Self-made DVD's from DVD recorder showing interlacing lines on HDTV - why?

[JonVic]

Hope this is in the right place. I wasn't sure where it should go!

I have a big problem here that I hope someone can help me with. It's a bit complicated so will try and keep as simple as possible.

In 2008 I copied some family video tapes (PAL VHS) to DVD. I used a Sony DVD recorder (HXD770). This has a hard drive so I recorded them to the hard drive and then burned them to DVD. At the time I had a CRT TV and I remember watching them back and they looked pretty good and was happy with them. It's now 2015 and the CRT is long gone and we got the DVD's out the other week to watch on our 1080p HDTV. I still have the Sony HXD770 and a PS4 for gaming and BluRay watching. I decided to watch the DVD's on the Sony DVD recorder. It is connected via HDMI and the output is set to 576p.

I turned on the first DVD and within a few seconds I noticed that on any movement I was getting pretty bad interlacing lines! I tried other output settings (720p, 1080i and 1080p) and they were just as bad. I was getting thick black interlacing lines on the edges of things and finer lines on other things. In desperation as to what was going on I tried to output using 576i which was greyed out on the menu. I had to change the output colour settings to allow this to be selected and then played the DVD using this output. The quality of the picture wasn't as good overall but the interlacing lines for the most part were solved.

I then decided to put the DVD in my PS4 in case the Sony DVD recorder was just doing a really rubbish job of de-interlacing anything above 576i. The PS4 only allows me to output in 480p (I am in PAL land so that's a shame) 720p, 1080i and 1080p. I selected 480p and the playback seemed to be 95% okay with only minimal interlacing lines on fast moving scenes. However (and this is what is annoying) I noticed that on many brighter parts of the picture it has fairly thick grey lines. These are hard to describe but are like thicker interlacing lines. If I select 720p, 1080i and 1080p these lines are not so thick but the interlacing problems are back with loads of fine lines appearing on scenes with movement to the camera.

So, my question is what is going on? When I recorded these DVD's to the Sony DVD recorder I used default settings (PAL 720x576) and the bitrate was set to HQ (maximum). This gives an average bitrate of around 9.3mbps. I know from reading around on the net that this is considered high but they seem to play fine without stuttering. I have checked the video settings and TMPGENC and Restream both tell me that the DVD's are upper field dominance which I believe is correct for PAL SD video.

I have tried playing these DVD's back in VLC media player and if i de-interlace using blend then I get the normal ghosting on fast moving scenes but I also get these jagged interlacing lines. The DVD's seem to look okay using the discard method of de-interlacing though. They aren't perfect but they are okay.

The tapes unfortunately got badly damaged when moving house a few years back so I can't re-capture these and need to try to get these DVD's to play on an HDTV above 576i without looking like an interlacing mess. Can anyone tell me what the problem may be as it's a bit upsetting to know that these DVD's may be screwed up as they have precious footage on them.

Cheers

[newpball]

Well if you see bad 'interlacing' lines when deinterlacing is on it usually means that field orders were mixed up somewhere down the line or that it got deinterlaced badly and was re-encoded interlaced again.

You could upload a few seconds (please use DGIndex) to verify but chances are it is fubar.

[JonVic]

This was a direct copy. By that I mean VCR was connected to input of the DVD recorder. I pressed play on the VCR and record on the DVD recorder. That's it! The DVD hasn't even been authored or anything. I have the videos still on the DVD recorder hard drive as well and these have the problem as well. There was no option to set the field order incorrectly and DVD recorders only record interlaced.

[newpball]

This was a direct copy. By that I mean VCR was connected to input of the DVD recorder. I pressed play on the VCR and record on the DVD recorder. That's it! The DVD hasn't even been authored or anything. I have the videos still on the DVD recorder hard drive as well and these have the problem as well. There was no option to set the field order incorrectly and DVD recorders only record interlaced.

Okay, well if you could upload a few seconds of video using DGIndex we could all take a look.

