VHS to Canopus ADVC 110 Firewire capture -- Horizontal field issue?

[sheenman]

I'm having an issue with capturing VHS (using Canopus ADVC 110) to Firewire/DV. I have tried using Sony Capture as part of Vegas and also WinDV. Same results. Maybe this is an easy question to answer, but I'm seeing something that looks like a field issue on all of my VHS tapes. It looks like interlaced combing on all frames, including frames without motion. Switching the fields to BFF or TFF on captured content doesn't seem to fix the problem. Deinterlacing takes care of it, but I'm not sure why that is necessary for frames with no motion.

See example images. First image is title screen with no motion exhibiting combing. Second image is example frame. For the third and fourth images, I ran Bob doubler in VirtualDub with BFF. So third image is the first frame result from the double (so the bottom fields). Fourth image is the top fields from same frame. I don't understand the horizontal shift when there is no motion.

Is this an issue with my VCR or can this be resolved with settings/filters?

[edDV]

First VHS and DV video are interlace and DV capture is BFF.

Even though the titles originally were still, VHS timebase error causes field one to field two horizontal jitter/drift displacement unless a timebase corrector is used either in the VCR or between the VCR and ADVC.

It is best to leave these interlace. A TV will display the fields in sequence so the line split will show as a slight horizontal blur. A computer deinterlacing player like VLC or MPCHC will convert 60i to 60p. If you deinterlace 60i to 30p using blend deinterlace, the field to field horizontal blur will be applied to the video permanently.

[jagabo]

There's something more wrong than just the usual time base jitter. It looks like one field is consistently shifted further right than the other. That could be caused by either the tape or the VCR. In any case, a line time base corrector should help. You could also try using a DVD recorder like a Panasonic ES15 as a pass through (cheaper than a new S-VHS deck or standalone line TBC). They include a line TBC in their processing.

https://forum.videohelp.com/threads/319420-Who-uses-a-DVD-recorder-as-a-line-TBC-and-wh...=1#post1983288

[2Bdecided]

I agree - that really does need a line TBC!

[NY2LA]

I have a question for sheenman, and I hope edDV and/or jagabo will chime in.

sheenman, what software or device was playing the video when you created the top two images?

When I bring my DV video (most created with the ADVC110) into Final Cut Pro X, and select "Show Both Fields", I always see combing.

I'll never see combing when playing the same DV video with Quicktime Player 10 on the same monitor.

edDV and jagabo, I wonder whether a production-oriented presentation of interlaced video should show combing. Perhaps one doesn't want on-the-fly de-interlacing in a production environment (with today's progressive monitors)? Might it be analogous to using monitor speakers when working with audio, because you don't want to be deceived by audio sweetening?

Could sheenman possibly being seeing combing that he should be seeing? Or is my thinking way off base?

[jagabo]

I'll never see combing when playing the same DV video with Quicktime Player 10 on the same monitor.

Because the makers of media players know people will be freaked out by comb artifacts so they deinterlace on the fly. And when viewing interlaced video you are supposed to see one field at a time, not the entire frame. That's what old CRT TVs showed you -- 60 fields per second, not 30 frames per second.

edDV and jagabo, I wonder whether a production-oriented presentation of interlaced video should show combing. Perhaps one doesn't want on-the-fly de-interlacing in a production environment (with today's progressive monitors)? Might it be analogous to using monitor speakers when working with audio, because you don't want to be deceived by audio sweetening?

I usually want to see comb artifacts when I'm working with a video. Of course sometimes you want to see the video deinterlaced (evaluating your noise filtering, for example) so the software should support both.

[sanlyn]

A line tbc will make a difference, as will Avisynth plugins that help clean up interlace problems (like QTGMC). Viewing interlaced video on a non-deinterlacing viewer (like VirtualDub, which is an editor, not a player) is one way to observe interlace problems. Interlaced video on a deinterlacing player like VLC will make it look, well, "normal".