TMPGEnc

[ubaddala]

In an effort to create a VCD, using ATI AIW RADEON, S-Video cable, I am capturing my home video from Sony Hi8 (NTSC) cam thro' VirtualDub (raw AVI) & encode the file with TMPGEnc 12a. My question reg. TMPGEnc is :
(1). on the Configure/Advanced/Video Settings/Video source type := ?? will this be interlaced or non-interlaced ?
(2). What is the field order ? Field A or Field B.
(3). What should I specify in the Source Aspect Ratio ? (there is a big list)
(4). Image positioning Method ? (again the list is big).

Thanks

[Triffid]

1. It depends on your capture. Did you capture x240 or x480 lines. If x240 then Noninterlaced. If x480 then Interlaced. Also if x240 question 2 is irrelevant (as you only have one field).

So, assuming x480:

2 It depends on your capture card. The newer versions of TMPGE (2.21, 2.52) can figure this out for themselves. If you want to keep using 12a it could be worth installing 2.51 just top test the field order then setting it manually in 12a. There are other, more complicated ways to it, that involve deinterlacing and checking to see that things occur in the correct order. As you are using NTSC, I guess there is also the Film/pulldown issue to consider. Again the newer versions of TMPGE seem to give some assistance here (although I wouldn't know...I only use PAL)

3. Source Aspect ration should be 4:3 (I can't remember if there is a PAL and NTSC option there, or only on the output settings, but if there is, use NTSC)

4. Fullscreen keep aspect ration (I think)

Good luck

[maxxnostra]

In VirtualDub when Capturing AVI-Raw file set your window to preview and test the capture internally. Whatch for interlaced lines (noisy lines like two same pictures are overlaped but one is few lines vertically missaligned). Interlacing is always occuring in any resolution that is higher then native video card capture resultion, or if it is a VGA resolution. That means any Vertical resolution higher then 288 for PAL or 240 for NTSC will be interlaced. VirtualDub has a build in filter for de-interlacing, and it works only when capturing raw data (not using compression). On my AIW128Pro PCI it worked with YUV2 capture.
Anyways. Settings in TMPEG are not much imporantant since you already captured interlaced frames and those are hardly detectable if not RAW AVI file. Sometimes this setting might create blurry scenes which are ment to look like interlacing effect. For example I was capturing a scen from "Mauilin Rouge" yesterday. The Moonlight was reflicting dark blue in "interlaced like" clouds in background of the scene. This efect was lost after deinterlacing. I got blurry sky with blue splash in background. Not good at all. Since AVI files have 40 to 80 times more frames then MPEG files, just encoding to MPEG file will probaly make those interlaced lines not catchy for human eye on smaller bitrates for VCD qaulity (1150 to 1600) and proably they cann't be eye catched on DVD quality (2000 to 8000)> another factor is FPS which for VCD/DVD is always 29.97. Simple math. 10 interlaced frames per second in AVI whould result in 5/40 (or 80 in case for lower bitrates /VCD qulity)... That is almost no interlaced frames in MPEG. However, leaving interlaced frames in encoding would create sharp image but in some way not looking good video for the human eye. Deinterlacing whould create smooth good looking (not so sharp) video for human eye. The choice is yours. You know what is the complexity of the captured video stream and you should be able to decide what is best for your complexity. I am using word complexity because more comlex the frames are less MPEG quality you will get. There are ways to play and find out what is best to for your capture. It will take some time to find out best settings for each capture you make, but hey... nobody ever said that Film-ware production is great fun on PC if you are looking for quality product. Just a reminder to everybody that MPEG based production is still to ******* complex for average PC hardware. Additional MPEG-2 Capture hardware that is capable of capturing all possible frames (IBP-Capture cards) is too ******* expensive to play with. You would buy this hardware only in case when you want to go compeltly in DVD/VCD production. For home users we can still play with cheap (even AIW RADEON 8500 is cheap) hardware and try to get near professional quality.