Vhs capture advice.

[Leanoric]

The video may be progressive (PsF), even on VHS. Nevertheless I re-encoded it as interlaced. That's debatable though.
Just a quick shot with a bit of denoising, colorsharpening and levels adjustment:

Nice one Sharc, looks much better than the clip that I posted. Can that all be done in virtualdub?



Do you have any idea why my captures are progressive? I have progressive turned off in the es10 settings, Is there something that I need to change in virtualdub?

[Sharc]

The video may be progressive (PsF), even on VHS. Nevertheless I re-encoded it as interlaced. That's debatable though.
Just a quick shot with a bit of denoising, colorsharpening and levels adjustment:

Nice one Sharc, looks much better than the clip that I posted. Can that all be done in virtualdub?

I did it in Avisynth, but I think same or similar filters (denoisers, chroma sharpening, level adjustments) are available in VirtualDub as well. You will have to do the filtering in post processing, not on the fly during capturing of course.

Do you have any idea why my captures are progressive? I have progressive turned off in the es10 settings, Is there something that I need to change in virtualdub?

Commercial VHS can have interlaced video with the even and odd field picture taken at the same instant in time, so the video looks like progressive frames. If this is the case for your source there is nothing you need to change with your capture settings, as I see it. Just make sure that you don't have a deinterlacer enabled somewhere in your capture workflow.

[rgr]

ES10/15 before in the workflow as passthrough.

Why is the ES10/15 so recommended?
I have EH58 and EH585 (supposedly has TBC too) -- will it be as good?

[oln]

Yeah those work just as well, I have the EH58 even so I know for sure that one works.

There are just less options in the US where lordsmurf is as the later Panasonic dvd-recorder models sold in the US used a different chipset that didn't have the same TBC capabilities.

[Leanoric]

Its amazing the difference a better vcr makes. I missed out on an s-vhs but got my hands on a new in unopened box JVC 4 head. Its one of the late models that wont record but will play s-vhs tapes.

Certainly not a vcr that would be recommended here for capture, but its a big improvement on what I was using. A tape that I thought had degraded as the picture was so bad, actually looks really good with this vcr, there was nothing wrong with the tape at all, it was the old vcr.

It has also eliminated the dot crawl that was on all of my captures. One tape that was a camcorder film transferred to vhs still has it quite bad, but its almost non existent on the other tapes that were previously bad.



One problem that still persists though, is the flickering. Its still present on all backgrounds and certain colours.

Is this normal on capture, and just something that has to be dealt with after in editing?

I had a play around with the filters in virtualdub but had no luck.

Motion blur was the only filter that seemed to take away the flickering backgrounds, it caused a sort of ghosting though so actually made things worse.

Could it be the elgato causing it?

[Sharc]

No, it is not the elgato I think. It's on the tape.
Download deflick13 from here and put the deflick.vdf into the plugins folder of VirtualDub
https://www.rationalqm.us/deflick/flick.html

and/or apply the 2 vdub internal filters
- chroma smoother (4:2:2 mpeg2)
- temporal smoother (4)

[Leanoric]

No, it is not the elgato I think. It's on the tape.
Download deflick13 from here and put the deflick.vdf into the plugins folder of VirtualDub
https://www.rationalqm.us/deflick/flick.html

and/or apply the 2 vdub internal filters
- chroma smoother (4:2:2 mpeg2)
- temporal smoother (4)

I think the deflick plugin must only be for the 32 bit virtualdub, as unfortunately it doesnt show up in filters on the 64 bit Im using.

I used the 2 settings you recommended on the other 2 filters though and they definitely calm down the flickering a bit, thanks for the help, its really appreciated.

[Sharc]

I think the deflick plugin must only be for the 32 bit virtualdub, as unfortunately it doesnt show up in filters on the 64 bit Im using.

Yes it is 32 bit, but why not simply use the 32 bit VirtualDub2?

I used the 2 settings you recommended on the other 2 filters though and they definitely calm down the flickering a bit, thanks for the help, its really appreciated.

