Restoring a poor quality Vhs

[MajinDave]

Hi guys , i have a video that was recorded of the Scifi channel , but it's in very bad shape , there is tons of noice and alot of scanlines . Any advice on how to make it better ? I know how to use virtual dub , but not sure what filters are reguired for this case .

[lordsmurf]

Scanlines? Leave interlace alone.

As far as the noise, STATIC NOISE REDUCTION with default settings, and then DYNAMIC NOISE REDUCTION with default settings. Select the interlace box where needed on those, I forget which one has it. Raise them slightly above defaults if more is needed, but do NOT go too far, else you can get ghosting on the temporal filters.

If you have chroma noise (I think I see some, but it's hard to see on stills), then use the CHROMA NOISE REDUCTION filter with default settings. Maybe raise them a bit, but again, watch for color ghosting.

Search google for these, they are not part of the base VirtualDub package.

[MajinDave]

That definitely made an improvement , but not by much , The noice is still a bit vissible . Going to try Neat video filter to remove the rest .

[lordsmurf]

What VCR are you using? VCR is more important than anything else when transferring tapes.

Also understand visible noise on computer may not be seen on the set at all, as tv is much lower res than the computer monitor. Burn a test to DVD and watch on tv.

[MajinDave]

i'm using a LG al182w VCR , i tryed burning it on DVD , the difference is about 30% in quality increase .

[lordsmurf]

Your VCR is not very good, so the signal it outputs is already noisy. You'd have no such issues with better S-VHS equipment. So you're fighting your own hardware, not entirely the fault of the tape.

[MajinDave]

Yeah you probably right , my Vcr is a toy ... , what is currently the best Vcr (regardless the price) ?

[swiego]

My vote would be for a JVC BR-S525DXU.