I have many tapes, how do I know what's on them?

This is the first of a series of How-To notes, describing how to perform various common logging tasks.

CatDV is designed to help you pull together all the information you have about what's on a tape to make it easier to manage your tape library and find scenes again. It will also manage low resolution previews that you can use even when the contents of a tape are not currently captured to disk.

1. First you need to load the information into CatDV:
   • If you have previously edited any projects containing material from your tapes then you can import those projects into CatDV to avoid retyping previously logged clip names.
   • If you have logged your tapes by hand (or using another application) you can import text files or EDLs.
   • If you have captured the contents of your tapes and have the movies on-line you can import QuickTime movies.
2. To find clips on a tape it's important that the correct tape identifier is entered for all your clips. Use the editing commands within CatDV to correct any mistakes or missing data. (For example, you could used the Search dialog to find all the clips from a particular project, then group by tape and drag the selected clips onto the correct tape name or use the Bulk Edit command.)
3. Once your clips are in a CatDV catalog there are lots of things you can do to help you find those of interest. For example, you could:
   • group clips according to the tape they are on,
   • search for a keyword in the notes field,
   • print out a single page index print to file with each tape,
   • display the DV date & time of recording of each scene,
   • create preview versions of your movies to use even when the media is offline,
   • share a catalog containing thumbnails with clients or friends, even if they don't have access to the original movies.
4. To build previews for a tape that is currently online (i.e. that has been captured to disk), select all the clips for that tape, ensuring they have the correct tape name, then use Build preview movies. Use the Preference options to determine the size and quality of previews.