A unique conversion issue...

[DigitalArtist]

Hi,

I've been having a dilemma with a particular movie and I've scoured the internet (this website included) not finding the answer I need so I thought I would try my luck here. Before I jump into the heart of the problem let me give some background info on the issue. What I have is VOB files for an extremely rare movie which is very difficult to find, unfortunately I can't legally state its name since according to the film production company it doesn't exist, and what I'm trying to do is convert it to DVD preserve it. The movie is from 1995 (pre-DVD technology era) and most of it has been successfully converted to mpeg2 already by somebody else, the problem is certain segments of the film. The version I have has a total of 45 minutes of previously unreleased additional footage, an alternate beginning, and an alternate ending all of which comes from the original unedited workprint of the film from 1995 so unfortunately the additional footage is all VHS quality. What I have is a DVD movie with the additional footage as VHS quality video inserts edited into the main film. It's also quite aggravating trying to watch a movie in DVD format which keeps switching to VHS quality for certain scenes.
The ultimate goal here is to convert the additional footage into mpeg2 format so it's DVD quality like the rest of the movie, but I've tried so much and I'm beginning to doubt if this is even possible. I've tried so many different multiple settings in Canopus Procoder 2 and X2D, but these programs unfortunately preserve the additional footage in the VHS quality. After multiple attempts I've learned that most encoding software doesn't re-encode the video stream in the way I want and simply just transcodes. I've even thought about rendering out the movie as an AVI and importing it into Premiere and splitting out the extra footage then trying to clean up the clips that way, but I'm not sure how much good that will do. I think the biggest problem I'm having is when someone else edited the extra footage into the movie that he didn't try to clean the clips up and kept them as VHS quality so when he rendered out the VOB files the clips where encoded with mpeg2 compression retaining the low VHS quality.
Something tells me though there is a solution to achieve the goal I want. I look at it in that respect because I think about when DVD technology first came out in the middle to late '90s. The video editors of the time took all the VHS movies and re-encoded the video streams for these older movies with mpeg2 compression putting the VHS into DVD format (that's the barebone gist of it). I've often wondered what tools and software was used for the VHS to DVD conversion because whatever they used back then I need something similar if I'm going to get the results I want. Any advice, ideas, and suggestions are greatly appreciated. If I'm wasting my time then please tell me so I don't continue working on a futile project.

[lordsmurf]

"ultimate goal here is to convert the additional footage into mpeg2 format so it's DVD quality like the rest of the movie"

This is not possible. The end. Sorry.

While you can surpass source quality when converting to a digital format, given the right hardware, it will never match a studio-cut DVD quality.

If you want quality to be steady, you'll have to lower the quality of the DVD version.

[manono]

The video editors of the time took all the VHS movies and re-encoded the video streams for these older movies with mpeg2 compression putting the VHS into DVD format (that's the barebone gist of it).

You're saying that the early DVDs used VHS tapes as a source and magically improved them by adding detail, clarity, sharpness and resolution so that they no longer looked like VHS tapes, but like the higher resolution DVDs we all know and love? Are you kidding? I know of quite a few early DVDs that used laserdisc masters, but even they are an improvement over VHS tapes.

I have a bunch of DVDs that used VHS tapes as masters. They look just like VHS tapes put on a DVD. If you have a DVD that has as a source a mix of VHS tape and some sort of a proper master made from the original film elements, there's no way to improve the bad stuff so that it looks the same as the good stuff. Yes, VHS tapes can be cleaned up, filtered, and denoised. They can even be sharpened up a bit to give the perception of added detail, but they'll still not ever look like a DVD made from a properly prepared master.

After multiple attempts I've learned that most encoding software doesn't re-encode the video stream in the way I want and simply just transcodes.

That doesn't make much sense. If you want to try and clean up the bad parts, don't rely on the encoder to do it for you. Either save it to a lossless codec and fix it up in some sort of an NLE program (you mentioned Premiere), or learn some AviSynth and use its filters to help clean it up, or learn to use VDub and its filters.

If I'm wasting my time then please tell me so I don't continue working on a futile project.

If your goal is to improve the VHS stuff so that it's as good as the regular stuff, I think you're wasting your time. I do think you can improve the VHS sourced footage, maybe even improve it considerably. But if this is the first project like this you've ever attempted (and from the sound of it, it is), you have your work cut out for you, as there's a pretty steep learning curve for these kinds of projects.

Here are a couple of guides about cleaning up captures, one using VDub filters, and the other using AviSynth filters. A lot of it applies to the kind of thing you're attempting. If the whole process looks kind of intimidating, that's because it is:

http://www.doom9.org/capture/postprocessing_vdub.html
http://www.doom9.org/capture/postprocessing_avisynth.html

[aedipuss]

you are talking about a fan edit of a movie correct? like the de-jar jar'd version of star wars I. like the other guys above have said, you can't increase the quality of an already rendered movie, it will always get worse with further encoding. the only way is to get better source material and try to make a better first encode yourself.

early retail dvd was not made by transferring vhs to mpeg2. it was and still is mostly done with expensive telecine machines that use film projectors.

[lordsmurf]

Some early DVDs were Laserdisc transfers, but that's about as low as it ever got.

[guns1inger]

I have a couple of commercial releases that have had "lost" material reinserted from one inch masters, and the difference between the scenes is night and day. The film source is widescreen and the one inch masters are 4:3, so that's problem one. And the quality difference - there is no way you could mistake the inserts for being anywhere near the quality of the film source. And these were done by people with money and equipment.

The only way to get seamless integration of the two sources is to enhance the quality of the lowest source as much as possible, then reduce the quality of the other until it all matches.