Avi vs. mpeg 1 - casette tapes.

[Videjac]

Hi everyone.

I am trying to digitize my old home movies.

What I have:
-camcorder: Panasonic palmcorder VHS-C
-software: Powerdirector
-capturing device: DVC 100 from Dazzle
-computer: Win. 7 home ed. 64-bit

I also have a HD PVR, but powerdirector won't recognize it, but Dazzle seems to work. I got the latest drivers, but still nothing.

I captured some video. I captured the video in avi format with I think 640 and 320 frame rate and I believe 4-bit audio.
Mpeg 2 is not an option, but I also tried mpeg 1 and the video kidn of slows down and there is no sound.

So is avi and that frame rate (and audio) the best for these type of cassettes.?

[hech54]

Capture at least MPEG2 video(720x480 for America - 720x576 for Europe) in "DVD Quality" setting if it has one....and PCM/LPCM audio. If you are going to do it.....do it right.

[Videjac]

But the VHS is probably not int hat quality so it wonćt matter, right?

[hech54]

But the VHS is probably not int hat quality so it wonćt matter, right?

But

640 and 320 frame rate and I believe 4-bit audio

is absolutely horrible and useless.

[Videjac]

Whether I capture at 720 or 1080, the quality will be the same and the file will take up more space. I just wanted to know the resolution of the original file, so that I capture the original resolution, I can't seem to find it, I tried searing.

[hech54]

Whether I capture at 720 or 1080, the quality will be the same and the file will take up more space. I just wanted to know the resolution of the original file, so that I capture the original resolution, I can't seem to find it, I tried searing.

Well it certainly isn't 640x320, it certainly shouldn't be 4 bit audio....both are USELESS. You will not be able to do anything with them once you have the file.
If you are worrying about file size....just quit right now.

[robjv1]

Whether I capture at 720 or 1080, the quality will be the same and the file will take up more space. I just wanted to know the resolution of the original file, so that I capture the original resolution, I can't seem to find it, I tried searing.

What is your intended output format? Are you wanting to burn standard DVDs?

If you do and the issue is that your device is unable to capture to MPEG2, capture uncompressed AVI at 720 x 480 (about 75 to 100 gigs an hour) or better yet HuffyUV or Lagarith (free, lossless capture, many less gb per hour). Then get yourself an MPEG 2 encoder (there are good cheap and free ones) and render to either (NTSC numbers, what country are you located?) 720 x 480 (full D1) or 352 x 480 (half D1) at a decent bitrate. Author and burn to disc. That's the process in a nutshell.

[yoda313]

Then get yourself an MPEG 2 encoder (there are good cheap and free ones) and render to either (NTSC numbers, what country are you located?) 720 x 480 (full D1) or 352 x 480 (half D1) at a decent bitrate. Author and burn to disc. That's the process in a nutshell.

If this is the route you want to go hcenc or quenc are two quality free mpeg2 encoders. They come bundled with avstodvd which is an excellent dvd authoring program that can encode and author and burn (with imgburn that is - also a freeware program and the only program you should burn with fyi).

[sanlyn]

The frame size and audio freq you say you intend to capture are not compatible with any DVD standard. Upscaling to HD for BluRay is a waste of time and effort with VHS source (your hardware and TV can do it better than software can). Whether you want standard DVD output or not, capturing tape directly to lossy compression is not a good idea; the encoders in budget capture cards that will even record to MPEG2 are not so great; the capture will look worse than the original tape. Keep in mind that playing old tapes on your TV won't look the same as digitally recording to AVI or even to MPEG2. The two processes are completely different; your capture setup doesn't "see" or process analog input the same way that more forgiving TV's do.

[Videjac]

Ok, the last two posts are helpful. Yes, I would like to burn on DVD for playback.
Also the device can capture on mpeg, but powerdirector won't recognize it for some reason. I treid to make the HDPVR work, but the pciture get's distorted after a few minutes for soem reason.

''hech'', you seem like a troll, saying ''If you are going to do it.....do it right.'' and ''If you are worrying about file size....just quit right now.'' Why do you care so much?

If the original recording on the cassette is 640x320, then capturing it at 720 will not matter, since it was recorded at a lower resolution, which means wasted space on the hard drive.

[Videjac]

The frame size and audio freq you say you intend to capture are not compatible with any DVD standard. Upscaling to HD for BluRay is a waste of time and effort with VHS source (your hardware and TV can do it better than software can). Whether you want standard DVD output or not, capturing tape directly to lossy compression is not a good idea; the encoders in budget capture cards that will even record to MPEG2 are not so great; the capture will look worse than the original tape. Keep in mind that playing old tapes on your TV won't look the same as digitally recording to AVI or even to MPEG2. The two processes are completely different; your capture setup doesn't "see" or process analog input the same way that more forgiving TV's do.

So, what's your suggestion. At what resolution should I capture from the camcorder? I'm not too worried about audio, since I can do audio production afterwards.

