Best Way To Capture High Quality MPEG

[kc5hwb]

Hi,

I am new to the whole "capture" process. I have been trading and downloading VCD files for some time now, so I am somewhat familiar with the process. But now I want to capture my own high quality video and I have a question about the best way to do it.

I know that if I have $1000, I can go out and spend money to but high quality Digital conversion equipment and firewire connections, but I am wondering if this is really necessary. I currently have an ATI All-In-Wonder card that seems to work fine, my only concern is that maybe I will regret not going with a higher quality digital solutions, rather than a analog capture device.

Does anyone have any suggestions for capturing high quality files? I am mainly interested in capturing from VHS tapes to preserve them, and I know that this is an analog signal to start with, but for the money....what is the best way to do this?

Thanks

[menace]

It seems there are 2 (at least) schools of thought. You could either capture as a lossless AVI and then encode to mpeg-1, mpeg-2 for VCD,XVCD,SVCD whatever, or you could do a direct capture to mpeg-1 and then create your VCD based on that. Personally I don't have 40 and 50GB of free space kicking around so i opt to the direct capture going straight from VCR to video in and let the card capture and convert in real time. I get great results with my radeon 64DDR VIVO. After that i burn in nero and voila xVCD.

The thing to remember is that how it looks depends on a whole mess of factors i.e. audio/video bitrate, resolution etc. For material that i don't need to edit i use a Variable bit Rate at 2.7mb/s with audio at 224kb/s and a resolution of 352x240 or 700x480 (or so). For 42mins i get a mpeg-1 file of about 600MB--turn off compliance in nero and burn. For material i have to edit i use constant bit rate at 2.01mb/s, audio at 224kb/s and a resolution of 352x240. Not as sharp as VBR but the editing is way easier and the file size is 690-715MB.

This si just the tip of the iceberg but once you play with it for awhile--you get something you can be happy with. Hope that helps.

If you were looking for the other school of that--I have no clue whats best

[kc5hwb]

That's pretty much what I am doing now. I am capturing straight to MPEG1 format with a bitrate of 1.15Mbps on the video. I get a 450MB file for 40 minutes of video.

I am just wondering if this was the best way to do it....or should I wait and get a digital interface for higher quality. Since the videotapes are analog, I didn't know if the digital interface would matter for capturing.

Thanks

[ChevyNo1]

Well, I'm new to capturing too. I have done a lot of research, and I just purchased the Dazzle Hollywood-Bridge along with a firewire card. Total cost including delivery was like $299. It hasn't shown up yet, but I can't wait to try it out! I don't currently have a digicam, but will in the near future, that's why I went with this ( analogue & digital capture ).

- Dug

[menace]

My first capture was at 1.15mb/s and then i realized my DVD player will play up to 2.9mb/s on VBR! Naturally CBR is limited by CD disk size but i would crank up vbr to the point where your DVD player says "enough!" You'll get way better looking captures! Just don't be surprised if they don't work in every player--mine only work in my pioneer dv525. Of course if you're looking for compliance, you'll have to settle for 1.15

[kc5hwb]

Chevy,

I have heard of these bridges, but know very little about them. Do you have to have a camcoreder to use with them? Can you capture with just the bridge and a firewire card to PC? What model would you suggest?

Thanks

[Anonymous65]

If you're going for mpeg-1 only (VCD, XVCD), then the PV231 hardware encoder card for $85 is the best way to go. Personally, I think it makes better VCD's than uncompressed AVI capture and Tmpeg encoding to VCD. I have not seen any card (for less than $1000) that can outperform the PV231.

http://steve.kittelsen.com/pv231

[kc5hwb]

My ATI card will capture straight to MPEG1, thats not a concern. I was wondering if someone knew a way to Crop the video while capturing. The only reason I run it through TMPG is to crop it....it is already a MPEG1 format.

[oberkfell]

There is an excellent post on resizing below:

http://rilanparty.com/vbb/showthread.php?s=a0ab8ac55fa48dfbe15d0d775bf31726&threadid=18252

[kc5hwb]

I am not trying to resize, only to crop.

I want to keep my 4:3 ratio because the original tape is 4:3...it is a TV show.

Anyway, with as much info as there is out here, I should have a college degree for learning all this crap. I need to win the lottery so that I can sit around all day and try new progs and stuff with this capture thing....

[ChevyNo1]

kc5hwb, go here for more info:

http://www.dazzle.com/products/hw_bridge.html

Also, there is a very good review here:

http://www.digitalpostproduction.com/cgi-bin/getframeletter.cgi?/2001/03_mar/reviews/D...e/DVBridge.htm

- Dug

[kc5hwb]

Chevy...

These reviews look great. I am seriously considering trying this unit.

Something that I haven't found yet, however.....what file type does this software allow you to save as once the video is converted on your PC? I am wondering if the software will let you save as MPEG1 or VCD, or if you will have to convert the file with TMPG.

Let me know when you get the bridge and let me know how you like it. I might be getting one here soon. If you couldn, send me an email when you get it.....zzyxxscarecrow@yahoo.com

Thanks

[ChevyNo1]

Well, it's supposed to arrive sometime today. I will let you know as soon as I find anything out!

- Dug

[rnwa]

The bridge captures in avi and will encode in mpeg 1/2 , dv avi/64bit, vcd, svd, and whole bunch else.

Not too shabby

[kc5hwb]

Capture in AVI and encode in teh other formats? I assume you mean that the software that comes with the bridge does all this, so it is an all-in-one process?

Sounds like a great product.

[rnwa]

Yes, the hardware captures in avi, then the software does the encoding.

[kc5hwb]

rnwa...

