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  1. Capturing Memories dellsam34's Avatar
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    Originally Posted by Brad View Post
    Originally Posted by dellsam34 View Post
    I have yet to come across a tape that contains any useful video at the top extra 6 lines that is reserved for signaling and other proprietary barcoding.
    Really? What about that cartoon trailer we both have (Grandma Got Run Over by a Reindeer)?

    Been meaning to add some examples to my old thread, so here you go: https://forum.videohelp.com/threads/359690-Geek-fun-with-VBI-Macrovision-DVD-recorders...es#post2656567
    That's not the top, it's the bottom section that includes the head switch, If you take those lines away you end up with 480 lines, Most of the video contained in the head switch section is a repeat of the last few active lines.
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    [Attachment 64810 - Click to enlarge]
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  2. Capturing Memories dellsam34's Avatar
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    Originally Posted by Videogamer555 View Post
    I'm thinking in terms of archival. Not like making a quick digital video to post on YouTube, but rather a way of archiving the video as a digital master copy, that loses NONE of the original information that would have been present in the image portion of the signal (this means all 486 lines must be recorded). Yes, there can be useful informatino there. There are ways though you can store digital data on those 6 missing lines, in particular closed caption text data. Other types of digital data from various sources may also use these 6 extra lines for their own source-dependent metadata (maybe some professionally made VHS tapes would store metadata describing the content of the tape, or broadcast sources might have used it to store the call letters of the TV station). For the purpose of archiving tapes, 486 lines recording is essential, as it can be more than just image signal stored there.
    What you are after will cost you a lot of money, The capture device you want is something like Snell & Wilcox TBS-800, it can capture video and signaling and I believe it can sample at more than 13MHz horizontally (I could be wrong), You also need the hardware or software to interpret the signaling data such as teletext and captions which can cost a lot of money assuming you can find them, However you will never be able to recover any proprietary signaling and barcoding as those hardware are long gone with the companies that made them.
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  3. Member Cornucopia's Avatar
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    Would love to hear exactly WHICH companies overwrote visible data with proprietary metadata. And why that would any longer be considered significant to anyone, other than as a technologically historical museum curiosity.
    Oh, and do tell us which DVCam, DVCPro, BetacamSX, IMX, XDCam, etc formats are NOT professional, just because they use 480.

    Scott
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  4. Capturing Memories dellsam34's Avatar
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    It's the same argument was being made back in the day when transferring 8mm and supper 8 films to DVD to whether include the sprocket holes in the frame or not, At least for film it was a big section of image between sprockets to be considered as useful, not like the garbled head switch at the bottom of a video tape frame.
    Last edited by dellsam34; 15th May 2022 at 23:20.
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  5. Formerly 'vaporeon800' Brad's Avatar
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    Originally Posted by dellsam34 View Post
    Originally Posted by Brad View Post
    Originally Posted by dellsam34 View Post
    I have yet to come across a tape that contains any useful video at the top extra 6 lines that is reserved for signaling and other proprietary barcoding.
    Really? What about that cartoon trailer we both have (Grandma Got Run Over by a Reindeer)?

    Been meaning to add some examples to my old thread, so here you go: https://forum.videohelp.com/threads/359690-Geek-fun-with-VBI-Macrovision-DVD-recorders...es#post2656567
    That's not the top, it's the bottom section that includes the head switch, If you take those lines away you end up with 480 lines, Most of the video contained in the head switch section is a repeat of the last few active lines.
    The head-switch area isn't a repeat of the lines above it. It just so happens that in that specific screenshot, the whole area is animated to be flat brown, so it does appear that way. Head-switching causes a horizontal skew, but the information is still there:







    Note the closed-caption line on the WB logo. The trailer itself has no captions, and puts active video on NTSC line 21. Yes, the extra 4 lines really are at the top of the image, not the bottom. A 480-line capture (at typical SMPTE RP 202 spec) would include the same amount of head-switching noise, just with the bottom half-line cropped off.