[robjv1]

If the original recording on the cassette is 640x320, then capturing it at 720 will not matter, since it was recorded at a lower resolution, which means wasted space on the hard drive.

One of the issues here is that VHS has no 'digital' resolution equivalent. It was measured in terms of lines of resolution by the manufacturers, not pixels. So the resolution you capture in is going to be dictated by your output format and for DVD that gives you exactly two choices -- 720 x 480 and 352 x 480. Even if 640 x 320 was supported, it wouldn't matter because the aspect ratio would be messed up and it wouldn't look right. What resolutions can you capture at with your device?

As Sanlyn hinted at -- there are many bad ways to do this, some good ways, and a couple of excellent ways. It really depends on how much time, effort, and money you want to put into it.

Encoding directly to MPEG2 with modern capture devices from a VHS source usually falls under the 'bad' column, because there is way too much noise to deal with. You'd have better luck with certain vintage DVD recorders if you're looking for an all in one, one pass solution. If you're going to capture to the computer, you'll want to go lossless, it'll give you more options and flexibility but it'll also take you more time to get running, as there is a learning curve to all of this stuff.

[davexnet]

VHS has a vertical resolution of 480 (NTSC) or 576 (PAL). That's why those sizes are recommended; it also retains the
interlacing and the temporal resolution.

If you drop down to 240(NTSC) / 288(PAL) you lose half the temporal resolution, and one field in the interlaced frame.

If you want to create a DVD you should capture all the vertical resolution, thus retaining the interlacing.
If your capture device can convert to DVD spec mpeg-2, use that, then you will not have to
re-encode for DVD. However, if it captures to AVI, 640*480 or 640*576, or even 352*480/352*576
may be acceptable (1/2 D1) .

VHS does not have an absolute horizontal resolution since it's an analogue signal. The vertical resolution, while analogue,
can be quantified and corresponds to the lines used in the picture of the TV system.

Hope this helps to explain it.

EDIT oops - robjv1 beat me to it!

[Videjac]

If the original recording on the cassette is 640x320, then capturing it at 720 will not matter, since it was recorded at a lower resolution, which means wasted space on the hard drive.

One of the issues here is that VHS has no 'digital' resolution equivalent. It was measured in terms of lines of resolution by the manufacturers, not pixels. So the resolution you capture in is going to be dictated by your output format and for DVD that gives you exactly two choices -- 720 x 480 and 352 x 480. Even if 640 x 320 was supported, it wouldn't matter because the aspect ratio would be messed up and it wouldn't look right. What resolutions can you capture at with your device?

As Sanlyn hinted at -- there are many bad ways to do this, some good ways, and a couple of excellent ways. It really depends on how much time, effort, and money you want to put into it.

Encoding directly to MPEG2 with modern capture devices from a VHS source usually falls under the 'bad' column, because there is way too much noise to deal with. You'd have better luck with certain vintage DVD recorders if you're looking for an all in one, one pass solution. If you're going to capture to the computer, you'll want to go lossless, it'll give you more options and flexibility but it'll also take you more time to get running, as there is a learning curve to all of this stuff.

Alright, my device allows for 720x480 capture and really anything in between. But only in avi and mpeg 1. Sony vegas won't recognize either of my capture devices so I'm just using powerdirector.

[robjv1]

I'm not familiar with PowerDirector, so I'm not sure how configurable the options are as far as capture formats. Perhaps someone else knows more. Can it do uncompressed AVI? How much hard drive space do you have free for temporary capture files?

With Vegas, might just be a driver issue. You could give VirtualDub a shot for capture -- it's free. If that can see your device and you are able to capture with that, you can pretty easily integrate Huffyuv or Lagarith into that and capture lossless AVI and save yourself some space for the capturing portion.

[robjv1]

VHS has a vertical resolution of 480 (NTSC) or 576 (PAL). That's why those sizes are recommended; it also retains the
interlacing and the temporal resolution.

If you drop down to 240(NTSC) / 288(PAL) you lose half the temporal resolution, and one field in the interlaced frame.

If you want to create a DVD you should capture all the vertical resolution, thus retaining the interlacing.
If your capture device can convert to DVD spec mpeg-2, use that, then you will not have to
re-encode for DVD. However, if it captures to AVI, 640*480 or 640*576, or even 352*480/352*576
may be acceptable (1/2 D1) .

VHS does not have an absolute horizontal resolution since it's an analogue signal. The vertical resolution, while analogue,
can be quantified and corresponds to the lines used in the picture of the TV system.

Hope this helps to explain it.

EDIT oops - robjv1 beat me to it!

No way, that's an excellent and through explanation. I just gave the quickie answer haha.

[Videjac]

VHS has a vertical resolution of 480 (NTSC) or 576 (PAL). That's why those sizes are recommended; it also retains the
interlacing and the temporal resolution.

If you drop down to 240(NTSC) / 288(PAL) you lose half the temporal resolution, and one field in the interlaced frame.

