wiggle amoeba effect on lp vhs tapes

[tesara]

Hi, I have a problem. I have a lot of VHS tapes with tennis matches recorded in LP mode. The tapes were recorded on a Panasonic nv sd20 vcr (so I think they are mono, as far as I know). The recordings have an effect that was described on the digitalfaq forum as the wiggle amoeba effect. The video seems to have a life of its own. I am attaching a link to an AVI file. The file was recorded using a Windows XP computer with a Pinnacle PCTV Hybrid Pro Stick 330e card and a JVC HR S7722 video recorder. I read a posts about passthrough using Panasonic DVD recorders. Could this help with this effect? In addition, the sound quality is poor. Would it be a good idea to use the same model of mono video recorder that was used to record the cassette, i.e. sd20? Thank you for any suggestions.

[dellsam34]

Ideally a line TBC in the VCR can help reduce the wiggle between scan lines, a DVD recorder may or may not fix it, people who use DVD recorders can answer that better than me, As far as audio, have you tried cleaning the audio heads? if that doesn't help you can get a cheap VCR that you can re-align the A/C head stack for better audio.

One thing you must know about linear audio, some VCRs are equipped with Dolby NR on the audio linear channel, so during playback Dolby has to be on to reduce some of that high pitch noise floor, Mis-alignment sometimes is also a problem between VCRs. Not implying this your problem but a general knowledge that you should be aware of.

[tesara]

Ideally a line TBC in the VCR can help reduce the wiggle between scan lines, a DVD recorder may or may not fix it, people who use DVD recorders can answer that better than me, As far as audio, have you tried cleaning the audio heads? if that doesn't help you can get a cheap VCR that you can re-align the A/C head stack for better audio.

One thing you must know about linear audio, some VCRs are equipped with Dolby NR on the audio linear channel, so during playback Dolby has to be on to reduce some of that high pitch noise floor, Mis-alignment sometimes is also a problem between VCRs. Not implying this your problem but a general knowledge that you should be aware of.

My vcr Jvc hr s7722 has tbc but it doesn’t removed the effect. My cassetes were recordered on misaligned vcr and I need to misalign my jvc to play them correctly.

[timtape]

The sample uploads from the FAQ forum looked pretty good to me. The Agassi was darker than I would capture it but otherwise OK IMO. Normally if the video tracks were misaligned on the tape we'd expect horizontal noise bands in the picture or worse. i dont see such problems in your uploads.

The linear audio may be misaligned. But as dellsam said, the audio/control head may need cleaning. I also asked you that on the other forum but you didnt respond.

At some point we have to go deeper. To clean the head and tape path we need to open up the machine. Although a good cleaning cassette used as per the instructions may help. To "misalign" the VCR for picture or sound we also open up the machine and make adjustments. Many people are not comfortable with that as it can be dangerous to the person and the machine unless we know what we are doing. So many people have to find a skilled person to do this work for them.

[dellsam34]

My vcr Jvc hr s7722 has tbc but it doesn’t removed the effect. My cassetes were recordered on misaligned vcr and I need to misalign my jvc to play them correctly.

Your capture looks fine, there is no tracking issues, I see some tape drop outs, that's about it. JVC machines are not equal when it comes to TBC functionality but don't expect miracles, it's the nature of interlaced formats, After de-interlacing most of those artifacts will be reduced, see attached sample.

[tesara]

I have tried passthrough with Panasonic dmr eh56 with svideo and scart output and it didn’t help. Amoeba effect still exist. Will using some Panasonic vcr with TBC be an improvement?

[dellsam34]

Not really, but you can try.

[Sharc]

@tesara: What exactly do you mean by the amoeba effect?
JVC VCRs tend to introduce slight ghosting when the DNR (Digital 3R) filter is enabled. I don't have your model, but at least for some JVCs one cannot totally disable any noise filtering with the TBC "ON" (Digital TBC/NR). So maybe try in edit mode with TBC OFF and use an external ES10/15 or equivalent in passthrough to stabilize the picture.
(Some of the artifacts may have their origin in the broadcast signal though.)

[tesara]

@tesara: What exactly do you mean by the amoeba effect?
JVC VCRs tend to introduce slight ghosting when the DNR (Digital 3R) filter is enabled. I don't have your model, but at least for some JVCs one cannot totally disable any noise filtering with the TBC "ON" (Digital TBC/NR). So maybe try in edit mode with TBC OFF and use an external ES10/15 or equivalent in passthrough to stabilize the picture.
(Some of the artifacts may have their origin in the broadcast signal though.)

I don’t know how to properly call it in english but it’t the tingling of the video especially can be seen on the lines of the tennis court.

[Sharc]

I don’t know how to properly call it in english but it’t the tingling of the video especially can be seen on the lines of the tennis court.

You can try some cleanup in post. Is this any better (video only)?

[tesara]

I don’t know how to properly call it in english but it’t the tingling of the video especially can be seen on the lines of the tennis court.

You can try some cleanup in post. Is this any better (video only)?

Yes it's much better, I assume You have done it in Hybrid and masking option, but the only problem is that the tennis ball is blurred and not can be as clearly seen as in original file. I don't know if it's can be fixed, as I don't know how to do it. Sorry for my perfectionism, but I have large collection of tennis matches and want to learn to properly transfer it. Thanks for Your help.

[Sharc]

Script you can play with:

AVISource("sample1.avi")
converttoYV16(interlaced=true) #convert to planar
assumeTFF()
QTGMC() #deinterlace
turnleft().QTGMC(InputType=3).turnright() #clean up the other direction
temporaldegrain2() # some denoising of your choice
# maybe add some chroma sharpening here ...

[tesara]

Script you can play with:

AVISource("sample1.avi")
converttoYV16(interlaced=true) #convert to planar
assumeTFF()
QTGMC() #deinterlace
turnleft().QTGMC(InputType=3).turnright() #clean up the other direction
temporaldegrain2() # some denoising of your choice
# maybe add some chroma sharpening here ...

Where should I use this script? I asking because I am newbie.

[Sharc]

It's an Avisynth script.
Maybe you can try (in Hybrid) something simpler like

AVISource("sample1.avi")
AssumeTFF()
QTGMC()
santiag()

QTGMC and santiag are included in Hybrid's Avisynth filter set.

[tesara]

It's an Avisynth script.
Maybe you can try (in Hybrid) something simpler like

AVISource("sample1.avi")
AssumeTFF()
QTGMC()
santiag()

QTGMC and santiag are included in Hybrid's Avisynth filter set.

Could You explain more how to do this? Thanks.

[Sharc]

It's an Avisynth script.
Maybe you can try (in Hybrid) something simpler like

AVISource("sample1.avi")
AssumeTFF()
QTGMC()
santiag()

QTGMC and santiag are included in Hybrid's Avisynth filter set.

Could You explain more how to do this? Thanks.

You should take the time to learn Avisynth to address issues like the ones you posted. The learning curve may be steep, but understanding Avisynth basics is very helpful for making best use of tools like Hybrid or similar.
http://avisynth.nl/index.php/Main_Page