For those who capture old wrestling tapes

[ProperRogue]

I've searched the board , went through some old topics , and found a lot of ideas for capturing my own classics on DVD. My question is this though , has anyone found that special bitrate for doing 3hr PPV's?

I read the bitrate will have to be somewhere between 3000 & 3500 , but what about the resolution? Any opinions on either 720x480 or 352x480?

Also , I read that some even capture at the highest bitrate and then transcode to fit a SL-DVD. About how long would you say that takes, to convert a 3hr mpg @ 12k max down to something in the range of 3k or 3.5k?

thanks

[lordsmurf]

Capturing high and transcoding is a terrible idea.
Using 3000-3500 for wrestling is a terrible idea.

You'd be better off with 352x480 at 5000k bitrate, VBR encodes.
That'd put 2 hours on a disc.

If you have 3 hours, make it a two-disc collection, 90 min per disc.
Up the bitrate to around 6000k, maybe just make it CBR.

Anything compressed more will be blocky.
Wrestling has a lot of light flashes, small detail, and fast action.
Lots of scene changes.
It's just horrible to work with, but not impossible.
Throwing a lot of bitrate at it is the way to go.

[ProperRogue]

Capturing high and transcoding is a terrible idea.
It's just horrible to work with, but not impossible.
Throwing a lot of bitrate at it is the way to go.

I've been doing some transfers, and they've turned out great except for the wrestling ones. Like you said, they're extremely tricky.

FWIW , I've made greats caps of my standalone tapes, like the 60-90min classics. It's just now that I've started trying to back up the PPV's that I've run into troubles.

Thank you for the advice lordsmurf, and I'm going to give that a try.

[GMaq]

Hi,
Unless you can do DL-DVD you are definitely going to have to do 2 discs. Depending on your capturing setup you could try 6000-6500kbps VBR @ 720x480 and expect good results also cutting the audio down to 192kbps would probably be sufficient for wrestling, You should try to do the best quality you can though, Even if you don't have a DL Burner now you can burn it at higher quality to 2 SL Discs and merge it on to a DL-DVD sometime in the future. I've never regretted using High Quality the first time, after making countless videos where I was stingy with bitrate just to save disc space, when it comes to getting out the popcorn and sitting down to watch it there is no substitute for doing it right the first time!!!

[ProperRogue]

You know GMaq, I've thought about doing them on DL's , but I heard the SL's are just a little more reliable for long term storage.

I've even thought about doing a stripped-down version of the PPV's. Like pulling out the sleeper matches and such.

There are only a few PPV's I even want to get transfered onto disc, none of which took place after '92.

As for the others , my old Coliseums are really starting to show their age. I've always been one for storing tapes, discs, even albums - the way their meant to be stored. And I've always taken good care of my library, but 20yrs+ is pushing it.

I know what you mean though. DL would definitely be the way to go.

[colt4523]

My rule of thumb is if anything is over 2 hours, I split them over 2 dvds. I use my dvd recorder, so I really do not have to mess with bitrates.

[Prohatchetman]

Just as an FYI, a lot of the work has been done for you in all reality.

Sendit.com, formerly blackstar.co.uk, actually has a lot of those old Coliseum video PPV's in 2-packs such as the Royal Rumbles, the Survivor Series, and the Summerslams in addition to the Wrestlemania's and I saw two sets of In Your House's.

These are of course in PAL format, but the hard work has already been done for you and you could always play them through a computer. You are guaranteed quality work and quality captures from high quality master sources this way. I thought of doing what you are doing right now, having had my own collection gathering dust somewhere, but I found these on Ebay and on that site and this just makes way more sense to me. You even get nice cases and clear artwork, what more can you ask for?

[lordsmurf]

I almost always agree, if something is released and of equal quality/content, don't waste your time transferring inferior homemade versions.

[nwo]

i think i will wait till HD-DVD's come out before putting all my Nitros and Thunders,
on them, as the video tapes stills looks better than DVD copys.