If you want to create a DVD you should capture all the vertical resolution, thus retaining the interlacing.
If your capture device can convert to DVD spec mpeg-2, use that, then you will not have to
re-encode for DVD. However, if it captures to AVI, 640*480 or 640*576, or even 352*480/352*576
may be acceptable (1/2 D1) .

VHS does not have an absolute horizontal resolution since it's an analogue signal. The vertical resolution, while analogue,
can be quantified and corresponds to the lines used in the picture of the TV system.

Hope this helps to explain it.

EDIT oops - robjv1 beat me to it!

This is what I was looking for. I read numerous times that to retain the best quality, it is best to capture the video in the resolution it was recorded on. 480 sounds right.

Edit: Now I tried VirtualDub and it automatically capture in 640x480, 29.97 fps, 48k/16bit
But I want to try loss less, could you help with the settings please.

[robjv1]

You don't want to capture less than 352 x 480, that should be your absolute bottom. Ideally you'll cap to either that or 720 x 480 to avoid resizing later.

Capturing to 48k/16bit is what you want -- that's the typical DVD audio spec, you can encode it as PCM audio or to AC-3 (192k/256k/384k are the most common used) for your DVD. Since it's coming from VHS, I'd go with AC3 stereo audio and save the rest of the bitrate for the video.

To see what resolutions it can capture to, in capture mode, click the video menu, then capture pin, then you should see a window that has two options on the left -- color space and output size. Output size should have the options available to you.

Edit: Whoops I read that as ' a lot less' not lossless.

To make a lossless capture -- you'll need either HuffYuv or Lagarith. Are you on a 64 bit version of Windows? I believe Lagarith offers multithreaded support for a 64 bit version, not sure about Huffyuv.

Here is the link:
http://lags.leetcode.net/codec.html

Just download the first one with the installer and make sure you close VDUB before installing.

After installation, open VDUB back up and it should show up in your compression options (in capture mode, go to video menu, compression options, select Lagarith, click configure and enable multi-threading). Make sure you choose your resolution in the other menu and then capture away. Make sure you have plenty of space on the drives you are planning to capture to.

[Videjac]

Thanks everyone for your help.

[Videjac]

I just tried capturing in 720x480, the picture skips. I think i'll go with a lesser resolution.

[robjv1]

Are you viewing that file after it's captured or just watching it in the preview window to determine if it skips?

[hech54]

I just tried capturing in 720x480, the picture skips. I think i'll go with a lesser resolution.

You are just determined to capture complete crap aren't you? That was your goal from the start.

[Videjac]

Are you viewing that file after it's captured or just watching it in the preview window to determine if it skips?

No IO stopped after 20 seconds and viewed it after, it skips. I just viewed it again to make sure and it does skip. The audio is fine, but I'll try the next lower resolution to see if that will help.

[themaster1]

sure go ahead lower the rez further, when you reach 60x30 rez holla back.
I love these low rez contests

[classfour]

I just tried capturing in 720x480, the picture skips. I think i'll go with a lesser resolution.

Unless you've ruled out skipping because of a computer issue (too many background programs, etc.), you may cheat yourself on the capture.

I use a Hauppauge card for DVD captures from VHS source because it's light on resources and captures to MPEG2 DVD format. If you're AVI bitrate is too high, you may want to consider this.

[Videjac]

I just tried capturing in 720x480, the picture skips. I think i'll go with a lesser resolution.

Unless you've ruled out skipping because of a computer issue (too many background programs, etc.), you may cheat yourself on the capture.

I use a Hauppauge card for DVD captures from VHS source because it's light on resources and captures to MPEG2 DVD format. If you're AVI bitrate is too high, you may want to consider this.

Thanks, I'll try it.

[sanlyn]

This is what I was looking for. I read numerous times that to retain the best quality, it is best to capture the video in the resolution it was recorded on. 480 sounds right.

Edit: Now I tried VirtualDub and it automatically capture in 640x480, 29.97 fps, 48k/16bit
But I want to try loss less, could you help with the settings please.

640x480 is the way I usually capture 4:3 analog, though many use 720x480. I encode later at 720x480. Anything smaller is going to require some rework and/or resizing, and let's face it -- VHS can't stand much of that sort of thing.

If you have skipping at the commonly used frame sizes, then some VDub settings tweaks would be needed and you should check VDub's recording stats for dropped frames. But what I'm thinking in immediate terms is "tbc".

[Videjac]

I just tried capturing in 720x480, the picture skips. I think i'll go with a lesser resolution.

Unless you've ruled out skipping because of a computer issue (too many background programs, etc.), you may cheat yourself on the capture.

I use a Hauppauge card for DVD captures from VHS source because it's light on resources and captures to MPEG2 DVD format. If you're AVI bitrate is too high, you may want to consider this.

Is it a HD PVR, if so with what program?

[robjv1]

Post a short sample (maybe 10 seconds) of something you captured that skips. It'd be easier to see what the issue might be.

[sanlyn]

Is it a HD PVR, if so with what program?

Don 't get too excited. HD PVR's don't record VHS to HD, they record SD to SD.