Is TV capture analog or digital?

[IMpactHorse]

Ok, this may sound stupid, but I just don´t know: if I capture a show from TV, do the right conversions, etc will my end product (file, DVD, SVCD) look like the image on the TV screen or will it have a better, sharper, "digital" look? 8)
Anyway, isn't the resolution of TV or VHS much inferior to any digital file? Do capture cards change that, and if so, how can I pick the resolution I want?

[x9protocol]

Crap in crap out. As far as digital in that is not going to happen. Even if you have digital set top box from a cable company there is no way to extract digital except, if the box has digital out for audio but as far as picture it will be analog.

[IMpactHorse]

OK, I get it, crap in crap out is plain and simple... But what if I use a DV cam to record from TV, does that make any difference? I guess the real question is if there's anyway to produce digital quality files from broadcast.
Thanks!

[Conquest10]

do you know what digital means? binary code. when you convert even at the worst setting, it is still digital quality because the file is made up of 0s and 1s.

[keithsebastian]

do you know what digital means? binary code

that's what it is. any video file that's on u're comp is digital irrespective of quality.[/list]

[IMpactHorse]

Sure, a computer file got to be digital, I think I know what that is, 0s and 1s, binary... But I see lots of TV capture vids that look awful, so how can I capture TV shows that look great, good enough for dvd, for example? Does my TV tuner card brand make any difference? Enconding tools?

[Craig Tucker]

If you want great captures for DVD, capture as an AVI file YUY2 with Huffy compression at 720x576(PAL) or 720x480(NTSC), then convert to mpeg2 using TMPGEnc with a decent bitrate, something like 2 pass vbr 9000max 5000avg 2000min (you may be able to use an even higher average bitrate depending on the length of video you want to fit on 1 DVD). Be prepared for a large initial AVI capture, something in the region of 40-50GB/hour. This can obviously be deleted once you have encoded to mpeg2. I have done it this way and to my eyes it looks just about as good as the original broadcast.

[Mirror_Image]

Sure, a computer file got to be digital, I think I know what that is, 0s and 1s, binary... But I see lots of TV capture vids that look awful, so how can I capture TV shows that look great, good enough for dvd, for example? Does my TV tuner card brand make any difference? Enconding tools?

If by "good enough for dvd" you mean similar quality to a commercial retail DVD movie - you can't. TV broadcasts (HDTV excepted) don't have that kind of resolution in the first place.

[Nelson37]

There is no such thing as either "Digital Quality" or "DVD Quality", or "Broadcast Quality", for that matter. All of these are highly variable.

I have seen commercial DVDs which are not as good as some of my best SVCDs. Admittedly, not very many, but more than one.

Resolution is NOT repeat NOT the end-all and be-all of quality. It is a POSSIBLE INDICATOR, nothing more. A higher-res video should look better than a lower-res copy, but this is no more absolutely true than a $50 dollar bottle of wine being absolutely, positively better than a $10 bottle. It is a matter of personal taste, available equipment, experience, and even situation. Some people see little if any difference between a VCR and a DVD.

My Summary - an analog capture of an analog broadcast will almost certainly suffer from noise problems, usually requiring filtering, which will negate any supposed clarity advantages of the analog broadcast.

An analog capture of a digital broadcast virtually eliminates the noise, clarity after final encoding is superior to analog source capture. If well done, the difference compared to a DVD is negligible TO THE HUMAN EYE.

Technical differences are unimportant, this is a SUBJECTIVE opinion. Would you allow any sort of testing equipment to DICTATE to you which bottle of wine tastes better, without personally trying them? The numbers don't matter, do they?

[IMpactHorse]

I wantto to thank everybody for their insightful comments, you've enlightened a once obscured mind! Can´t find the words to compliment the VCDhelp.com staff... Great work!

[bmiller]

Tv broadcasts regardless if they are cable ,satellite or ota,are all in the end analog (hdtv is the exception).Satellite is digital in transmition,but analog at the start,and analog at the end.If they are mpeg2 video in the first place,is there any reason to capture in avi.Why not capture in mpeg2,and then encode in Tmpg at the same bit rate as the capture?
Right or wrong.
Brad

[keithsebastian]

Impacthorse wrote :

But I see lots of TV capture vids that look awful, so how can I capture TV shows that look great, good enough for dvd

I use the monitor out (composite) and audio out from my TV and
send it it to composite in (on TV tuner) and line in (on soundcard)
to get xcellent quality TV recordings. I think this is due to the fact
that the tuner&audio decoders on the TV are far superior to the
ones on the TV Tuner card.

