VHS Tapes to DVD

I am in need of some serious help! I have a Canopus ADVC-100 and for some reason it is creating a white line in the center of the video when I convert from VHS to Digital format in Final Cut Express. Can anyone tell me why it is doing this?

 

Have you checked the DIP switch settings? I am in the USA, and the only switch I had to change was SW2 from off to on (NTSC setup level = 7.5 IRE)

The ADVC100 works great with my computer and Pinnacle Studio 9 as the capture software.

 

Well animated Menu"s are going to take up a Lot of Space because they are Mpeg2 files encoded at a High Bitrate but a regular Menu made from a BMP or JPG image only takes up a Little bit more than the Size of the Image file...
When Useing DVDLab I can get about 4.275gb of Video/Audio on a DVD with 16 menu"s and the DVD Structure has an overhead of about 75mb or so...

nickyshim:
So you are useing a Mac with the ADVC-100???
I have no experience useing a Mac so I can"t help you much there, Just make sure your VHS tapes aren"t copy protected because that can cause simular effects as you are Experienceing....

Cheers

 

Oops! Never Mind!

 

Is VirtualVCR the best FREE capture program if you want high quality?

Thanks

 

When captureing to AVI the capture software has very Little effect on the Quality of the Captured File so there is No answer to your Question because it doesn"t apply...
AVI capture quality is mostly Based of the Quality of your Source and your Capture device and whatever codec you are useing to Capture with...
As for Capture codecs you will get the best quality useing either Uncompressed AVI or useing the HuffYUV Codec, you can also achieve good quality useing the PicVideo Mjpeg Codec.....

 

Thanks Minion - I'm currently using the Huffy codec with Virt VCR. The AVI files are so huge, but I know they must be. When I put the files onto DVD using MyDVD the files become so small. Does MyDVD compress them too much? Thanks again!

 

Is there a good program to compress AVI? I would like to Capture my old VHS's in AVI so that it will enable me to manipulate them later. 1 VHS tape captured with a HUFFY Codec means alot of DVD's. Any help?

Thanks

 

Here's how I convert my AVI file to a form that will fit on a DVD. First I use TMPGEnc 3.0 XPress to "cut-edit" the file to remove commercials or other unwanted portions. I also use the Dolby AC-3 plug-in to compress the audio by converting it to Dolby stereo. The XPress program will use the exact amount of compression needed to fit the resultant material on the target, such as a DVD, and it's output will be an MPG file. Be forewarned that the transcoding process can take several hours if you want maximum quality. Then I use the TMPG DVD Author program to author and burn the DVD.

See http://www.pegasys-inc.com/en/index.html for information about these programs.

 

nograde1: The size of the Captured AVI files has nothing to do with the Size they will be after encodeing, so it doesn"t matter if your AVI file is 100gb or 1gb ,what matters is the Length of the File and the Bitrate you use to encode it to Mpeg which determines the Size of the Mpeg file.....

You would get much better quality if you use a real Mpeg encoder to encode your Captured files as opposed to useing MyDVD cuz a Standalone Mpeg encoder will produce much higher quality at a Lower Bitrate....
Try useing Tmpgenc/Tmpgenc Xpress to encode or for Faster high quality encodeing Check out the MainConcept encoder.....

Cheers

 

Hey!

I've recently bought the Canopus ADVC 100 but had problems with it, so i think i'm going to return it. I am thinking of getting the Snazzi DV.AVIO. I would like to ask you if you have had any experience with it and if the encoder is 24bit on Snazzi, just like on Canopus. I am only looking to make DV files, and i want to know if the DV files will look the same as on Canopus or not.

Also, if you happen to know better devices than Canopus for making DV files from ANALOG (VHS), please tell me.

 

You are the first person I have met who has had problems with the Canopus ADVC-100. What type of problems have you had? I routinely use the ADVC-100 to convert VHS tapes to AVI files. I use S-Video and L/R audio between my JVC HR-S3600U VCR and the ADVC unit. Then I use a 1394 cable between the ADVC-100 and my computer where I use Pinnacle Studio 9 to capture the digital data and create a very large AVI file.