Keep in mind that every filter is a compromise between desired and undesired effects. You have to find the acceptable balance by means of the filters settings.
Avisynth has a rich set of filters. Take the time to learn avisynth.
Or you may want to take a look at NeatVideo for VirtualDub. You can try before you buy.

[Leanoric]

I think the deflick plugin must only be for the 32 bit virtualdub, as unfortunately it doesnt show up in filters on the 64 bit Im using.

Yes it is 32 bit, but why not simply use the 32 bit VirtualDub2?

I used the 2 settings you recommended on the other 2 filters though and they definitely calm down the flickering a bit, thanks for the help, its really appreciated.

Keep in mind that every filter is a compromise between desired and undesired effects. You have to find the acceptable balance by means of the filters settings.
Avisynth has a rich set of filters. Take the time to learn avisynth.
Or you may want to take a look at NeatVideo for VirtualDub. You can try before you buy.

I mistakenly thought that I could only use the 64 bit version with my 64 bit windows. I’ve downloaded the 32 bit version now and have used deflick and the other filters you recommended. They've made a world of difference. I’ve tried them on a few different test captures from various tapes and they all look a lot better now.

I’ll have to check out neat video. I did watch a tutorial on youtube for avisynth, and to be honest, its well beyond my understanding. Maybe when I get my head around all the basics, I’ll go back and try to learn how it works.

[Leanoric]

Guys, I’m trying out different cables to see if I can see any improvements. I want a scart to s-video but they all seem to be sold as s-video to scart.

Can anyone tell me if these cables will work bidirectionally? https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Belkin-Pure-AV-Silver-Series-Video-audio-cable-S0-Video-and...edirect=mobile

[Alwyn]

What VCR are you using?

All the S-Video equipped VCRs I'm aware of have an S-Video Out socket, so you don't need SCART to get it. That said, very few machines have SCART here in Australia, Europe might be different.

[Leanoric]

Its the opposite here, very few vcr’s have s-video out, only svhs machines have it. All vcr’s here have scart though, except for the older ones.

[Eric-jan]

There are SCART adapters with an in/out switch, these are also in through versions, and have RCA audio/composite s-video DIN, depending the setting of the switch, they are input or output.
(A cable version should have a switch, or cables both for in and output)
I'm not a fan of SCART, i use RCA or DIN for better quality connections, where possible. (because of better shielding)
(btw. maybe your "bad" tape was recorded in SuperVHS ? did it had horizontal black "spikes" ? quasi SuperVHS is only at standard VHS resolution)

I don't have an ES-10, but on the PAL ES-15 is an additional NR setting: "Display" button on remote, the choose Picture.

I've just noticed for the 15: a "progressive" on/off selection in Setup>Connection menu. That could be why your captures are progressive instead of interlaced.

you can't have progressive over the composite or s-video outputs, only by the component output.

Thanks Alwyn, I checked the es10 settings and progressive was off, while there though, I noticed there are settings for av1 and av2. Av1 which is the output Im using was set to rgb. Ive now changed that to s-video as my cable has just turned up.

The RGB or VIDEO setting on AV1/AV2 has only effect on using RGB or COMPONENT modes, and has no effect on s-video or composite, (AV3 is the front input)
Using RGB gives no signal on the COMPONENT RCA output, using VIDEO gives no signal on the RGB, when setting to VIDEO you can set the component output to progressive, or normal to interlaced, in RGB "mode" you can't change this setting, with the SCART type model you can set to NTSC or PAL so you can transfer tapes in their original tv-system type, so no PAL60 or NTSC50 modes are used.

[oln]

S-Video over scart will only work on vcrs that have it, e.g SVHS VCRs and some of the late model DVD-recorder/VCR combos that send everything via the internal digitizer (via composite internally) and output the signal turned back to analog again. As S-Video over scart is a bit of an addon to the scart standard it shares wires with other signal so it has to be set to output S-Video manually, either in menus or with a switch on the back depending on model. If it's a normlal VHS deck you have (and it's not one of those very late dvd-recorder combos as noted) it won't have S-Video over scart.


Scart -> RCA/S-video adapters are normally for inputting to the scart side if they're not marked otherwise. For output from the scart socket the most common ones that can be used are ones that have a in/out switch on them. Adapters with cables hanging out that have output do exist but they are pretty rare (and may have two sets of cables, one for input and one for output).

