Laserdisc to DVD am I doing it right?

[LadyLiete]

Here is how I do it:

I have 3 color av cables going from my laserdisc player, to the input on the back of my ILO Dvd recorder. I set the record time to SP, 2 hours push record on the player, then play on the laserdisc.

Half way through I pause the recording, flip the laserdisc and resume. Once the disc is recorded I open it in Dvdshrink reauthor mode to seamlessly splice the two halves together and remove any unwanted content, (Like catching fuzz a few seconds before the recording starts)

Someone told me there was a more professional way to do this... but I haven't found it

[stantheman1976]

Well, you could record to PC if you want to do any editing. Either use a capture card to capture to AVI or use a camcorder to do passthru to DV AVI and edit. However, if you are happy with the results from your current method there is nothing wrong with the way you are doing things now. A DVD recorder seems to be the easiest method for converting old laserdiscs and VHS tapes.

[SLK001]

The "professional" way is much more complicated and time consuming. Do you really want to know how to do it?

[Noahtuck]

After transfering to your pc via rw or how ever you are doing it, you could use something like TDA to do a better job of editing & also make somewhat custom menus.
You don't have to record directly to your pc to edit, as you already know.

I think TDA still has a 30 day fully functional free trial & does a better job of editing out disc flips, ect. than DVD Shrink does, plus the addition of better menu's, sub menus, setting chapter points anywhere you want.

[LadyLiete]

I usually use mpeg video wizard dvd to add menu's and such if i feel the need.

I just use the source video that I cleaned up in dvd shrink and load it into the program.

[jman98]

Here's how I do it, although I haven't done this in about a year.
1) Hook up my laserdisc player to my Hauppauge PVR-350 card via S-Video for video input and 2 audio cables. Record as MPEG-2 at a constant bit rate of 8000 Mbps or 8500 or 9000 if you prefer. I never go above 9000. Set the audio to MPEG audio at a bit rate of 320 Mbps. My laserdisc player will flip the laser to play the other side, so I need to stop recording only to change discs.
2) Edit the recording file(s) together with MPEGVCR into one file and save. Of course I throw away any blank screens between discs and intro stuff (like FBI warnings) I don't need.
3) Demux the audio and video. If desired, convert the audio to PCM and convert that to AC3 if you want or leave it as PCM for something like musical recordings. Again, it's your choice. MPEG audio technically isn't legal for NTSC DVDs, so I avoid it, but some authoring applications will let you use it anyway.
4) Re-encode the video stream with CCE (Cinema Craft Encoder) using 3 pass VBR down to a lower bit rate to fit the movie on a DVD and take up as much space as possible. The mechanism for re-encoding with CCE is quite complicated.
http://www.doom9.net
has some guides on how to do that. The results are excellent, but it's not for novices.
5) Reauthor and burn with your favorite programs.

It takes more time to do it my way, but I have a lot more control over the process than by using a standalone DVD recorder. It just depends on whether you want it done quick or you want it done as well as possible as to which method is better for you.

[Barnabas]

Depends on how much time you have, and what you want to spend. LD's can have a fair amount of noise that should be filtered. I capture them to DV, filter out the noise, and encode with CCE basic, then author.

You will get better results capping to DV or AVI and then filtering instead of using a DVD recorder.

[BCdave]

I don't know about the recent models, but I believe that many of the older ILO recorders had the superb LSI encoding chip, which cleaned up some noise, etc. while recording.

In any event, you can improve the quality by one simple step: unplug the video cable (but not the audio cables) from your LD player & the recorder, and use an S-VHS connection instead (the $10-$15 S-VHS cables at Walmart will be fine)

DVD's are sure a lot handier than those clunky LD's, aren't they ?? I guess it's too late to sell our hard-earned collections off to Big Emma's ...

[jagabo]

Laserdisc's native format is composite. Using an s-video cable will not help unless the player has a better luma/chroma separator than the capture card.

[LadyLiete]

I recently inherited a rather huge laserdisc collection from my late unclue (mainly because no one else wanted it). I was quite shocked to find it was around 200 or so laserdiscs, ranging from the original Star Trek series, to the Star Wars trilogy, and large amounts of disney cartoons.

Upon digging through the disney section I was completely amazed to find a rare imported copy of Song of The South, which typically goes for $200-$300 on ebay. I of course decided to keep it rather than sale.

The player that came with it was very old, it had wood finish and a record like top... im assuming it was 80's and didn't work. I hopped on ebay and bought a used Pioneer model for about $60 + shipping.

When I got it I found out it used to belonged to a college, and had been very lightly used, maybe a hand full of times max. I don't think it was a very expensive unit, but wear and tear was virtually non-existant.

... and since that day about 2 weeks ago ive been working on converting this massive collection and putting the converted discs into giant cd wallets, and the originals in the closet