One disadvantage is that you will have to keep the TV switched on
tuned to the appropiate TV channel.
This method will give you excellent quality TV captures that is
only limited by the quality of your TV signal. However be aware
of interference that may be caused by poor connectors/cables.

Use Showshifter to directly record to DivX. Use the DivX pro movie
recording profile. However you will have to register both DivX
and Showshifter to take full advantage of DivX Pro.

[Nelson37]

BMILLER - Your method has one flaw - the REAL-TIME ability of most hardware to record in fairly low bitrates is not very good. However, recording in hi-bitrate and then re-encoding to lower rates does work very well.

Plus, a software-assisted solution is going to improve as you upgrade your processor. Going from an 800 Duron - Real-time SVCD really crappy - to a 1700 XP Athlon (with many steps in between) - the 1700 gives decent real-time SVCD cap, still not as good as a re-encode but good enough for casual use. Next couple of upgrades should yield good real-time SVCD cap, but then I'll hopefully be trying to cap HDTV and/or full D1.

[bmiller]

I tried a test record with my ati all in wonder,at "full dvd quality mpeg2 720x480 8mb/sec" 40 min bbc show Ab Fab. I then cut out the comercials using Tmpg Merge and cut(down to 30 min.) and then encoded at svcd high quality. The final file was 600 mb,and i burned it as an xvcd in nero.My dvd player plays xvcd but not svcd.
The result was quite surprisingly good.I can hardly wait to get the sony dru500a and encode at 8 mb/s to see the quality improvement.

[Nelson37]

BMILLER - could you please detail your ATI cap settings and MMC version? Also your TMPGenc version, and settings choice for Merge and Cut? Do you have Audio Synch problems?

I have similar system and method, BUT TMPGenc always freezes after 2 or 3 operations, I can rarely make more than one cut. I don't think I have ever gotten it to cut commercials out of a complete 1-hr episode.

If I could reliably cut these MPGs without re-encoding, I would probably make more real-time caps than I do now.

Before anyone mentions it, I have tried Womble and M2-Edit pro, also several others, without success.

[bmiller]

I'm using Tmpg 2.59 plus and Mmc 7.7.0.1
I decide after encoding the video as a svcd high quality,to try and remove the commercials.
In Tmpg open merge and cut select the file type from the drop down menu,in this case it was svcd,and then add the video you want to edit.Then select the output file to save the edited video to.Highlight the video to edit,and then select edit.
A new window opens with the video displayed.In xp you have to start and then pause the video to prevent freezing.
Use the slider to find the start and stop times of the section you want to keep.Enter these times in 2 areas above the displayed video,and then ok.
The previous window is displayed.you then add the same video again,select edit and find the next section you want to keep.
Continue until all the segments you want are displayed in the main window with the corresponding times.Select run and let tmpg do it's thing.When it is finished you will have to de-multiplex mpeg 2's to encode.I used simple de-multiplex to split the video and audio.
Open the main Tmpg encoding window,and open the separate video and audio files to encode.Load the template you want.The final edited 30 min video encoded as a svcd high quality came in at 600mb.I have to burn with nero5.5.9 as a non compliant vcd,as my toshiba 3750 doesn't play svcd.
I will have to try the merge and cut with a captured video to see if i can cut out one encode and save hours of time.It was an afterthought after the first encode to see if it would work

[Nelson37]

Didn't realize you were re-encoding after cut, though for my purposes it doesn't matter, I guess. Usually when I am setting that slider for the second or third time it just locks up.

What settings do you use in MMC, and did you ever do this cut with MMC 7.6? I have been unable to get MMC 7.7 to run on my AIW 128, but that's another issue.

In 7.6 I cap I-frame only, 720x480 cropped, 12 MBPS MPEG-2 CBR. Currently I Demux, edit and frameserve with Vdub, and re-encode.

Have tried real-time SVCD, which is visually decent, but I can't edit it, even after demux-remux, even progs that don't crash screw up the audio synch.

[bmiller]

I'm using the ATI template dvd capture which is not I frames only p frames 4,B frames 2., VBR 8MB/S,720x480 mpeg2.
Good point about the re-encoding after the cuts.Maybe i don't have to do it.I'll have to give it a try,unless someone else has already been down this road.
I've neever tried 7.6.