Is there any way to....

[skip2mylou]

Hi everybody i have a large library of home videos that have a lot of memories on them and i was wondering if there is anyway to be able to convert them onto VCD without a DVD recorder with minimum hardware requirements. i was hoping that there could be some kind of wire or cord that i could hook up my VCR to my PC and play the tapes on my PC then be able to convert them to MPEG somehow and then burn them onto a VCD. if anybody knows anyway how to do this give me all the advice you can squeeze. if it provides any help, i am getting a dig. camcorder that uses MiniDV tapes so if i can like convert my VHS tapes to MiniDV, that would be cool too.
thanks

[psx_pirate]

you need to fit a capture card into your computer so that you can copy the video from your camcorder to your computer

[Vejita-sama]

To burn VCD/SVCD/CVD you only need a CDRW. You only need a DVDR drive to burn DVDs. The main difference (quaility wise) between CDR and DVDR is that DVDR's hold more and support a much higher bitrate (see what is section to left).

VCD - 352x240 video = 1150kbit/s
SVCD - 480x480 video = 2520kbit/s
CVD - 352x480 video = 2520kbit/s
DVD - 720x480 video = 6000-8000kbit/s

For most backups CVD is a better choice then VCD (as you capture/retain both fields). However you can only put ~40min of video per 80min CDR.

See the guides to the left on Capture, Convert, Author for more info. Basically you buy a capture card and 'record' your videos to your HD. Then encode them to MPEG1/MPEG2, then author them as CVD (or whatever) and burn to CDR.

As an aside DVD burners are dropping in price. The new lite-on is suppose to go for like $150 mail order IIRC.

[ZippyP.]

If you are getting a DV camcorder then you can use that to capture and convert your analog VHS footage to DV. The camcorder has to have a video input in order to capture. The DV footage is then transfered via firewire into your computer which needs to have a firewire adapter. The DV footage can then be edited and filtered and fed to a software mpeg encoder such as TMPGEnc. The resulting mpeg can be burned to CD or DVD depending on the mpeg format you want.

It might be desirable to have a camcorder with video pass through. Pass-through enables analog footage to be converted to dv by the camera and fed via firewire to your pc "on the fly." By that I mean it isn't recorded to tape first then fed at later time to your pc. Basically, in this setup your DV camera takes the place of a pc capture card.

Perhaps someone that uses analog to DV pass-through can recommend a camera.

[skip2mylou]

hey zippyP. can u walk me through on how to do that let me tell u what i need again. i am trying to be able to convert my VHS tapes to MPEG then onto VCD. so how do i do it with my dig. camcorder and is there any way that i can do it without a dig. camcorder if so please tell. please break down the steps for i am not an easy learner thanks.

[Heavensent]

if you have a digital camcorder with a passthrough
(some have it and some dont), than you need to get a firewire card.
you need to connect the vcr to the camcorder use the software on your comuter to save the avi.
you need something like studio 8, premiere.
there are a lot of programs that will let you do that so you will have to
choose the one you like the most.
most of these programs will let you convert the movie into other formats
like - vcd,svcd,dvd....
so you will be able to burn the movie to cd's or dvd's.

if you dont have a digital camcorder and a firewire card, you will have to use some sort of a capture card or a tv tuner.
if you buy one of these cards, you will connect the vcr into them and
record into the computer.
there are free programs that will let you capture throw these cards,
and they all come with software that will also let you do that.

if money is an issue than just buy a simple tv tuner card (really cheap)
and use that to do what you wanted.
you will need a lot of harddisk space to capture in good qulity.

after that you will be able to convert the movie you captured to vcd.svcd.dvd using different encoders (TMPEG is a good and a cheap one)

i myself use an old pinnacle pctv pro tv tuner card, and it works fine for me.

[skip2mylou]

what does this TV tuner do in particular and how much does it cost. is it some kind of device that has a cable that connects to my PC then letting me upload the file. how much does this tuner cost, under 30 maybe cause i am really in tight and what would the softwares that i need be? Is NERO or Ulead Moviefactory good?

[ZippyP.]

i am getting a dig. camcorder that uses MiniDV tapes so if i can like convert my VHS tapes to MiniDV, that would be cool too.

If you are buying a DV camcorder anyway, then you might want to purchase one that has video input as well as pass-through capability. DV camcorders are hooked into PC's via a Firewire port, which is a card that needs to be installed in your PC. So in this setup a VCR can be hooked up to a camcorder which is hooked up to the Firewire port on your PC. Press play on the VCR, start the recording software on your PC and the footage is captured in DV format on your hard drive. You will need a large hard drive with plenty of free space, DV takes up about 13 Gigabytes of space per hour of footage. I think this setup would be superior to a TV capture card.


So the steps are: Capture, Edit, Convert then Author (and Burn). You'll notice that each step is a section on the left hand margin of this website.