Need some lessons learned for improving AVIs in Vegas 9 for DVD playback

[tonyp2]

I haven't posted in quite a while. I finally moved up to Sony Vegas 9 Movie Studio Platinum to convert my AVIs for DVD playback. I've been experimenting but have been having a lot of trouble coming up with a set of adjustments to improve Contrast, Brightness, Unsharp, and Color on similar types of captures. Output is to MPEG2 using the Mainconcept Renderer.

My starting point is a lot of AVIs which have been captured from SS video cam through a Canopus ADVC110 via its Firewire output. I'm trying to get the burned DVDs to look as close to the original source as possible. I've gone a little overboard trying to apply varying adjustments to test clips, but so far I haven't fallen on what I think is the "best fit" which gets me 90% of the way there. I typically find the DVDs to be a bit muddier, a bit less detail (especially in the blacks), and a bit less sharp. My display is a calibrated Pioneer Elite 111FD. Retail DVDs look fine through this setup.

I've been finding the Video FX choices in Vegas overwhelming, not sure exactly which ones to limit myself to in order to get the best result with the least complication. Is there some guidance for this type of conversion with Vegas/Mainconcept which might help me? Like "Never push Unsharp Mask past these points for SD DVD playback", or "This is about how far you can go with the Saturation adjustment" etc? Or at least some recommended starting values for this type of captured source?

Apologies in advance if this just sounds like a stupid request.

[guns1inger]

Honestly, aside from the it's colour correction tools, I would skip Vegas for most of this work and use avisynth instead. I do the bulk of my restoration work in avisynth, output to a lossless format, then load it into Vegas for editing, final tweaking, and output.

It takes some investment up front, as avisynth is an acquired taste, but the results are unmatched.

[tonyp2]

Yes, I've tried avisynth in the past and have to agree with the "acquired taste" thing. But maybe I'll give it another try. What is your own consensus on why you've gone this way instead of using Vegas' installed tools?

[guns1inger]

I do like the colour correction FX in Vegas, and do use them. I also sometimes use the Brightness/Contrast filter. Most of the rest of the adjustment tools I find to be clumsy or limited in what they can do. The other issue I have with them is that they tend to be slower (often much slower) that avisynth, and often I am using a wider range of avisynth tools at the same time.

This speed issue really comes to the fore when you are doing 2-pass encoding during the rendering stage, as slow tools have to be processed twice, or you have to process once out to a lossless format, then re-import. Given avisynth is usually faster, is it simpler to do all the initial processing in avisynth first, then bring it into Vegas for editing or a colour correction.

If you have good, clean source, the Vegas tools are fine for most of what you need to do. However they aren't all multi-CPU aware or optimised, and can bring even a strong system top a crawl when processing.

[tonyp2]

That's a useful assessment. Thanks. Any advice on the best source of really good scripts for avisynth?

[guns1inger]

The restoration forum here is a good place to start. I have a handful of shells that I use as starting points, but every script is different, as every video is unique.

Start with AvsP as an interactive script development environment, and go from there.