Vhs capture advice.

[Bwaak]

A dollar per swab? You gotta be kidding me. I bet 12voltvids does not bother with such posh tools.

[Leanoric]

A dollar per swab? You gotta be kidding me. I bet 12voltvids does not bother with such posh tools.

He uses paper. Thats why i asked here, as a lot of people seem to think its a bad thing to use.

[lollo]

A dollar per swab? You gotta be kidding me.

As per the TBC discussion, if for you it's an issue paying $0.76/Swabs, it's your problem, not mine.

[Leanoric]

A dollar per swab? You gotta be kidding me.

As per the TBC discussion, if for you it's an issue paying $0.76/Swabs, it's your problem, not mine.

Have you noticed fibres coming off of your ones? The ones that I bought had a lot of fibres coming off them so i had to send them back.

[lollo]

No; extensive usage on several VCRs, never a problem

[Leanoric]

Hi all, im using colormill for colour corrections but the results have been very hit or miss.

I know that its another very complicated aspect of processing/restoration and that you cant just tell me what to do, but is there a general rule of thumb for the order of what needs to be adjusted? Brightness and contrast should be done last?

[lollo]

You can start from here:

https://www.cambridgeincolour.com/tutorials/histograms1.htm

https://www.cambridgeincolour.com/tutorials/histograms2.htm

[Leanoric]

Thanks Lollo.

[Sharc]

Hi all, im using colormill for colour corrections but the results have been very hit or miss.

I know that its another very complicated aspect of processing/restoration and that you cant just tell me what to do, but is there a general rule of thumb for the order of what needs to be adjusted? Brightness and contrast should be done last?

What do you want to achieve? As you say we can't tell you what needs to be adjusted without seeing a picture. A first step may be to check and adjust the white balance. With respect to colors there is a wide range of personal preference. But worse, the source may have irreversible technical flaws, or loose details when converting between color spaces.
Perhaps you upload a sample you are wrapping your head around, and tell us what you like to improve, and collect ideas from members here.

[Leanoric]

What do you want to achieve? As you say we can't tell you what needs to be adjusted without seeing a picture. A first step may be to check and adjust the white balance. With respect to colors there is a wide range of personal preference. But worse, the source may have irreversible technical flaws, or loose details when converting between color spaces.
Perhaps you upload a sample you are wrapping your head around, and tell us what you like to improve, and collect ideas from members here.

Its just that the picture is always a bit dull and the colours just seem to be slightly off, on all of my captures.

Blacks or dark colours are normally too dark, when somebody is wearing a suit for example, the lines of the pockets wont be visible.

Brightening up the picture definitely helps but quite often I end up making things look a bit washed out.

[Sharc]

Blacks or dark colours are normally too dark, when somebody is wearing a suit for example, the lines of the pockets wont be visible.

Brightening up the picture definitely helps but quite often I end up making things look a bit washed out.

Sounds to me like you would get away with some gamma and levels adjustments. Easy in Avisynth.
In Vdub or VirtualDub2 you may want to play with the filter "gradation curves". You probably have to download this .vdf plugin.
https://forum.videohelp.com/threads/287113-Gradation-Curves-VirtualDub-filter-v1-45
https://neosol.at/vdub/index.html
The tutorials point the way:
https://neosol.at/vdub/tutorial/tutorial.html

[jagabo]

Its just that the picture is always a bit dull and the colours just seem to be slightly off, on all of my captures.

Blacks or dark colours are normally too dark, when somebody is wearing a suit for example, the lines of the pockets wont be visible.

Brightening up the picture definitely helps but quite often I end up making things look a bit washed out.

I usually start with adjusting the black and white levels (contrast and brightness, really gain and offset). Then a gamma adjustment (which may then require further contrast/brightness adjustments). Then saturation (saturation usually requires about the same boost as the contrast). Then white balance.

But you may want to look at adjusting your capture device's video processing amp before capturing. Otherwise you may be crushing blacks and brights even before you start filtering/editing.

As noted earlier, adjustments for a specific video sample would be more elucidating.

[csmart]

Hi, unfortunately I'm new to this forum and can't find how I post a question. So my query is about capturing video from a Betacord Sanyo vtc5150. I have a Click & Convert transfer device, but don't have a cable that will fit the back of the video recorder. The capture device has yellow, red & white female leads, and a 5 pin female lead. The converter is Arcsoft Showbiz DVD 2. Can anyone help please? Thank you, and sorry for hijacking this thread.

[jagabo]

The pictures I saw weren't very clear but it looks like that deck has a BNC connector for composite video output. You can use a BNC to RCA adapter. Then use a regular AV RCA cable.

https://www.amazon.com/Monoprice-BNC-Male-Female-Adaptor/dp/B006VK8IEI/

[Leanoric]

Sounds to me like you would get away with some gamma and levels adjustments. Easy in Avisynth.
In Vdub or VirtualDub2 you may want to play with the filter "gradation curves". You probably have to download this .vdf plugin.
https://forum.videohelp.com/threads/287113-Gradation-Curves-VirtualDub-filter-v1-45
https://neosol.at/vdub/index.html
The tutorials point the way:
https://neosol.at/vdub/tutorial/tutorial.html

Thanks Sharc, Ill read up on that and give it a go over the weekend.

I usually start with adjusting the black and white levels (contrast and brightness, really gain and offset). Then a gamma adjustment (which may then require further contrast/brightness adjustments). Then saturation (saturation usually requires about the same boost as the contrast). Then white balance.

Thanks jagabo, Ill try adjusting things in this order and see if I can get more consistent results.

But you may want to look at adjusting your capture device's video processing amp before capturing. Otherwise you may be crushing blacks and brights even before you start filtering/editing.

Ok Ill look into this if the other methods dont work out.