Help! VHS to VCD?

[hellzpawn]

I'm trying to convert some VHS tapes into VCD, currently using ulead mediapro to extract them into mpeg format.

the problem is, I'm using a 3 hr video cassette recorded over a 12 hour period. So when I extract the image, it's in 'fast forward' motion. I've tried switching the vcr to LP but it will automatically turn to SP when playing the tape. Is there any way I can edit the clip so that the speed is normal speed?

[theDruid]

that's a strange problem!

IMHO, I don't think you're going to get it looking 'normal' unless you can get your VCR to play the tape at the right speed.

You could try slowing the framerate down (sorry - no idea how you do that in ulead mediapro). For example, if the capture is coming in at 25fps (PAL), then you could try slowing it down to a quarter of that (nice round number 6.25!). Of course, that won't make a compliant MPEG1 VCD file, but you could fix that later.

VirtualDub will allow you to change the framerate without encoding (I think: Video->Frame Rate), then you could encode to your preferred standard (PAL/NTSC etc..) and the encoder should 'pad out' extra frames into the video to bring it back up to the normal framerate.

I think it'll end up being a messy work-around, and just thinking about what VHS tapes look like on Seek/Fast Forward, I don't think it's going to look great even if you manage to get it going at the right speed.

Try and find out how to get the VCR to play the tape at the correct speed would be my (not massively helpful!) advice.

cheers,

mcdruid.

[twodogs]

hellzpawn,

Perhaps you can explain "3 hr video cassette recorded over a 12 hour period".
SP is 1x, LP is 2x, and EP (Extra Long Play on Panasonic VCRs) is 3x.

I could be wrong, but I am not aware of any VCR that does 4x recording.

With your VCR returning to "SP" when you play the tape, this indicates that the tape must have been recorded in SP mode.

Can you provide more details? Did you do some sort of time-lapse recording like that used in video surveillance ?
Also, what does the image look like on your TV when playback says SP ?

[bobit]

play the video in one vcr at SP then hook up another vcr record
it in LP THEN PUT IT ON YER HARD DRIVE AND BURN