I'm using a ATI Wonder TV tuner card to capture TV video. It has a composite input so you can connect it to your VCR or camcorder. Works pretty well. I also have a Firewire card which I use with my Sony HandyCam to capture video. 

You can even create VCDs so you can watch your videos on your DVD player.
http://www.linuxdoc.org/HOWTO/VCR-HOWTO.html

On Fri, 11 Jan 2002, Miller, John wrote:

> Has anyone done any video editing with their Linux machine.  I am looking to build a new machine and am looking for pointers on components, mainly the video card.  I would like video in and video out so I can transfer video tape to the computer.  I am also thinking of taking some of the videos and making DVD's out of them.  
> 
> The components that I am thinking about so far are
> AMD XP 1800 or 1900
> Elitegroups ESC K7S5A with the SIS735 chipset.  Tomshardware gave it a good review.
> 512 MB DDR
> 36 GB SCSI Ultra 160 Drive
> SCSI DVD-Ram and CD-RW (2 components)
>