 

Yes the Canopus ADVC-100 is By far the Best Analogue Digital Converter on the Market within it"s Price range...Any other thing you Buy is going to produce results substandard to what the ADVC-100 will produce....

You are the First and Only person i have ever heard of not Likeing the ADVC-100 ,I suspect what ever problem you are haveing is Not related to the Device but to you Not useing it Properly or some other Problem....

What is the Problem you are haveing???

 

I would be interesting in knowing if you have a better quality finished product using the methods discussed in this thread or simply doing a direct recording from the VHS tape to a standalone Panasonic recorder and then using TMPGEnx DVD author to edit the video and add menus?

I don't want to spend all of the additional money buying the A-D capture box, software etc and spend several hours of time only to find the finished DVD is no better quality then simply using the Panasonic standalone.

I am obviously a novice so would certainly appreciate your feedback.

Thanks

 

Minion
Not having the disk space neccessary for avi capture I decided to try your WinDVR 3.0 very high bit rate (20,000kbs) method. So now I have 3 high quality mpeg files of my 90 min VHS movie. What do you recommend I do to best process them to a DVD? Your help would be most appreciated.

 

Well you have to use a Good mpeg encoder to re-encode the Captured files to a Lower bitrate...

At 20,000kbs you would only be able to fit 45-60 min on a DVD Plus the File wouldn"t be DVD compliant because the Max allowable bitrate for DVD is 9800kbs...

You should use an encoder Like Tmpgenc or Canopus Procoder or Mainconcept or CCE to encode it to Mpeg2 at about 6500kbs for Video and 192kbs for audio and the Whole 90 minute movie will fit on a Single DVD-R...

After encodeing you can use a DVD Authoring Program Like DVDLab to put the Movie on to DVD with menu"s and Chapters.....

In your WinDVR 3.0 capture profile you should have set the Max File size to something like 50,000kbs that way you captured file will not be broken into small 4gb Parts.....

 

Minion
Thx for the prompt response. Next time I'll remember to change the max file size. In the mean time I thought I would experiment with this capture. I note that TMPGEnc 3.0 Express will allow me to add all 3 files and then it will encode these to 1 mpeg file at DVD spec, shrunk to fit on 1 DVD. CCE asks for an avi file so how can I use CCE? My previous experience demuxing an mpeg file with DVDLab gave major audio synch problems. I had much better luck with ProjectX. What will happen to the quality, it would be nice if the quality of the 3 original files was preserved as much as possible into the DVD. What are your thoughts?

 

You can only use CCE to encode Mpeg files if you use a Frameserver....
DVDLab will only give you sync problems with Files created with some Mpeg capture software so it should not cause this problem with files created by an encoder, You could allways demux the File yourself useing the "Mpeg Tools" in Tmpgenc(Not Xpress)....

You should not loose very much quality as Long as you use a Good encoder and the Highest Bitrate Possible which is 6500kbs for Video and 192kbs for Audio for a 90 minute movie...Also try some Filters to clean up the Image a Bit ,Like a Bit of Noise Filtering and maybe a Bit of Sharpening....

 

Thanks Minion
Sticking with TMPGEnc Express (because I have it) I note that I can select filtering as you suggest. As for bitrate it says that the limit will be 6004, which will give a file size of 4200MB. Aren't DVD-R's 4700MB? Incidentally it says that your recommended 6500 would give a file size of about 4500MB. I nomally use CCE in combination with DVDRebulder to shrink DVD's (as recommended elsewhere in Afterdawn).

 

Minion

I had posted this just above but was not responded to. I am not sure whether this was a stupid question or why no reply was posted but would certainly appreciate your opinoion should you care to share it.

Thank you

I would be interesting in knowing if you have a better quality finished product using the methods discussed in this thread or simply doing a direct recording from the VHS tape to a standalone Panasonic recorder and then using TMPGEnx DVD author to edit the video and add menus?

I don't want to spend all of the additional money buying the A-D capture box, software etc and spend several hours of time only to find the finished DVD is no better quality then simply using the Panasonic standalone.

I am obviously a novice so would certainly appreciate your feedback.

Thanks