    Video sample attached. I've left vhs-decode's padding, so it's 760x488 but only 485 lines are passed through from the source.
    Image Attached Files
    My YouTube channel with little clips: vhs-decode, comparing TBC, etc.
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  6. Originally Posted by Videogamer555 View Post
    Nonstandard isn't completely impossible. Sometimes copyprotection data is embedded in blanking areas of the video. In fact, if I remember right, not only does VBI and HBI sometimes contain copyprotection data, as people got more sophisticated in breaking copyprotection, some of the final versions of the Macrovision copyprotection actually altered the sync signals as well. They were altered just enough that a TV could still properly sync, but VCRs wouldn't be able to sync properly (due to VCR sync detection circuits usually being stricter in only detecting sync that stays on spec, while TV sync detectors are intended to pick up even poor quality signals so they can still detect the intentionally out-of-spec sync pulses). For the purpose of archiving a video source, ideally the entire source signal would be archived (all image, blanking, sync, absolutely everything) so that people could study the structure of such video signals (both in-spec signals, and signals with proprietary stuff added). It could make for an interesting study, but to make such a study possible, the equipment to capture the signals is needed first. Obviously that equipment would be likely expensive, but I wouldn't think that it would be too expensive to make a cheap capture card that could capture all 486 lines of video (even if it captured nothing else), and that itself would be an interesting study. See how many different companies sources embedded stuff in the video lines just outside of the normal 480 lines.
    I understand what are you saying but still not sure if you not going beyond practical aspects of private hobby... anyway this is not my call - i can only recommend solution such as https://www.analog.com/en/design-center/evaluation-hardware-and-software/evaluation-bo...ADALM2000.html or similar - no need to solder as most of such boards is usually connectable trough standard cables.
    There fast ADC there and USB connectivity on opposite side. Additionally you have drivers and limited support - build your own acquisition front end - rest is software - you may (IMHO community should) join efforts to make feasible use of such approach for general archivization purposes (so VCR RF capture and demodulation in software, your case is same code as it will be used later to extract video signal after FM demodulation).
    Recently Analog Devices solution became more expensive (overall post-pandemic economic issues and Russian aggression on Ukraine) but still this is flexibility level you desire. Alternatively use on of the Bt478/878 (or CX) boards - they are quite flexible too - use VBI mode to capture composite signal as single channel 27MHz grayscale data - chip is capable to do such things. Demodulation can be done in SW.
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  7. Capturing Memories dellsam34's Avatar
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    Originally Posted by Brad View Post
    The head-switch area isn't a repeat of the lines above it. It just so happens that in that specific screenshot, the whole area is animated to be flat brown, so it does appear that way. Head-switching causes a horizontal skew, but the information is still there.
    Why would someone leave an ugly noise bar in the frame so he can view 3 or 4 lines of useless video? Anything below the noise is garbage and was never in the camera viewfinder to begin with, I think this is just an obsession, look at any of my youtube videos and tell me if any is missing some information or not delivering a message, because none of them is even close to 480 lines.
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  8. Member Skiller's Avatar
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    Originally Posted by Videogamer555 View Post
    I don't see any reason for a height of 480, other than the fact that very old CRT computer monitors (which did not suffer from overscan like CRT TVs) tended to actually be exactly 480 pixels heigh (there were physically 480 rows of pixels on those old CRT computer monitors).
    There are no physical pixels in any CRT. At all.
    Overscan in (CRT) TVs is not "hard coded", you can freely adjust horizontal and vertical size on virtually any CRT to eliminate it – but you should not because it has ill effects.
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  9. Originally Posted by Skiller View Post
    There are no physical pixels in any CRT. At all.
    Overscan in (CRT) TVs is not "hard coded", you can freely adjust horizontal and vertical size on virtually any CRT to eliminate it – but you should not because it has ill effects.
    Technically there are some "pixels" in CRT's.

