What resolution is my Handycam ? do I capture at this res?

[scottb721]

I have a Sony 8mm analog handycam, TR511E PAL, and I'm wondering what resolution to capture to in VirtualDub.
Or, should I just capture at the resolution of my final product , eg SVCD at 480x576 ?
It is a Hi-8 camera but I only use regular tapes, not Hi-8 tapes.

Thanks

[Gees]

Generally speaking :c) capture at higher than or equal to final intended output. Always resize down, never up.

[scottb721]

But if I capture at a resolution that is greater than the source material won't that introduce garbage to the picture as it tries to fill in the gaps during the capture process?

[Gees]

I'm not sure what you mean by "filling in the gaps", but if you read - for instance - any threads on capturing from VCR, most people would capture at 720x480 (for NTSC) when VCR is actually much lower "resolution" than that. (Although it's not exactly the same thing.)

Lots of people capture at half D1, Some prefer that, others don't.

With most things, it's always an idea and good practice to try small segments in many ways - as tests - and see which you prefer.

[pijetro]

Or, should I just capture at the resolution of my final product , eg SVCD at 480x576

That's a good idea, considering that you've pretty well captured all the relevant analogue info. you'll need for decent quality output. The fact that your encoder doesn't have to resize, should improve speed...

A clean source is the most important factor.

I've noticed many a thread arguing for and against capture and/or encode resolutions
From personal experience, 1) a good source with minimum noise, 2) huffy compression, 3) at half d1 capture and convert, will produce phenomenal quality...Especially for interlaced output like you're attempting to do.

When tapes get degraded, and quality of footage wasn't good to begin with, then the topics get more interesting. You'll find more people arguing for 720x480 captures.
But even with this scenario, I still prefer half D1 captures, and filter out the noise before encoding....

[scottb721]

Sony says the output res for my XR video8 camera is approx 300 lines.

Say for instance my desired product is 480 x 576 SVCD.

If I capture at 480, doesn't the capture app (Huffy & Vdub in my case) have to create extra picture info the same way that TMPGE would for a SVCD conversion of a 300 capture ?

To me, it seems both have to create extra picture info to turn 300 lines into 480 lines, they're just doing at different parts of the process.

[Gees]

I think your situtation has been answered twice. It is the way to do it. Trust us. We would not lie to you. :c)

You are getting overly concerned about your source "resolution". You can not produce a working disc with less than what's specified for that type of disk. See What Is SVCD on the left (if that's what you're making) for more info.

[Dragonsf]

A gerneral question: as 480x480 (or 480x576 PAL) is not a 4:3 AR, wouldn't a capture in this format (without resizing before encoding) produce a strange looking picture on a SVCD?
I always thought, that one should capture with the same AR as the source is and change eveyrthing later.

[fmctm1sw]

A gerneral question: as 480x480 (or 480x576 PAL) is not a 4:3 AR, wouldn't a capture in this format (without resizing before encoding) produce a strange looking picture on a SVCD?
I always thought, that one should capture with the same AR as the source is and change eveyrthing later.

On a computer screen, yes, it will look rather square. But it's OK on a TV. Someone explained to me a while back that it's got everything to do with a digital computer monitor vs an analog TV set.