Capturing from my DV camcorder: artefacts with straight lines (fuzzy)

hydrocynus · Member Joined: 14 May 2007 Location: United States

Hello all. Awesome forum!

Well, I have Panasonic PVDV102 that has firewire. My XPS Dell laptop also has firewire so the connection with the camera is easy and the capture is in real time.

If I play the video I recorded directly on TV through the cables provided with the camcorder, the video is crystal clear with NO artefacts.

Now, when I capture the DV stream into my computer, I have the following problem:
- when the camera or the subject is moving slowly, I do not have any artefacts
- when the camera or the subject is moving quite fast, I have some artefacts that are like horizontal lines on the edges of the subject. This is pretty obvious in a footage I shot last week of my son playing tennis. All the white lines on the court are fuzzy. See picture below

I do not know how to fix that.
I use Scenalyzer to capturing my DV streams. This capture problem does not seem to be linked to the computer with firewire capabilities I use, since I have the same artefacts when I use my desktop, which is quite powerful.

Any idea why I have these problems and how to solve these annoying artefacts?
Anything else is perfect, no dropped frames and great audio/video synchro.

Serge

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Baldrick · Administrator Joined: 09 Aug 2000 Location: Sweden

The dv video is interlaced and you will see it on your computer monitor.
Read http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interlace

What is you goal with the video? make a dvd? convert to a video format for computers?

jagabo · Member Joined: 09 Dec 2005 Location: none

Yes, your video is interlaced and the software you are using is deinterlacing it (for display on the computer) by throwing away one field and duplicating the other. Otherwise you would see interlace comb artifacts which look even worse.

As Baldrick hinted, if you are making a DVD, ignore the PC display and burn an interlaced DVD. Make sure your MPEG encoder recognizes the source as bottom field first.

hydrocynus · Member Joined: 14 May 2007 Location: United States

Dang, you are fast!

My goal is to burn a DVD that plays as well as when I play my DV from my camcorder with not interlacing artefacts.
Actually, I am testing the camcorder that is mounted on a Helmet to end with a helmet cam. The cam should record flyfishing DVD quality movies for my sponsor to show how his fly reels perform. It does not need to be HD, but DVD quality will suffice.

I have no problem ignoring the artefacts on the PC, but now, how do I burn it so that I get rid of the artefacts?

I use generally TMPGenc to encode my DVDs... but I still get the artefacts mentioned here. How do I set it up to get rid of them. Any other programs that would do a better job?

Thanks again for the tips!

Serge

jagabo · Member Joined: 09 Dec 2005 Location: none

Make sure TMPGEnc identifies your source as interlaced and bottom field first. If it doesn't, correct it. Then convert to BFF interlaced MPEG2 and burn to DVD. You're DVD player will play the resulting DVD exactly the same way your camcorder plays the DVD tape.

Each frame of interlaced video contains two half pictures. One half picture is in all the even numbered scanlines, the other in the odd numbered scanlines. When you view this on an interlaced TV you see one field at a time. You don't see the whole frame at once. From a camcorder the two half pictures were taken a two different times (1/60 of a second apart). Since you see only one field at a time on the TV the right one has to be displayed first. Otherwise you'll get very fast jerky motions.

On a progressive computer monitor you see both fields at the same time unless the software you're viewing with deinterlaces in some way. If anything moved during the 1/60 second between the two fields you will see interlace comb artifacts.

edDV · Posted: May 14, 2007 19:56