    First phosphor particles are finite size, of course there is no regular matrix like in typical graphic plane but still this is finite size particle.
    Secondly there is limited electron beam diameter - simply mechanical accuracy and physics prevent electron beam to be focused into very small diameter.
    Third limiting factor is projection of the electron beam on phosphor - even with dynamic focal point there is still particular size of electron beam.
    Fourth limiting factor is present in typical RGB CRT's where between phosphor layer and electron gun special mask is placed - holes pitch and regularity (heavily affected by many factors) limiting resolution and creating quasi-orthogonal structure of pixels (Trinitron with some exception).
    Of course "analog pixel" have shape very close to Gaussian where "digital pixel" is very close to rectangular but anyway resolution is limited.

    More proper differentiation between CRT's and modern display technologies is that pixels in CRT are addressed indirectly (in analog way) where almost all modern display offer direct pixel addressing - this is substantial difference between those two display techniques.
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  10. aBigMeanie aedipuss's Avatar
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    i'd go with pandy. there are "lines" of phosphor dot groups that could be considered pixel like. i really liked the rectangular sony wega analog xbr "pixels"
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    "a lot of people are better dead" - prisoner KSC2-303
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  11. Formerly 'vaporeon800' Brad's Avatar
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    Originally Posted by dellsam34 View Post
    Originally Posted by Brad View Post
    The head-switch area isn't a repeat of the lines above it. It just so happens that in that specific screenshot, the whole area is animated to be flat brown, so it does appear that way. Head-switching causes a horizontal skew, but the information is still there.
    Why would someone leave an ugly noise bar in the frame so he can view 3 or 4 lines of useless video? Anything below the noise is garbage and was never in the camera viewfinder to begin with, I think this is just an obsession, look at any of my youtube videos and tell me if any is missing some information or not delivering a message, because none of them is even close to 480 lines.
    As mentioned in my "geek fun" thread linked earlier, my solution these days doesn't have head-switching noise in the visible image anyway. I've adjusted the head-switch point to avoid the issue and obtain every possible clean line.

    These Reindeer samples are old files with default HSW point. I only brought up this specific video because I know you have it too, and you'd said that you've never seen useful video within 486's "top extra 6 lines that is reserved for signaling and other proprietary barcoding." Meanwhile, my copy has 4 complete video lines up there.

    Not that it matters, but if you still have your tape, I'd be curious to see an uncropped capture. No rush obviously; not a high priority. If yours doesn't include those lines intact, I guess my Canadian tape originates from a slightly different master.
    My YouTube channel with little clips: vhs-decode, comparing TBC, etc.
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  12. Capturing Memories dellsam34's Avatar
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    I stand corrected never find any useful video lines on top of the frame so far, Bellow the head switch bar sometimes there is repeated lines, sometimes an additional 2 or 3 lines that cannot be added to the video due to the noise bar separating them from the rest of the frame. though I don't have vhs-decode and I didn't shift anything up, I use legacy broadcast capture devices, As I mentioned I never got more than 480 total lines vertically, I average 476. My copy of that cartoon tape I believe was 472 clean crop. I even downloaded your screen shots and cropped of the noisy edge at the bottom and they all came out 479-480, I don't think this is an important issue that we should be debating about, Everyone has his own techniques of capturing video, let's just leave it at that.

    Image
    [Attachment 64829 - Click to enlarge]
    Last edited by dellsam34; 17th May 2022 at 03:12.
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  13. Originally Posted by Cornucopia View Post
    Would love to hear exactly WHICH companies overwrote visible data with proprietary metadata. And why that would any longer be considered significant to anyone, other than as a technologically historical museum curiosity.
    Oh, and do tell us which DVCam, DVCPro, BetacamSX, IMX, XDCam, etc formats are NOT professional, just because they use 480.

