8MM Home Movies to Digital, looking for comments on method

[rlchapin]

Hi folks, first post on the forum. I have read quite a bit but was wondering if anyone can offer some sugggestions for improvement on my large project. Any information would be appreciated. I am a Newbie to Digital Video.

We bought a Sony 8MM camcorder in 1993. I still have all of the original 8MM tapes. We transferred them to VHS over the years, but I kept the original 8MM's. I tried transferring from the VHS tapes to digital but the quality was not good. Then I figured going to back to the original tapes would help, and it did a little.

The camcorder has an RCA video output and and RCA audio output (only one audio) and it has another plug between the two of them. The cable provided for the transfer with the camcorder has a funky plug on the end with the two RCA plugs and this other plug in the middle (the cable says RTU or RFU, typing this at work so not sure). The end that plugged into the VCR was just COAX.

I am transferring through my digital camcorder (Cannon ZR45). It allows analog to digital transfer through it. The Cannon came with a cable that has three RCA plugs Video, Left Audio, Right Audio for the output side, it goes into a special plug on the Cannon ZR45. Since my old Sony camcorder only has one audio out I just use one. My DVD's end up with sound only coming out of one speaker. Any options here?

Capture software: WinDV
MPEG encoding: TMPGEnc
DVD Authoring: TSUANMI Pro, formerly TMPGEnc Author (I guess?)
VirtualDub : for misc clipping and merging of AVI files.

The video quality is okay. Any improvement options anyone can offer?

Remember my newbie-ness when offering suggestions.

Thanks for any and all help,
Bob

[Richard_G]

Your 8mm camcorder has only mono audio, hence only the one audio output. By connecting that to just one of the audio connections on your digital camcorder you are only connecting the left or right audio channel. Hence you only get audio out of one speaker. Get a splitter and split the mono audio from your 8mm camcorder so you can connect to both left and right channels. The audio will still be in mono but it will be the same coming out of both speakers. Other than that your method seems fine.

[suppafreak]

Never used the WinDV, but if there is a way to capture audio in MONO, might fix the audio problem. Improving the video is much harder. That will require, playing with a lot of filters and adjustments, which most likely not available in the software you are using. It is also possible to improve the quality using the external hardware, but the cost does not justifies the means. I think TMPGEnc has some filters that can be applied during the encoding, but other than that you are out of luck.

[redwudz]

VD is a good simple editor for DV. It also has many filters available that can improve problem videos. But go easy with filtering, it can reduce resolution if overdone.

I use VDMod for DV but any of the VD versions are fine. I also frameserve the output of VD directly to TMPGEnc encoder. This speeds up the process and doesn't create an intermediate file, saving hard drive space. A guide for frameserving with VD:

https://www.videohelp.com/virtualdubframeserve.htm

Some filters won't work with frameserving, so be aware.

I also save out the audio as a WAV in VD and convert it to AC3 with ffmpeggui. This saves space on the final DVD that can be used for a higher video bitrate and better quality. I then add the AC3 back in during authoring.

As Richard_G mentioned, get a 'Y' RCA splitter and convert your mono audio to stereo. You can do it with software, but that's simpler.

[rlchapin]

Thanks for the input. I picked up a splitter last night!

[INFRATOM]

I have Sony cam from that erra, it was a Hi8 broke down I had to buy one just to save my old tapes and bought one that also has digital feed through it makes it very easy connecting through firewire. All these cams are stereo you just need the special cable that came with it. It has a big stereo banana jack. The one you are talking about is the RF cable to connect to to TV antenna if necessary most TV's had A/V input though. One other thing my new Sony cam came with its software to capture .. it gave me hell and it didn't work then I got Ulead and was compatible with all the camera features better than Sony package.

[handyguy]

Just get a dvd recorder, it can convert your analog 8mm to digital & put it on a dvdr in one step in real time. You can edit it later on your PC.

[TheFamilyMan]

I also use a rca y-cable to split a camcorder audio out into "stereo". The quality of 8mm footage can't really be improved much in terms of enhancing picture detail. Video noise filters can smooth out the overall graininess and yield better MPEG2 compression, but too aggressive of a setting will start wiping out detail. Colors can also be enhanced/repaired with filters, but IMHO fiddling with this stuff is truely an art form. You can find a wealth of info on these topics by "poking around" this web site. Good Luck!