[jagabo]

I tried to output using 576i which was greyed out on the menu. I had to change the output colour settings to allow this to be selected and then played the DVD using this output. The quality of the picture wasn't as good overall but the interlacing lines for the most part were solved.

This indicates your DVD recorder has a poor deinterlacer. The deinterlacer in the TV is better.

Use Mpg2Cut2 to extract a small sample with motion and post it here. We'll be able to tell you if anything is wrong with the recording.

[JonVic]

Okay, I will try and cut a small sample out this evening and post it here for you to take a look at, thanks guys.

As far as the de-interlacer being poor in my DVD recorder - yes. That's what I thought initially. By outputting at 576i it's making my TV do the de-interlacing whereas if I output progressive (or at 1080i) I assume the DVD recorder is de-interlacing it? That goes some way to explaining the issue but the PS4 is also having issues and playback using blend on VLC looks like crap. Anyway I will sort that sample out asap.

Thanks

[Cornucopia]

The de-int & scaler in your TV is so-so, but it sounds like the de-int & scaler in your recorder is much worse. The recorder should be set to output 576i.

The PS4 is unfortunately even worse in that it doesn't do 576 at all, so 576i is getting badly de-interlaced and scaled (to 480p) and then scaled AGAIN! Evidently this is a known black mark in reviews of the device. (Probably those stuffy non-engineers trying to force people away from interlacing! ) No, more likely severe economizing forces.

You don't say what model your HDTV is, so can't compare it's deint/scaler. Maybe a newer/better TV or a dedicated BD/DVD player (NOT the PS4!) that is known to have a real good deint/scaler would be better. Or using an HTPC.

If none of those work (or if your budget cannot handle those right now), you could always rip the contents of the DVD, then use AVISynth to deint+scale and then re-encode to a BD (at a somewhat higher bitrate) - couple of options possible there. The types of deint & scaling available in AVISynth are head & shoulders above what is available in many hardware chips, but the tradeoff is your time & effort (and slight re-encoding quality loss, and an extra disc, if you go that way).

Scott

[newpball]

The PS4 is unfortunately even worse in that it doesn't do 576 at all, so 576i is getting badly de-interlaced and scaled (to 480p) and then scaled AGAIN!

Unbelievable!

(Probably those stuffy non-engineers trying to force people away from interlacing! )

Ah, you got there ahead of me!

[JonVic]

Hey Scott, thanks for the input. Some good information there. Yes, I should have put the model of my HDTV on here. It is a Panasonic TX-40AS640B. I only bought it about 6 months ago and I believe it's a good unit so shouldn't have issues with de-interlacing I wouldn't have thought?

What you say about the PS4 is interesting and could clearly be why I am getting those weird grey lines on playback. If I set it to 480p my TV then says it is playing at 576p, so as you say it's scaling an NTSC resolution to PAL which is bad. I find it odd that the DVD recorder can't de-interlace it's own recording effectively but it clearly does suck. I put in a DVD someone else recorder for me years ago of an F1 race and although I didn't see thin interlacing lines I did see those horrible black combing marks so that is clearly an issue with the player. Maybe I just have two horrible units for 576i playback.

I suppose playing a VHS capture on a DVD scaled to 720p and 1080p is always going to show issues as well? VHS is really low resolution so I suppose when the DVD recorder captured the tape it scaled it to 720x576 and then when i play it full screen on the HDTV it is scaling and creating 'new' pixels to fill the space which could possibly manifest itself as hugely exaggerated interlacing lines? But that's just a guess.

I will get that sample uploaded here later tonight so we can check if there is an issue with the videos and then go from there I guess.

Thanks for the help so far everyone

[jagabo]

There is one other possibility: The recording contains interlaced frames but was encoded in progressive mode. So any device that is set to output progressive frames will not deinterlace. Even when upscaling to 1080i the frame is upscaled without consideration that the video is really interlaced and comb artifacts are left in the picture. The reason 576i output works is because the DVD recorder is flagging the output as interlaced without otherwise mangling the frames, then the TV, seeing interlaced frames, deinterlaces for display.