    Scott
    Technological historical interest is EXACTLY why I'm interested in it. And the longer that people wait to realize this, and the longer that companies making video capture hardware ignore this (and continue to produce hardware that can't capture this), the more that tapes will demagnetize to the point of being unrecoverable before getting digitized, thus losing some very historically interesting embedded signals. I know for a fact that data in the image portion of the signal, but outside the safe zone, can use metadata, as the companies that made the tapes would have assumed nobody would be able to see this content. And indeed at that time, TVs couldn't show that content, due to overscan. So it was a safe (at that time) way of embedding metadata directly in video frames. I know that CC signals are embedded in the overscan part of the image part the TV signal, or just outside of it in the VBI. Copyright data can be written even outside of the overscan part of the picture part of the frame, will into the VBI or HBI portions of the raw video frame. Ideally capturing the full signal including blanking and sync would be done for archiving, but most people can't afford the equipment for that, so I think that at least capturing all of the visible frame, including all of the overscan (on all sides of the picture) would be the best way to go for most people like me who are into historical archiving of video. This would mean a capture device capable of capturing all 486 lines of the visible frame.
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  14. Member Cornucopia's Avatar
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    Still didn't really answer my question (WHICH COMPANIES).

    You are misinformed. I worked for a company that in the process of duplication, inserted VBI material. Standards were STRICTER then, not looser, because equipment was dumber and less forgiving. And being analog, there was always loss. So waveform monitors, vectorscopes, confidence monitors with cross-plus and blue-only views were mandatory.

    We would NEVER stick any material into video that was not in normal blanking area, with the exception of a bug overlay (which would be very obvious, and necessary).

    Also, your assumption that people couldn't see the overscan (outside of safe area) is wrong as well - there were plenty of consumer TVs that could adjust visible screen size, as well as ALL of the pro monitors that could, plus some consumer TVs that might have been mis-aligned and so showed the overscan area. Bezels varied considerably as well, with some being almost non-existent.

    You can find info in the VBI, but even using a 486 capable card, the most you would get there would be CC, Timecode (since those were the reserved elements on those last lines). But visible area?

    Again, please back up your assertion that companies put stuff in there with some facts/examples. Because I think you are inflating the potential of this specialty need.


    Scott
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  15. @Videogamer555, I suggest renaming this thread from "Why does NTSC video usually get captured at a resolution of 720x480?" to something like "How can I capture as much video information as possible, including blanking area and service data"?
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  16. Capturing Memories dellsam34's Avatar
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    Originally Posted by Videogamer555 View Post
    so I think that at least capturing all of the visible frame, including all of the overscan (on all sides of the picture) would be the best way to go for most people like me who are into historical archiving of video. This would mean a capture device capable of capturing all 486 lines of the visible frame.
    Be my guest, I will be listing a S&W TBS-800 shortly on eBay for $1000 starting price, Not only it captures 486 but it can extract separately captions, teletext, AR flag, timecode and other signaling data, of course with a special software decoder which I don't know if it exists or not besides the studio environment which used hardware decoders/encoders.
    Last edited by dellsam34; 26th May 2022 at 15:01.
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  17. Originally Posted by Cornucopia View Post
    Still didn't really answer my question (WHICH COMPANIES).
    Off the top of my head I can immediately think of a certain group of companies. Any companies that made kids toys (and associated VHS tapes) that utilized the Microsoft Actimates technology. Motor-control data and spoken-audio data for the toy, were stored on the left side of the image part of a video frame, in the overscan part of the image. The way it worked was that the VHS tape was put in your VCR, and the composite video out was connected to the video input on the Actimates module. The video out (just a pass-through for the video signal) connector on the Actimates module was then connected to the TV's composite video input. The Actimates modules contained circuits to extract the data stored on the left side of the video frame (just outside of the safe area), and transmitted just that data (not full video frames). The toy contained a builtin RF receiver tuned to the same frequency as the transmitter in the Actimates module, and a microcontroller in the toy would use this data to control the motors and speaker in said toy, to makes its arms move, and even speak, based on the motor-control signals and spoken-audio signals that yes, WAS IN FACT originally stored in the left-side overscan part of the image part of the video signal on the VHS tape.

