A Better VCR or a TBC?

[DMS]

Hi All

Im trying to improve my captures, and there is one thing i notice more than any other problem and that is the line wiggle (not sure of the correct term) it can be clearly seen in the attached video.


This is my current setup:

VHS Tape is a retail video from 1984>Toshiba V633UK VCR (only VCR i have at present very basic) SCART out to > Panasonic DMR-EH50 (with all the settings set as per the guides on this forum) Svideo out via Scart adaptor > I-O DATA GV-USB2.

Will a better VCR help with the line wiggle? or do i require a TBC?

I know both will probably be the best option, but getting a TBC is nigh on impossible within the UK.

Thanks in advance

DMS

[dellsam34]

For line timing you need a VCR with line TBC if the DVD recorder in passthrough hasn't addressed the problem, But some recordings are bad so not sure if that footage can be corrected by a line TBC, It looks like a second gen studio dub with compounded line timing.

[Alwyn]

I can't see any line wiggle. The Eh50 will fix vertical wobbling/wiggling/wavy vertical lines, normally visible on the edge of the picture. That wiggling is side to side.

Or do you mean the whole picture jumping or the noise on the edges of all the letters? Have a look at a light-coloured part to observe the edge of the picture.

[DMS]

For line timing you need a VCR with line TBC if the DVD recorder in passthrough hasn't addressed the problem, But some recordings are bad so not sure if that footage can be corrected by a line TBC, It looks like a second gen studio dub with compounded line timing.

It is a very old, well played video, so maybe its just not repairable. I have another capture from a later video release that has had hardly any play, you can still see the wiggling on the right handside edge frame. im not sure if this is normal, or the VCR is just not that very good.

Thank you

DMS

[DMS]

I can't see any line wiggle. The Eh50 will fix vertical wobbling/wiggling/wavy vertical lines, normally visible on the edge of the picture. That wiggling is side to side.

Or do you mean the whole picture jumping or the noise on the edges of all the letters? Have a look at a light-coloured part to observe the edge of the picture.

Hi Alwyn

If you zoom in on the text it is wiggling/wobbling, im not sure of the correct term. it doesnt look so bad when showing normal video clip, except when looking at the edges, you can see it on the second clip i posted above.

Thank you

DMS

[Alwyn]

Fair enough, I had to put my glasses on to see it.

What does it look like when you go from the VCR direct to the GV? If it's a wonky tape I would expect the wavy wiggling to be much worse when the EH-50 is removed from the workflow.

From reading here, I've always had the impression that the inbuilt Line TBCs are weaker than the Panny DVD Recorders, but the Line TBCs are much more desirable from a picture quality POV.

[DMS]

Fair enough, I had to put my glasses on to see it.

What does it look like when you go from the VCR direct to the GV? If it's a wonky tape I would expect the wavy wiggling to be much worse when the EH-50 is removed from the workflow.

From reading here, I've always had the impression that the inbuilt Line TBCs are weaker than the Panny DVD Recorders, but the Line TBCs are much more desirable from a picture quality POV.

Hi Alwyn

I will capture direct from vcr see how it looks, it won’t be via s-video though just composite.


DMS

[DMS]

Hi Alwyn

Here is the capture directly from the VCR via composite, i dont see much difference, which is worrying, maybe the Panny is not doing its job!

Cheers

DMS

[DMS]

Here are 2 captures of the video without text, one direct from VCR using composite to capture, the other passing through the EH50 using s-video to capture. I can now see a slight improvement but the wiggly lines are very present on both.

[DMS]

Sorry had to add the second clip on its own as too large for both in one post. This is the passthrough one.

[dellsam34]

Yes both have line timing problems, you definitely need a better VCR. The passthrough is mainly for tearing and flagging, If you have a mediocre VCR the line errors will be baked in and it is hard for the DVD recorder to track their burst signal, A good VCR can do a better job.

[DMS]

Yes both have line timing problems, you definitely need a better VCR.

