Karl,

To accomplish this, you will need a computer with a video
digitizing card.  I have used the Matrox Rainbow Runner
Suite for digitizing video from VHS/SVHS tape.  You can then
used Adobe Premier to edit/join tape segments, add
audio/narration and produce your own digital video file.
(AVI)  If all you want to do is digitize the video, you
don't need Adobe Premiere as the video card will come with a
program to capture video to a file.

You will then need to write a computer program to display
the video when a button is "clicked" as you describe.  Your
program could manage several short video clips.  This all
depends on the size of the hard drive you put in the
computer and the length of the videos you are playing as
well as the compression scheme used to digitize the video.
It is possible that you may need to equip the computer with
an AV rated hard drive.  This is a high-speed hard drive
designed to play back video smoothly.

You will need a computer with a P-100 or higher processor,
the video card will cost around $400, and an AV-rated HD
usually runs $2x to $3x more then an IDE drive of the same
capacity.

Matrox has a listing of it's products at www.matrox.com

Mark C. Vang
Freya Ventures
www.freyaventures.com
[log in to unmask]


************
We have one exhibit on the floor which includes a short
videotape in a
TV-VCR combination which aotomatically rewinds and plays
again.  I am
preparing an exhibit for which I am considering showing the
"movie" via
computer display so that clicking a button (or touching a
"button" on
the screen) will start a digitized version of the movie
playing from the
hard drive of the computer, or restart it at the beginning,
or change to
a different movie.
Does anyone have experience with equipment which gives the
viewer more
control when viewing short video material related to an
exhibit?  Or
recommendations about what kind of equipment to use for
repetitive
playing of a short video?
------------------------------