Do you use one of these units now? What do you think about the post in this forum about the guy who says that he gets flickering video and the bridge doesn't work that well? The thread is labeled "Dazzle Holywood DV Bridge"

I am wanting to get one of these, but I want to make sure that it is worth having and it will do a good job. Quality is the key....

Thanks

[Nexzus]

(1) One thing I've found is that most time capture and converting to VCD format on the fly isn't the best way. I get MUCH better results capturing MPG2 720x480 5MBPS and then converting down to VCD. The difference is like night and day.

(2) I use the Dazzle DVCII. I read that the Bridge had some sync problems sometimes. The DVCII comes with a PCI MPG2 to do hardware MPG compression on the fly, much better than software compression on the fly.

[rnwa]

The thing to remember is that unit there is a standard in computers and computer componants (which there never will be) then hardware will work differently on these different computers. My father and I have used the hollywood bridge for about a year, So minor problems in the beging with artifacts while outputting, this was a firmware issue and was replaced, perfect ever scince, my father, same story but a differety make of computer. So again, the system takes its toll.

[LavaJockey]

Another good hassle-free option is the ADS InstantDVD device. It's easy to install; just plug it into the USB port. It does MPEG1 and MPEG2 conversion in realtime via special purpose hardware. And it costs less than $200.

The quality looks to be near that of the MPEGS created from TMPGEnc that were captures as lossless AVI.

[Anonymous65]

Not sure why you want to crop 4:3 video? Black borders are not taking up many bits in the compression, so you will not gain alot by croping black borders. If you want to cover VCR head switching, then you have to do that before you make the mpeg file. The PV231 is the only device that has it as an option to crop the bottom of the video to cover the head switching during capture. Otherwise, you will not gain much by cropping.

[MOVIEGEEK]

I have to agree with "Nexsus", I get the best results capturing in MPEG-2
640x240 pixels,4mb/s and then converting to VCD using TMPGEncoder.

[dan1st]

skittelsen, is the PV231 u mentioned the True Blue Action card?
and wat's the PV233?
It's the card I intend to get...

How does it perform against the Dazzle DVC, d'ya know?

[kc5hwb]

I would like to thank everyone for posting in here. all of this information has ben very helpful.

To all of you who keep saying that you capture to MPEG2 at 640x480 at 5Mbps, and then down-size for VCDs....Are you using the ATI card to capture, or something else like the DV Bridge? I am wondering of there is a difference in the quality if you are capturing from a ATI card, which is what I have now. My only reserve about capturing at such a high bitrate is that I like o keep the MPG files for a kind-of "original" so that I can make multiple VCDs. Obviously I cannot write a 1000MB file to CD-R, so thats why I have been capturing MPGs at the VCD 2.0 compliance settings (320x240@ 1.15Mbps).

I know that the higher the bitrate, the higher the picture quality, but I am wondering if I am beating a dead-horse with using the ATI card. It seems that with little effort, I can get much better results with the Dazzle DV Bridge and have a better, longer lasting file to burn VCDs.

Thanks

[Sulik]

Bitrate is the main quality factor in MPEG compression.
The reason why DV typically look so much better is only because the bitrate is so high (15Mbps)

[catnip1]

I am new to capturing also but I did a lot of research before purchasing and this forum helped me out a lot!!!!! I ended up buying the Dazzle Hollywood-Bridge because I wanted to convert VHS tapes to digital and burn vcd's. I am putting this in just for the record so you can use it to compare. I use the bundeled software that came with the bridge and have pretty good luck. I have been using TMPEge to convert to mpeg1 and then burning the vcd with the software that came with my Sony burner (I don't remember the name). The AVI's are a little choppy but when I convert to mpeg1 they clean up pretty good.

Here is my setup: Celeron 633 Mhz
256 Meg sdram
2 Gig capture HDD 4500 rpm @ 16.6 MB/sec
4 Gig HDD 5400 rpm


Both HDD's set for DMA and mem set to 256 MB. I realize that this is not a fast setup (HDD being the week link) but even with this I get a pretty good capture. I am planning on getting a Western Digital 80 Gig (7200 rpm @ 100 MB/sec data transfer rate) HDD in the near future and I feel this will make a big difference in my AVI capture quality. The early Dazzle Hollywood-Bridges had a problem with sync. The serial numbers did not contain an "X". the newer ones have an "X" in the serial number and do not have the sync problem.

I hope this has been helpfull,

cat

[kc5hwb]

That helps a great deal, thanks for the post.

I wonder why you have choppy AVIs? Do you think this is a problem with your HDD or the Bridge?

Also, I thought that the software that came with the Bridge would capture to MPEG1, but maybe I am wrong. I have used TMPG, and it is pretty good. The only problem I have had is with splitting a MPEG file into 2 files...due to a large original file that won't burn to CD. When I do this, it doesn't seem to Re-Multiplex very well...the sound and video frames are way off. But other than that, TMPG seems to be great for converting to MPEG1.

Thanks

[catnip1]

I think my HDD is causing the AVI capture problem. A data transfer rate of 16.6 MB/sec is pretty slow compared to a more updated HDD with a data transfer rate of 100 MB/sec. Every little change I've made to make the system faster has made the system a little faster. Setting the DMA on the drives has made the biggest noticable difference. I think you are right about being able to capture to mpeg1 with the bundeled software but I haven't really had time to play with it.

Cat

[Rich927]

I am assuming these cards are capturing analog video to MPEG-1 or MPEG-2. Are there any Firewire cards that will capture directly to MPG-1 without a second rendering step? I understand that cards like Pinnacle first caputre a preview then recaptures once you have done your editing. Ulead Videostudio 6 claims to capture straight to MPG but it has to pause to render during the process which takes more time than rendering from AVI to MPG.