We'll be able to see this if you upload the requested sample from mpg2cut2 (or DgIndex).

[JonVic]

If that is the case and it is encoded in progressive mode can that be fixed without re-encoding the DVD?

[manono]

If that is the case and it is encoded in progressive mode can that be fixed without re-encoding the DVD?

Yes, but stop writing and do as you've already been asked - post a sample. Until then it's only guess work. But that was my first thought as well - that it was encoded as progressive and the player's deinterlacer won't kick in when that happens.

[JonVic]

I'm only writing because I get a free couple of minutes here and there. I don't have the time to sit down and take video from a DVD until the kids are asleep. Should be able to in an hour or so....

[JonVic]

Here we go guys, this is a short clip with plenty of motion. Hope this helps show the issue...

[newpball]

You are lucky, frame double it (TFF) and you should be OK!

[jagabo]

The video is encoded interlaced, top field first. And indeed contains interlaced, tff frames. So you encoded the video correctly and any DVD player (or TV, whichever device is performing the deinterlace for display) should be able to handle it correctly.

[JonVic]

Thanks for checking guys, if i'm honest I hoped there would be an issue that could then be fixed as this just leaves me more confused.

I'm not being ultra-fussy, there are serious interlacing issues on these DVD's when played back on my TV and on VLC media player.

So, I am left with the result that even though the net is full of people saying they upscale DVD's to 576p, 720p, 1080i and 1080p I cannot do that and am stuck with only outputting in 576i which doesn't look as good visually?

I don't get it! So seriously I have to assume that both my DVD recorder and Playstation both suck at de-interlacing? I have commercial DVD's that play sweet as anything at 1080p on the PS4?

Maybe the source tapes are throwing out these issues but the DVD recorder records the interlacing errors as correct? I'm confused as to where to go from here.


@newpball: What do you mean by 'frame double it'?

[newpball]

@newpball: What do you mean by 'frame double it'?

Well if if the only option for you is to view it on a DVD your opinions are none.

Frame double means doubling the frames per second to give each (interlaced) field a separate frame.

You could burn it as a 50p blu-ray or simply play it from a USB, would that be an option?

[JonVic]

Well, really I want to view it on DVD. That is the aim. I am trying to understand what the issue is. If I have created these DVD's correctly then what's going on?

How would I go about creating a frame doubled version and burn it on Blu-ray? That and a USB could be an option but really I want to know why all my hard work putting these tapes on DVD hasn't worked!

[Cornucopia]

Commercial (PAL) movie DVDs are ostensibly 720x576i, but most often they are coded to be 576p, so they won't exhibit deint artifacts when scaled.

Scott

[newpball]

How would I go about creating a frame doubled version and burn it on Blu-ray? That and a USB could be an option but really I want to know why all my hard work putting these tapes on DVD hasn't worked!

It is really simple, DVD does not support progressive, but I have been told (personally I do not use CRT screens) that interlaced video looks really good on CRT screens.

Perhaps viewing your video on a CRT is an option?

[JonVic]

I see, so a home DVD recorder such as mine will capture in a far less advanced way and be true 576i meaning that I have to match the video size and type in the output and has far less ability to be scaled and converted to progressive like a commercial DVD?

If so then this raises more questions for me!

When I send a 576i signal from the DVD recorder to the TV it's the TV that scales the video to fit the screen and does the necessary de-interlacing to allow it to show on a progressive display.

If I output 576p then the DVD recorder takes over and scales the video and de-interlaces it before sending it to the TV meaning the TV doesn't have to do anything? Have I got that right?

If so then what is the difference between the techniques? Does that prove that with the right scaler and de-interlacer this stuff will look okay and it's purely a limitation of my DVD recorders ability to do this? If this is correct then why does my TV de-interlace okay but give me a grainier image than if 576p is playing from the DVD recorder/PS4?

[newpball]

Well this is just my personal opinion but interlaced video sucks, big time!

Best thing to do is to run a good deinterlacing filter (like QTGMC) and double the frames per second and move on!

