Burn digital camera videos to VCD
Burn digital camera videos to VCD
Worcester Telegram, MA
TECH Q&A
THE NEW YORK TIMES
Q How do I copy short videos taken with a digital camera to a CD-R that can be played on a CD/DVD player? The videos have been stored in my PC, which is equipped with a recordable CD drive.
A If your computer does not have a drive that can record DVDs, you can probably burn your digital camera’s clips to a video compact disc, also known as a VCD.
A video compact disc is a CD that can play moving pictures and audio in the MPEG-1 format. Many (but not all) DVD players can play video compact discs. With the right software, you can also play a VCD in a computer’s CD drive.
At the most, a VCD can hold about 80 minutes of video, and the picture quality is typically not as sharp as a movie encoded for DVD; many have compared the picture with that of a movie on VHS tape. Another format, Super Video CD (SVCD), offers better picture quality but doesn’t hold as much video.
If your PC did not come with software that can convert video to MPEG-1 and create video compact discs, other commercial video-editing programs are available. Many programs for creating DVDs also give you an option to make a VCD.
There are specialized programs like VCD Easy ( www.vcdeasy.org; a free trial download is available) for creating these discs. The VideoHelp site ( www.videohelp.com) is one place for further reading on the topic, with information, forums and tutorials on making your own VCD and SVCD movies.
Q Is there any way to move all of my appointments from the Palm Desktop Date Book into iCal in Mac OS X?
A Apple’s iCal calendar program, included with Mac OS X, can import data from other scheduling programs. First, though, you have to export your data from the Palm Desktop program.
In Palm Desktop 4.0 or later, go to the File menu and choose Export. Give the file a name, choose “Date Book” from the Module pop-up menu and also choose “All Date Book Items.” Choose “vCal” as the file’s format and click on the Export button to save a copy of your Date Book schedule on your computer.
Next, open the iCal program, go to the File menu and choose Import. Click on the button to “Import a vCal file” and click Import. Locate the vCal file you just saved from the Palm program and select it to import to pull them into iCal.
Apple’s technical support site for iCal ( www.apple.com/support/ical) has several articles on working with the program, including using it with a Palm organizer or iPod, or publishing your calendar to the Web.
Add comment April 9th, 2007