    And if you watch here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2AGuPtYA1YA you can clearly see that this data does overwrite part of the actual image signal, because the strip of toy-control data that goes down the left side of the image, doesn't go along the ENTIRE left side of the image. You see, it doesn't go all the way to the bottom. And below this strip you can see that there is image signal there. You challenged me to find even one company that would overwrite valid image signal with proprietary data. I have won your challenge.

    And by the way, this Actimates thing, I'm guessing is far from being one-of-a-kind. I'm guessing that other companies may also have used similar techniques to embed similar data (possibly equipment control data for toys, or even less frivolous uses). For example, I wouldn't be shocked to find out that some special videos intended to NOT be used by the general public, but only to be played by broadcast stations on TV broadcasts, might include metadata like a serial number, so that if it ever got leaked to the general public, the source of the leak could be determined by decoding the embedded serial number (this might help to track down the last employee who had access to the tape, so he could be punished appropriately). For example, if Disney releases a VHS tape special edition of a movie, only ever intended for TV broadcast (the TV station is intended to put it into a professional VCR wired directly to their transmitter for broadcast), and not for home video release, it may contain certain metadata unique to that specific physical tape. But I'm guessing that some such tapes have leaked at some point (as well as home-video recordings of the TV broadcast that someone may have made with their own personal VCR), and for the historical record, it would be interesting to digitize them fully, including any metadata they may contain.

    The metadata could be embedded anywhere, including in one of the 6 image lines not digitized by consumer-grade 720x480 video capture hardware. It could even be embedded outside of the image part of the signal entirely, such as in the VBI or HBI so long as it was carefully placed so as to avoid overwriting any sync signals or chroma bursts. By the way, it's a bit less critical for chroma bursts, as long as it doesn't overwrite too many of them, as the chroma oscilator in the TV it's ultimately viewed on should theoretically be able to not go too far out of phase if chroma burst is only missing on one or two lines out of every ten lines or so. By the way, this is actually exploited by one of the later more advanced versions of Macrovision on home-media releases, as this technique messes up the color recording of VCRs, but most TVs can display the video properly in full color.
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  18. After doing a Google search for 720x486 capture hardware, I found his professional PCI-card for video capture looks like what I would have wanted, but it's discontinued.
    https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/180133-REG/Aurora_IGNITER001_IGNITER_Video_Capture_Card.html
    It sounds like it could capture all 486 lines per frame (720x486 mode), as well as an even more raw mode where it would capture the fields to save to file immediately without combining the fields into frames (720x243 mode). This would have been a VERY interesting capture device to have. Unfortunately, I don't know if there are any other devices like it being currently sold by any companies.
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  19. Capturing Memories dellsam34's Avatar
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    All capture cards can capture that left side barcode, I had few of those tapes and was able to capture the barcode with a consumer capture device I believe it was a Plextor brand, The question is are you able to write a piece of software that can extract the data from the frame? As far as I know there is only one software decode called Ruxpin decode for TV Teddy VHS system, but that requires the vhs-decode hardware, software and the knowledge how to run it and debug it, and it is not MAC or MS. If there is any hope for what you are after, it's going to be through VHS-decode assuming the project will finalize some year in the future, There is hardly any quality capture devices left, let alone a feature that almost no one wants in a capture software.
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  20. Originally Posted by Videogamer555 View Post
    After doing a Google search for 720x486 capture hardware, I found his professional PCI-card for video capture looks like what I would have wanted, but it's discontinued.
    https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/180133-REG/Aurora_IGNITER001_IGNITER_Video_Capture_Card.html
    It sounds like it could capture all 486 lines per frame (720x486 mode), as well as an even more raw mode where it would capture the fields to save to file immediately without combining the fields into frames (720x243 mode). This would have been a VERY interesting capture device to have. Unfortunately, I don't know if there are any other devices like it being currently sold by any companies.
    Osprey's cards will capture with a configurable 480 or 486 lines, along with a bunch of other interesting options.

