What is a dropout ?
A dropout is when your camera fails to record an image for a short period. The most common cause is the tape losing contact with the recording heads. This can be because of irregular tape shrinkage, poor tape tensioning (along the length of the tape most often, but sometimes across the height of the tape), excessive camera motion, poor tape storage practices or defects in the tape surface. Most of the time dropouts look like an area of the screen that is black with random square or rectangular digital artifacts appearing all over the picture area. There is often a clicking or whistling sound, or a digital shirping that accompanies a visual dropout. It is possible to have either a video or audio dropout alone, but video dropouts are far more common.