Here is a quote from the godfather of deinterlacing:

“Why are we still talking about using interlace? This is something I’ve been dealing with for decades and I can’t believe we’re still considering it in the 21st century. I’m a complete enemy of interlace. There are some things in an interlaced picture that you just can’t de-interlace. When TV began it was a very simple way of reducing bandwidth, but now it is not needed. I’m very depressed when every ten years I see people about to make the same mistakes.”

- Yves Faroudja

[hello_hello]

I don't know about the other players you're using but VLC's de-interlacing option doesn't seem to stick when enabling it from the video menu (it kept disabling itself for me each time the video stopped playing). Enabling it via Tools/Preferences/Video and setting it to automatic works and Yadif (x2) de-interlacing does the job (frame doubling). Blend de-interlacing is fairly awful.
Your sample also looks fine when played with MPC-HC and I remuxed it as a ts file with tsmuxer, stuck it on a USB stick and tried it with my Bluray player and it looked like it was being de-interlaced properly. I don't know why you're having so much trouble with it.

Blurry due to movement, but VLC with Yadif (x2) de-interlacing.

[newpball]

I don't know about the other players you're using but VLC's de-interlacing option doesn't seem to stick when enabling it from the video menu (it kept disabling itself for me each time the video stopped playing).

Go to Tools/Preferences and select Video on the left side, activate "Enable Video"

In the box named Video there is an option for "Deinterlacing", you can put it to Off, Automatic or On. Right of this option is the "Mode".

Press Save and it should use the setting you selected by default.

[hello_hello]

Blurry due to movement again, but MPC-HC running fullscreen on a 1080p TV (playing/de-interlacing the sample from post #14):



The problem might be in regard to how well the video is being de-interlaced, but there's nothing wrong with it a such.

Given newpball bought it up.....
De-interlaced with QTGMC, cropped and resized. Then again with Yadif de-interlacing. Both 50fps. Most encoder GUIs will have Yadif de-interlacing. QTGMC is a fair learning curve.

[pippas]

As newqball suggests -- de-interlace and frame double.

Attached file shows the sort of thing.

Edit: hello_hello beat me to it. My clip only uses Yadif...(it's a bit simpler to use than QTGMC!)

As you mentioned in your first post, the bit rate in the original is pretty high... some DVD players might choke a bit on that?.....

[jagabo]

Of course, you can't frame double if you want to play the video on DVD because DVD doesn't support 50p.

Any DVD player should be able to play your interlaced video without comb artifacts, upscaled or not. Interlaced video was the standard in the TV industry until HDTV came along. Even HDTV supports interlaced video. All upscaling DVD players, Blu-ray players, and progressive TVs know how to deinterlace (though quality can vary).

VLC played your video fine on my computer, deinterlaced to 50 fields per second. No comb artifacts. Make sure you have deinterlacing enabled in VLC:



There is one other possiblity though I'm just speculating here: maybe the IFO files are telling the player the video is progressive. I don't know if that's even possible because I'm not familiar with IFO details. Maybe somebody else here knows if that's possible.

[manono]

Maybe somebody else here knows if that's possible.

It's not. Unlike the DAR information which is found in both the IFOs and the video itself (and is sometimes (rarely) contradictory), whether a section has been encoded as progressive or interlaced is found only in the video. After all, theoretically that information can change frequently.

Like you I don't understand where these bobbing suggestions are coming from since more than once JonVic has said he wants to keep it as a DVD.

[pippas]

Like you I don't understand where these bobbing suggestions are coming from since more than once JonVic has said he wants to keep it as a DVD.

It has become clear that - for whatever reason - the DVD the OP is using has issues. Maybe the bit rate is just too high for his DVD players, for example.. (He says other DVDs play fine on his equipment)?
The sample extract of the video he uploaded is fine, and the various conversions posted show what it might look like, when de-interlaced satisfactorily.

So if he did want to keep it as a DVD, then it looks like it's going to need remaking anyway. And in 2015, I can't help feeling that there are probably better ways of keeping a 'special' family video than redoing the process as another DVD.
Especially for the longer term...