Morgan Weistling Paints David R. Darrow (Sped-up 500x)
April 1998
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Running time: 2min, 25sec.
My friendship with Morgan Weistling goes back to 1988 when he substitute-taught for Craig Nelson's class at Art Center College of Design. Somehow, we hit it off and became friends over the years. This same class is where he met his now wife Jo Ann who was studying illustration at the school. They are both wonderful painters, and good friends.
Morgan and Jo Ann asked me to pose for a head-study back in 1998. You can't see me there, because I am directly behind the canvas.
Morgan set up his VHS video camera and ran the feed to his TV so I could also watch the progress of the painting. They painted for 2hrs. and when the tape ran out, they only painted a few more minutes. Later, Morgan gave me a VHS tape with the entire 2hr session on it.
On Feb. 13, 2010, I digitized the VHS tape* so the video quality would degrade no farther.
Morgan's Web site: www.morganweistling.com
Jo Ann's Web site: www.jperalta.com
Questions or Comments? e-mail me david@darrowart.com
*VHS Tapes have a short life
What we never knew about VHS tapes is that they do not last forever. In fact, they degrade slowly each year and become almost unbearable to watch after 15 - 20 years, depending on recording speed and tape quality.
How to digitize old tapes or capture live SD (standard definition) TV.
With my Mac, I connect my DV-camcorder via Firewire with the camera in 'playback mode.' I also connect my VHS player to the camcorder using the little cable that came with the camera that has a 1/8" (3.5mm) 3-section tip (looks like a male headphone tip) and at the other end is has RCA (or composite) connectors.
The Red, White and Yellow connect to the VHS player's OUT jacks (if you only have yellow and white, ignore the red). The other end that looks like a headphone pin goes in the DV-Cam's AV port.
In the camera's settings I turn on 'AV-DV passthrough.' This means that whatever AV (analog video) signal the camera receives through the AV input will be converted to digital and sent back out the Firewire connection. From there I just capture the newly-digitized signal in iMovie, Quicktime Pro, or Final Cut Pro. Windows users can do the same thing with their movie editing software.