[Sharc]

@Leanoric:
What exactly is your setup? What equipment? You will probably need something like this to connect your VCR to the DVD recorder or capture dongle:

[Attachment 69257 - Click to enlarge]

or perhaps this from your ebay link:


[Attachment 69258 - Click to enlarge]

[Eric-jan]

or….. from my message #154

[Leanoric]

Ive got the correct cables/equipment, I was just thinking about upgrading them.


[Attachment 69261 - Click to enlarge]

The es10 has cleared up most of the dot crawl, but there is still some visible on some tapes, rainbows as well, noise is the biggest problem though, I was hoping that some better quality cables might help.

I’m using the adapter and cables that came with the elgato to connect the vcr to the es10, so probably not the best.

[Eric-jan]

You are sure, all recordings are pure PAL, or not bad tuning/reception of the transmitted station ? or maybe home movie recordings from a french camcorder ?
maybe a device has bad capacitors ? (when with all tapes)
the quality of cables matter most of the time when they are very long, an should not matter for 1 meter or so…..
could other equipment like plasma tv be a source for interferrence ? try to (ex)change things in your setup, is your setup connected somewhere with a coax cable to a media provider ?
…….wild guesses, because i find it strange you have that much interferrence……
If you also have component out as source you could also try to convert from there, i tried some converters, with mixed results, most of them upscale to widescreen, which sucks, found only one or two that do a reasonable job without scaling, which works both for interlaced and progressive to HDMI, which gives more options for better (prosumer) recorders, and HDMI (prosumer) capture/converter cards, using a computer to capture, is only getting more difficult these days.

[Leanoric]

You are sure, all recordings are pure PAL, or not bad tuning/reception of the transmitted station ? or maybe home movie recordings from a french camcorder ?
maybe a device has bad capacitors ? (when with all tapes)
the quality of cables matter most of the time when they are very long, an should not matter for 1 meter or so…..
could other equipment like plasma tv be a source for interferrence ? try to (ex)change things in your setup, is your setup connected through a coax cable to a media provider ?
…….wild guesses, because i find it strange you have that much interferrence……
If you also have component out as source you could also try to convert your selve from there, i tried some converters, with mixed results, most of them upscale to widescreen, which sucks, found only one or two that do a reasonable job without scaling, which works both for interlaced and progressive to HDMI, which gives more options for better recorders, and HDMI capture/converter cards, using computers to capture, is only getting more difficult these days.

I dont think that theres anything wrong with my equipment/setup, its just that the raw avi files have a bit too much noise for my liking, maybe its the elgato, Ive read that its captures have slightly more noise compared to other similar devices.

Is it normal to find the raw avi unwatchable until filters are applied?

[lollo]

Is it normal to find the raw avi unwatchable until filters are applied?

No. Can you post a sample, and the used workflow?

[Skiller]

The S-Video and Composite outputs on the PAL Panasonics should not be used. Instead a Scart to S-Video/Composite adapter should be used to connect to the capture device. There is a very subtle issue with brightness stability on these outputs ("brightness pumping") which is not there over Scart. Issue affects all PAL models, including newer ones.

[Leanoric]

Is it normal to find the raw avi unwatchable until filters are applied?

No. Can you post a sample, and the used workflow?

JVC 4 head vcr scart > es10 s-video from scart > elgato video usb > pc

[dellsam34]

That's mostly chroma noise, not sure if it's cable related, Do you have a JVC VCR with S-Video and LTBC? The DNR in the TBC function should get rid of most of that noise.

[Eric-jan]

This amount of noise won't be as much visible after compressing in h.264
your captures could use some more contrast though.

[dellsam34]

Compression blurs the noise, It doesn't get rid of it it just makes it look different.

[Eric-jan]

Compression blurs the noise, It doesn't get rid of it it just makes it look different.

correct, i just said that...

[Sharc]

I don't think other cabling would help much.
Here just a quick shot with Avisynth filtering (denoising, color tweaking). I left it interlaced.