Thanks dellsam, i thought it would be the case, time to start looking!

Cheers

DMS

[jagabo]

I don't think that orange text on a black background is a good way to test a line TBC. I believe most of the horizontal wiggle is dot crawl (incomplete separation of the chroma carrier from the luma signal), not time base errors. 2.AVI in post #4 is a much better test. If you look at individual fields you can see the vertical edges wiggle left and right -- even in the grey areas were the chroma carrier would be negligible.

[oln]

I wouldn't be certain that a different VCR would make a drastic difference to horizontal stability here, there may be some baked in instability in the source (other than that s-video may avoid dot crawl as noted in the previous post). The in-VCR TBC may not be able to do much better than the EH50, though a different vcr may give you some more options (not sure if this toshiba has the sharpness adjustment setting available or not) and slightly nicer picture quality.

[dellsam34]

Like I suspected in post #2, it could be baked in timing from multi-gen dub, Yes a line TBC may not be of much help but it certainly will be better than the Toshiba/DVD passthrough. For tearing and flagging I agree, a line TBC in the VCR will not help since it only addresses line timing to certain tolerance.

[DMS]

I don't think that orange text on a black background is a good way to test a line TBC. I believe most of the horizontal wiggle is dot crawl (incomplete separation of the chroma carrier from the luma signal), not time base errors. 2.AVI in post #4 is a much better test. If you look at individual fields you can see the vertical edges wiggle left and right -- even in the grey areas were the chroma carrier would be negligible.

Hi Jagabo

Thank you for the reply, what would be the best option to try and alleviate dot crawl? Is it to do with the connection between the vcr and EH50? as that is scart.

Thank you

[DMS]

I wouldn't be certain that a different VCR would make a drastic difference to horizontal stability here, there may be some baked in instability in the source (other than that s-video may avoid dot crawl as noted in the previous post). The in-VCR TBC may not be able to do much better than the EH50, though a different vcr may give you some more options (not sure if this toshiba has the sharpness adjustment setting available or not) and slightly nicer picture quality.

Hi Oln

The toshiba doesnt have many options at all im afraid, i can change the sharpness, but it doesnt seem to make any difference.

[Attachment 79123 - Click to enlarge]

Cheers

DMS

[Sharc]

.... what would be the best option to try and alleviate dot crawl? Is it to do with the connection between the vcr and EH50? as that is scart.

In my past experience I could reduce dotcrawl significantly with the EH50 in passthrough. Use Composite IN (as you have composite only from your VCR as I understand) and S-Video OUT and enable the COMB Filter in the EH50.
There are also Dotcrawl filters available in Avisynth, but the EH50 was much more effective in my tests (quite some time ago I admit).

[DMS]

.... what would be the best option to try and alleviate dot crawl? Is it to do with the connection between the vcr and EH50? as that is scart.

In my past experience I could reduce dotcrawl significantly with the EH50 in passthrough. Use Composite IN (as you have composite only from your VCR as I understand) and S-Video OUT and enable the COMB Filter in the EH50.
There are also Dotcrawl filters available in Avisynth, but the EH50 was much more effective in my tests (quite some time ago I admit).

Hi Sharc! (again)

I will switch the comb filter on and see what happens. i will post my results.

Cheers

DMS

[DMS]

.... what would be the best option to try and alleviate dot crawl? Is it to do with the connection between the vcr and EH50? as that is scart.

In my past experience I could reduce dotcrawl significantly with the EH50 in passthrough. Use Composite IN (as you have composite only from your VCR as I understand) and S-Video OUT and enable the COMB Filter in the EH50.
There are also Dotcrawl filters available in Avisynth, but the EH50 was much more effective in my tests (quite some time ago I admit).

Hi Sharc

Here is the video with combfilter on in the EH50 and also with the VCR sharpness at its default of 9, i believe the other capture i did may have had the sharpness set to 1 (it goes upto 15, and 15 makes it very grainy).

Cheers

DMS

[Sharc]

.... what would be the best option to try and alleviate dot crawl? Is it to do with the connection between the vcr and EH50? as that is scart.

