your PC to capture directly to an AVI file.
If you don't have a camera with an analog line-in converter, you can purchase a simple Digital/Analog converter box like the Canopus ADVC-110 (priced less than $230 at Amazon). You plug the analog out from the camcorder or VCR into the analog in of the ADVC-110, and then the firewire digital out connects to either the DV camera (to record to DV tape) or to your computer's firewire port to capture video to disk.
Digital Tape
Video shot on a digital camcorder is already on mini-DV tape. If you want to transfer the video to your PC for editing or burning a DVD, you'll need a firewire cable (it probably came with your camera) and a firewire port on your PC (you may have to buy an inexpensive firewire card if your PC didn't come with a firewire port.
Royalty-free music
If you want to distribute your DVD more widely, and need to insure that your music is royalty-free, a common solution is a composition engine that uses prerecorded loops, or snippets of music that are linked together. Sony produces an excellent professional sound library tool called Acid (priced under $350 at Amazon) , as well as an entry level alternative called Acid XMC (less than $35 at Amazon).
Reproducing your DVDs
If you are only making one or two DVDs, burning them yourself makes lots of sense. However, if you need to make more, it works out better to use a duplicator. My favorite is a very slick, well-priced online duplicator called Discmakers. I have used then a couple of times and their quality, ease of use, and pricing is excellent.