[Eric-jan]

I don't think other cabling would help much.
Here just a quick shot with Avisynth filtering (denoising, color tweaking). I left it interlaced.

That's indeed a great improvement ! so i guess the capture is optimal, so the noise is from the capture device ?

[Sharc]

That's indeed a great improvement ! so i guess the capture is optimal, so the noise is from the capture device ?

I think it's mainly VHS noise from the tape. No idea where the color shift came from. It looked like filmed through sunglasses.

[lollo]

The samples are very noisy, probably because the tapes and not (completely) fixed the VCR, but not completely unwatchable.

A simple AviSynth post-processing improves a bit. Just a quick attempt on my side, play with the parameters for better results.

sli image comparison: https://imgsli.com/MTU2MTI3

image comparison:

video restored: Clip1.avi

video comparison: cfr.avi

AviSynth script:

# plugins directory
plugins_dir="C:\Users\giuse\Documents\VideoSoft\MPEG\AviSynth\extFilters\"

	# FFmpegSource
loadPlugin(plugins_dir + "ffms2_87bae19\x86\ffms2.dll")

video_org=FFmpegSource2("Clip.avi", atrack=-1)

# cropping 
	crop_left=12	# | rimozione esatta delle bande nere sinistra, sopra, destra e del disturbo sotto	
	crop_top=2	# | 720-(12+16)x576-(2+14)=692x560
	crop_right=16
	crop_bottom=14
video_org_crop=video_org.crop(crop_left,crop_top,-crop_right,-crop_bottom)

video_org_crop_adj=video_org_crop.ColorYUV(off_u=+12, off_v=-6)

	# QTGMC
Import(plugins_dir + "QTGMC.avsi")
	# Zs_RF_Shared
Import(plugins_dir + "Zs_RF_Shared.avsi")
	# Nnedi3
loadPlugin(plugins_dir + "NNEDI3_v0_9_4_55\x86\Release_W7\nnedi3.dll")

	# TemporalDegrain2
Import(plugins_dir + "TemporalDegrain-v2.2.1_modGMa.avsi")
	# RgTools
loadPlugin(plugins_dir + "RgTools-v1.0\x86\RgTools.dll")
	# MaskTools2
loadPlugin(plugins_dir + "masktools2-v2.2.23\x86\masktools2.dll")
	# MVTools
loadPlugin(plugins_dir + "mvtools-2.7.41-with-depans20200430\x86\mvtools2.dll")
	# FFT3DFilter
loadPlugin(plugins_dir + "FFT3dFilter-v2.6\x86\fft3dfilter.dll")
	# FFTW
loadPlugin(plugins_dir + "LoadDll\LoadDll.dll")
loadDll(plugins_dir + "fftw-3.3.5-dll32\libfftw3f-3.dll")
	# dfttest
loadPlugin(plugins_dir + "dfttest-v1.9.6\clang\x86\dfttest.dll")
	# dither
loadPlugin(plugins_dir + "dither-1.28.0\win32\dither.dll")

	# LSFmod
Import(plugins_dir + "LSFmod.v1.9.avsi")

### de-interlacing
deinterlaced=video_org_crop_adj.AssumeTFF().QTGMC(preset="slow", matchpreset="slow", matchpreset2="slow", sourcematch=3, tr1=2, tr2=1, NoiseTR=2, sharpness=0.1)

### convert to YV16
deinterlaced_yv16=deinterlaced.convertToYV16()

### denoising
denoised_yv16=deinterlaced_yv16.TemporalDegrain2(degrainTR=3)

### convert to YUY2
denoised=denoised_yv16.convertToYUY2()

### convert to YV12
denoised_yv12=denoised.convertToYV12()

### sharpening
sharpened_yv12=denoised_yv12.LSFmod(defaults="slow")

### convert to YUY2 with chroma from YUY2 color space
sharpened=sharpened_yv12.convertToYUY2().MergeChroma(denoised)

### add borders
video_restored=sharpened.addborders((crop_left+crop_right)/2,(crop_top+crop_bottom)/2,(crop_left+crop_right)/2,(crop_top+crop_bottom)/2)

return(video_restored)

edit: Sharc arrived first!