In my past experience I could reduce dotcrawl significantly with the EH50 in passthrough. Use Composite IN (as you have composite only from your VCR as I understand) and S-Video OUT and enable the COMB Filter in the EH50.
There are also Dotcrawl filters available in Avisynth, but the EH50 was much more effective in my tests (quite some time ago I admit).

Hi Sharc

Here is the video with combfilter on in the EH50 and also with the VCR sharpness at its default of 9, i believe the other capture i did may have had the sharpness set to 1 (it goes upto 15, and 15 makes it very grainy).

Cheers

DMS

Hmmm...still dotcrawl as I see it.

Try with Avisynth something like

v=ffms2("2 combfilter on.avi")
chroma=v.checkmate(thr=12,max=25,tthr2=25)
luma=v.checkmate(thr=12,max=25,tthr2=0)
out=luma.MergeChroma(chroma)
return out

Attachment: Left=original; Right="fixed"

[The_Doman]

Here is the video with combfilter on in the EH50 and also with the VCR sharpness at its default of 9, i believe the other capture i did may have had the sharpness set to 1 (it goes upto 15, and 15 makes it very grainy).
DMS

Well that looks already way much better watchable then that first (soft/fuzzy) recording (2.avi) you posted earlier.
I was thinking it was recorded from a badly tuned aerial broadcast.
Logically the best VCR sharpness is about the middle (if you not have any special edit settings), oversharing with VCR (or capture card) gives only undesirable results.
With my dazzle DVC100 i can set the sharpness up to 15 but that sharpness it is only artificial and looks horrible, so i turn it off at 0 or sometimes at 1.

[DMS]

Hmmm...still dotcrawl as I see it.

Try with Avisynth something like

v=ffms2("2 combfilter on.avi")
chroma=v.checkmate(thr=12,max=25,tthr2=25)
luma=v.checkmate(thr=12,max=25,tthr2=0)
out=luma.MergeChroma(chroma)
return out

Attachment: Left=original; Right="fixed"[/QUOTE]

Hi Sharc, there is a definite improvement there, i will give it a try. Thank you.

[rgr]

Hi All

Im trying to improve my captures, and there is one thing i notice more than any other problem and that is the line wiggle (not sure of the correct term) it can be clearly seen in the attached video.

You can use QTGMC.

[rgr]

Or also using filters to resize.

[rgr]

Here is the video with combfilter on in the EH50 and also with the VCR sharpness at its default of 9, i believe the other capture i did may have had the sharpness set to 1 (it goes upto 15, and 15 makes it very grainy).

Leave it in the middle position (this is my experience with Toshiba).

[DMS]

Hi All

Im trying to improve my captures, and there is one thing i notice more than any other problem and that is the line wiggle (not sure of the correct term) it can be clearly seen in the attached video.

You can use QTGMC.

Hi rgr,

That looks great, may i ask what settings were used for QTGMC please?

Many Thanks

DMS

[rgr]

Hi All

Im trying to improve my captures, and there is one thing i notice more than any other problem and that is the line wiggle (not sure of the correct term) it can be clearly seen in the attached video.

You can use QTGMC.

Hi rgr,

That looks great, may i ask what settings were used for QTGMC please?

Many Thanks

DMS

ffms2("1.avi")
#converttoyuv444.convertbits(10) #try
qtgmc(preset="slower",inputtype=2, TR2=3) #or inputtype=1; maybe add sharpness=0
#temporaldegrain2
bicubicresize(360,288)
nnedi3_rpow2(2)
lsfplus(preset="slow")

I treated the credits as progressive because they do not look interlaced.

[Alwyn]

@RGR

lsfplus(preset="slow")

Could you provide a source for nmod please. I can't find one.

[rgr]

@RGR

lsfplus(preset="slow")

Could you provide a source for nmod please. I can't find one.

https://github.com/Dogway/Avisynth-Scripts --> MIX Mods