    https://www.ospreyvideo.com/analog

    Blackmagic's capture cards will also do 486 lines, but BMD's support for analog and interlaced in general is pretty terrible, unfortunately.
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  21. Originally Posted by Videogamer555 View Post
    Off the top of my head I can immediately think of a certain group of companies. Any companies that made kids toys (and associated VHS tapes) that utilized the Microsoft Actimates technology. Motor-control data and spoken-audio data for the toy, were stored on the left side of the image part of a video frame, in the overscan part of the image.
    ...
    And if you watch here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2AGuPtYA1YA you can clearly see that this data does overwrite part of the actual image signal
    Wow! On the one hand, this is something I did not know about, and I would never think that MS would do something like this! On another hand, what a junk tech to replace a real live friend, I am dismayed.
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  22. Originally Posted by dellsam34 View Post
    All capture cards can capture that left side barcode
    2 Problems:

    1) I think the barcode may go up above the 480 lines of a normal capture, right up to the boarder between blanking and image signal. In all 486 lines of image of a video frame, there is one line below the normally captured 480, and 5 lines above the normal 480. This barcode doesn't go down all the way, but I think it goes up all the way. To capture ALL the data from such a tape, you would need a 720x486 capture device. 720x480 capture wouldn't get all the data, so a correct decoding of the data wouldn't be possible. The reason I think it goes up all the way, is that in that video I saw on Youtube, the image loses sync for a bit, which pushes the image frame down by a few lines, and I can see the bottom of the VBI, and the barcode appears to go all the way up to the border with the VBI.

