NTSC vs. NTSC-J

[ESPY]

I’m doing a lot of VHS to MPEG-2 (and then DVD) captures using my AIW 9000 PRO (MMC 8.9). So far, the majority of my source materials have been pre-record VHS tapes of Kill Bill-style Japanese gangster movies that I inherited from a Japanese video store that was dumping them to make room for more crummy TV dramas.

In the beginning, I found that most of my caps were too dark and too color-saturated, especially for the MMC’s default display settings.

On a whim, I changed the setting on Display from NTSC to NTSC-J. Things started looking like they should have all along: nice contrast levels, and milder colors. If anything, I had to lower the brightness now, instead of jacking it up.

I don’t know enough about NTSC, let alone Japan’s NTSC, to understand what the difference is and how it impacts image quality. But simple common sense says, since everything on those tapes was made for playback on NTSC-J equipment, that MMC's J setting would make it happy as well.

But being the paranoid type, I’m wondering what happens when I take the final NTSC-J DVDs and play them on regular US-made NTSC equipment. Am I losing picture information? Am I gaining something? Is brightness and color all there is to NTSC-J? And am I being unpatriotic for capping like this in the first place?

Anyone else have any thoughts, coherent or otherwise, on NTSC-J?

[sacajaweeda]

Us round-eyes don't need as bright a picture to look at. That's why the regular NTSC settings aren't as bright. That said, the NTSC-J setting does wonders if you're capping those old martial arts flicks. Fixes those lip-synch dubbing issues right up.