How to capture a full VHS tape?

[burrowsfan]

Here is the deal...I have about 20 old VHS tapes that I need to digitize. What do I need to set to capture the full tape? I have tried a few different programs to capture....Premiere Pro seems to lock up or reboot my computer when trying to capture a 2 hour tape(possibly my computer needs to be wiped).....Scenalyzer Live and Windows Movie Maker tend to stop capturing at every break in the tape! By break I mean the part of the tape between scenes that would be just your standard snow.

Is there a setting that I am missing in these programs that I need to be setting that can change the time before it declares it a break in the tape? Or is there some other program that someone has used that works great? I dont want to have to sit there and babysit each tape, restarting at every stop...I just want to set it and forget it!

HELP!

[Baldrick]

What capture card/box are you using? sounds like some dv connection if you are using scenalyzer.

[tinker]

If you capture in DV format, you need hard drive formatted in NTFS.
If it is in FAT32, you can download only 4GB file size. May by that is why Premiere quit.
2 hour DV format will be well over 30GB size.
I use Premiere for this also and no problem there.

[burrowsfan]

I am using a canopus advc300...which is firewire. Havent had any issues with it in the past. If I recall a few years back the Scenalyzer site emailed me and told me what settings I needed to do this and for the life of me I cannot find that email nor answer on their site...I have emailed them recently...not sure if they are still in biz or what!

[Nelson37]

If you don't want Scenes Analyzed and detected, I might suggest that you stop using a program that is specifically designed to do just that, and perhaps try one of the dozen or so other DV-capture programs which are available.

A highly complex editing program would not be my first choice, either.

[tinker]

Well, you are using converter(avdc300). You should check in Premiere web site if that particular one is compatible with that software. I know there is a list of capture devices usable with Premiere.
I use Premiere Pro and Digital Movie camera as a converter via firewire, have no problem with that one.
It is also possible that Scenalyzer is conflicting with Premiere during capture. Try to uninstall that and see.
Also try to reinstall Premiere, may be something went wrong with some of the files.

[burrowsfan]

I think I may try to reload my pc and see if that works. I have a clean image I created awhile back so I may try that!

[JohnnyMalaria]

Don't do that! Well, yet.

You need to find out what exactly is going on when the picture turns to snow. Does your converter create DV with snow or does it just not do anything? To figure this out, open My Computer and look for a something named "Canopus DV Converter" or similar. Open it (as if it were a drive) and you'll see the video coming from it. Play your VHS tape. When it gets to the snowy bits, do you see snow on your computer or does it just freeze? If the latter, then your capture software is probably intrepeting this as a break in the video as if it were the end of the tape - or it sees a break in the timecode - which some capture software hates. If the snow continues, try a different capture program (Windows Movie Maker, WinDV, ours).

If I get a chance, I'll run some tests - I have to find my VHS recorder first!

Oh, one last option - I think the Canopus can generate color bars(?) - if so turn them on or connect another video source that doesn't have breaks (e.g., the tuner output from the VCR or the menu page, a DVD player etc) then set the capture processing running. If it keeps going and going then the snowy video is the problem (because the snowy picture is due to there being no real video signal at all).

[burrowsfan]

Hey Johnny...being a newb here I hope you dont mind me asking....So does that color bar feature take the place of no video signal in between scenes? Its weird...it seems Premiere Pro was working through those issues,(Premiere has that option of aborting capture if there is dropped frames..I unchecked that) it was just the issue of it rebooting and me having to start all over. It was the other programs that were stopping at the no signal parts like it was the end of the tape or something.

[JohnnyMalaria]

The color bars suggestion was just a means to generate a continuous, uninterrupted DV signal so that you could try to capture for a very long period. If you still saw the same behavior (aborting) then you'd know it wasn't because of the snowy parts between clips. I don't think the converter will replace missing frames with color bars - it would be a nice feature, though.

[Brainiac]

From my experience with Scenalyzer, I'd check the following settings by going to FILE -> Options

1. Capture settings tab: max file size set to unlimited for NTFS; scene detection mode set to no scene detection
2. Stop capturing tab: no more video timeout (mine is set to 30 seconds)

Hope this helps

Brainiac

[lordsmurf]

Use WinDV, big hard drive formatted NTFS, the end.