How do I convert from SVCD to VHS

[Colindale]

What hardware is required, or necessary

[geek rock]

connect your DVD player up to your VCR, insert blank tape into VCR and SVCD into DVD player, press record on the VCR, press play on the DVD player.

8)

[gmatov]

Someone here in just the past day or 2 asked the same thing, and answered himself when he put a disk in the combination DVD-VHS machine, played and simultaneously, recorded to tape.
If you don't have that, but do have video out, just play on your 'puter to the VCR and record. It was demacroed when you ripped, should be no problem.
Same thing if you don't have video out. Play on the DVD player, record on the VCR.
I've been meaning to do the same with my own setup. All my components are wired more or less in series. Cable box, DVD,VCR, VCR#2, TV.
My cap card is direct from the cable before the box, no premium/digital channels, and Video out goes to the a/v inputs on front of the second VCR.
I WILL admit, I have one hellacious tangle of wires on the floor behind all this stuff. And, I'm due to have the carpets scrubbed, and shudder to think of reconnecting all these damn wires when I put it all back together.

[gmatov]

Boy, did the geek beat me to the draw, in 10% of the words.
But, yes, that's it.
(Gotta learn to type!)

[Colindale]

Thanks, now that's not too hard, piece of cake!.

Thanks again.

[gmatov]

Piece of cake.
I love the response.
Have fun

[DJRumpy]

The only problem I see with what you're suggesting, is that most SVCD projects are multi-disc, making the 'pause to swap disc' bit a little ugly on the recorded project. There is also the issue of overlapped video from SVCD to SVCD. Most overlap about 2 seconds of repeat video (why do they do this? Is their memory that short?). To clean those up effectively, and get rid of the overlap, you can use AVISynth and MPEG2DEC (or MPEG2DEC3 if you use AVISynth 2.5) to play back your mutli-disc SVCD set as a single video.

Save all your SVCD MPEG's to disc. Open them all in DVD2AVI (use the ADD button if you need to..ensure their in order). Save it as a project file ( filename.D2V ).

LoadPlugin("mpeg2dec.dll")
mpeg2source("filename.d2v")

At that point, save your AVS script in the same directory as your .D2V project file. Drag/Drop the AVS script into VirtualDub. Use the slider to find the join points for each SVCD. Look for overlap where the first disc ends, and the second begins. The cut frame will be all pixelated. Note the frame number previous to the pixelated frame. You also need to note some landmark on that frame so you can identify that exact frame from the second disc. Find that frame where the second disc starts, and go one frame beyond it, and again, note the frame number.

Now you should have both the end frame # for the first disc, and the starting frame # for the second disc, which begins exactly 1 frame after your first disc frame #. Repeat this process for each disc in the set (you're done if your svcd disc set only has 2 discs).

Open your .AVS script in NOTEPAD again, and add the following lines:

LoadPlugin("mpeg2dec.dll")
mpeg2source("filename.d2v")
clip1=Trim(0,disc1endframe)
clip2=Trim(disc2startframe,0)

The 0 at th end of the clip2 line indicates 'to the end'. If you have more discs in the set, it would have the endframe# of disc 2 instead. Just replace the discXstart/endframe with the Frame #'s you gather in VDub.

Save your .AVS, and drop it into media player to ensure your splices don't have any major hiccups.

You can now play your .AVS as if it was an AVI, and output directly to your VHS as a single joined movie, with no overlap, and no pausing to swap discs.

[Hardcoreruss]

Also watch out on the pal ntsc problem.

When I first tried to do this I had a multi region player (ntsc vcd) but a pal vcr and because of this everything was black and white make sure the standards match each other.

[DJRumpy]

This isn't a problem. If your want to convert from PAL to NTSC, just include this line in your final script:

LoadPlugin("mpeg2dec.dll")
mpeg2source("filename.d2v")
clip1=Trim(0,disc1endframe)
clip2=Trim(disc2startframe,0)
clip1++clip2

w = width()
BicubicResize(int(w),480)
AssumeFPS(23.976,True)

If you want to convert from NTSC to PAL, add this line:

LoadPlugin("mpeg2dec.dll")
mpeg2source("filename.d2v")
clip1=Trim(0,disc1endframe)
clip2=Trim(disc2startframe,0)
clip1++clip2

w = width()
BicubicResize(int(w),576)
AssumeFPS(25,True)

If you don't need to convert between the two, just leave the blue lines off.

[thayne]

(why do they do this? Is their memory that short?)

It's so you don't cut off someone in mid sentance and miss something.

[DJRumpy]

I'll chalk it up to a difference in technique. When I created SVCD's, I'd pick a scene that didn't have that problem (no talking), or a transition/fade. I'm guessing the majority are due to DVD2SVCD folks, who have no idea where the splice might land.

Someone should ask the author to attempt a split on a detected scene change when possible.