    2) If this company embedded data like that, I think it's possible other companies have done similar things, even if it only stores proprietary metadata about the video (something no consumer device would be intended to decode). So the only way to check for this stored metadata is to get a device capable of capturing all 486 lines (or possibly even a little more, to make sure that at least some of the VBI is also included, not just the overscan part of the image region). I know for a fact that that one Actimates video I linked to has more than just the barcode on the left side. There's also some kind of data stored one line above the top of the image part of the frame, as can be seen when the video goes out of sync for a bit. It may be a timecode or closed caption data, or possibly some other proprietary information (some of which may even pertain to operating the Actimates toy, in addition to the barcode on the left side of the image).
    Last edited by Videogamer555; 27th May 2022 at 17:40.
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  23. Capturing Memories dellsam34's Avatar
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    Those proprietary decoders work out of composite signal which is 525 vertical lines, No capture card is capable of capturing 525 NTSC scan lines. As I said above vhs-decode is what you will be looking for. You are making a big deal out of 6 lines of data that you have no way of decoding it.
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  24. Originally Posted by dellsam34 View Post
    Those proprietary decoders work out of composite signal which is 525 vertical lines, No capture card is capable of capturing 525 NTSC scan lines. As I said above vhs-decode is what you will be looking for. You are making a big deal out of 6 lines of data that you have no way of decoding it.
    I assume that the proprietary data decoders in the RF transmitter module for Microsoft Actimates, actually have a built-in NTSC capture chip which captures fields (even if it doesn't combine fields into frames) as separate chunks of data, and then uses a DSP chip to perform decoding on these 2D image fields, not decoding on the raw composite video stream.
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    The Osprey 260e card I used a few years ago has some flexible settings in the driver. You can choose 480- or 485-line capture. If you pick 480 lines, you can tell it what line to start at. You can also choose to capture fewer than 720 horizontal samples and specify a delay to start picking up the image. This is useful if your source has consistent horizontal timing, because you can limit capture to 704 samples (or whatever) of the image without any slop. Here is the manual I just looked up for someone else asking about this card.
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  26. Originally Posted by JVRaines View Post
    The Osprey 260e card I used a few years ago has some flexible settings in the driver. You can choose 480- or 485-line capture. If you pick 480 lines, you can tell it what line to start at. You can also choose to capture fewer than 720 horizontal samples and specify a delay to start picking up the image. This is useful if your source has consistent horizontal timing, because you can limit capture to 704 samples (or whatever) of the image without any slop. Here is the manual I just looked up for someone else asking about this card.
    Osprey card? By card do you mean like a PCI-e card? I don't have a desktop, only a laptop, so it would have to be a USB-3 based device to work on my laptop. Fortunately (I think I already mentioned this) I already have the Black Magic Design Intensity Shuttle for USB-3. It got discontinued just before I finally committed to buying it. I contacted them and asked them if they could make one more just for me and they said no. So I ended up buying one on Ebay. However that was like a year or two ago, so there's no guaranty that anybody can find one of these on Ebay now. I would hope that I can find an alternative USB-3 device for this so that I can recommend it to others, as the BMD-IS is long discontinued by now. I don't know if the Osprey is USB based or if it requires a desktop with expansion card slots.
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  27. Capturing Memories dellsam34's Avatar
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    It would cost them hundred of thousands of dollars to remake a discontinued product, Everything is automated, once the production chain is dismantled it's done. It's not like someone is making them in his basement and has some left over components.
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  28. Originally Posted by dellsam34 View Post
    It would cost them hundred of thousands of dollars to remake a discontinued product, Everything is automated, once the production chain is dismantled it's done. It's not like someone is making them in his basement and has some left over components.
    The Black Magic Design Intensity Shuttle for USB-3 is the only (at this time) product I'm aware of that could capture all 486 active image lines of an NTSC video signal. Do you know of any alternatives that also capture 486 lines and will run from USB-3 (doesn't require a desktop PC with expansion card)?
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  29. My thread here https://forum.videohelp.com/threads/405886-Captured-NTSC-composite-video-with-Picoscope-2204A has an MP4 video file I uploaded (unfortunately you'll need to download it to play it as this site doesn't have an embedded player), and it shows the exact kind of metadata I'm talking about in NTSC video. Above the image is some metadata in the video (which I captured myself using the technique I described in that post). The signal source is actually a Sony camcorder. When you enable widescreen mode in the menu (note that the menu graphics themselves aren't passed through to the composite video signal), the metadata above the image part of the field changes. There's one bit of data enabled on the left, and 2 bits on the right normally. When you enable widescreen mode, a bit that's 2 bits to the right of the left bit becomes enabled, and the 2 bits on the right side of the field become shifted to the right right by 2 bits. At the same time, when you enable widescreen mode, the content in the active portion of the field gets stretched vertically, though the active portion itself doesn't expand, thus cropping off the top and bottom of the content that was originally in the active portion of the field.

    If even the output of a normal Sony camcorder contains such metadata, think about all the other video sources that are out there. I mean think about things like other video cameras, professionally made tapes, home-recorded tapes of TV broadcasts, etc, and the treasure trove of metadata that could be archived for historical signal archiving purposes.
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  30. Capturing Memories dellsam34's Avatar
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    Originally Posted by Videogamer555 View Post
    The Black Magic Design Intensity Shuttle for USB-3 is the only (at this time) product I'm aware of that could capture all 486 active image lines of an NTSC video signal. Do you know of any alternatives that also capture 486 lines and will run from USB-3 (doesn't require a desktop PC with expansion card)?
    I'm not sure if the BM IS can capture 486 lines, And I'm not aware of any good capture device that uses USB 3.x let alone captures 486, You will need a pro capture device, it comes in two flavors, PCI or SDI (then SDI2USB3). and no I don't know where you can get one of those besides just searching online.
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