VHS Captured With DV Converter Judders In Compressor/DVDSP, OK In iDVD.

This is more a statement than a question.
Some people will be familiar with my inability to produce judder-free DVDs from HDV or AIC footage burned in iDVD ........ which I have previously described +ad nauseam.+
Well here's something entirely different!
Yesterday I copied an old, very poor quality VHS tape to DV via my DAC 100 converter.
Apart from the lousy colour and pictorial quality, the video played OK in the timeline so I exported it to Compressor and burned in DVDSP.
The DVD exhibited the same kind of judder I get when I try to encode HDV in QT Movie and iDVD.
I wasted another DVD getting the same result, so in desperation I exported my project to QT Movie and burned it in iDVD.
The results - PERFECT - at least as far as image steadiness was concerned!

iDVD 7.0.1 and Compressor 3.0.3
I was hoping this would crack the old problem, but no.
I used a 40 second sequence with the camera panning very slowly across a street of houses with strong contrasty vertical and horizontal lines formed by windows, doors, drainpipes and rooflines etc. in the first half and a person walking across the frame etc. slowly in the second half. The 6' walker was a fair distance away only filling about 45% of the height of the frame.
4 test QT Movies were exported and burned in iDVD on one DVD. These were the straight video and then 3 versions with the Shift Filter in the +1, None and -1 settings.
They all looked the same, with jitter not so much on the vertical lines as the horizontal ones, which was a little surprising. The person walking across the frame definitely exhibited jitter.
All these problems disappear when encoded in Compressor or down-converted to DV by the camera during capture and burned in iDVD.
Still, it was worth a try.
I'm wondering whether it is possible to hack into iDVD and maybe alter field etc. settings in there!
There has to be some simple reason why there is a dramatic difference between Compressor/DVDSP and iDVD and it's nothing to do with quality or power or cost.
Incidentally a friend of mine went on a world tour, using an identical HV20 and rough-editing on her MBP as she went. The resulting rough edits were burned in iDVD and the DVDs sent back to her family. These DVDs apparently were jittery but the family didn't mind!

Similar Messages

Capturing with a converter

I set up my capture so its set for dvNTSC dv converter, and am running a signal through my converter and connecting the output fire wire to final cut express. It's not reading the signal. The converter is accurate and adjusted properly (i know this, because i can capture in windows software on a different computer, but in FCE, i'm not getting any connection.
Any Ideas?

At first I wasn't, but yes, then I switched to it, and it still didn't work. When I try
it with the DV Converter Setup, there is no preview, the capture window says
"No Communication" and if I press Capture, a window says there is no video.
In DV-NTSC, or DV-NTSC Firewire Basic, it says "VTR OK", but no preview
and if I press Capture Now the capture window that opens up is just black,
and below it says "Waiting for Timecode"
Some more info, I don't know if this applies: I first tried this today with my old
Dazzle Hollywood Bridge converter which I used successfully several years ago on
a G-4 in an older FCPro not FCE app. I gave up after trying to download Media Star
software but only PC versions seem to be available....I don't know. So I bought the
Canopus, tried everything I could think of, I keep thinking I am missing some step,
or that something is set wrong in my Mac.

Jerky capture with DV converter

I'm using a Canopus 55 to convert VHS-C tapes, which look fine on the TV monitor. I have a Macbook Pro connected to an external drive using Firewire 800 which daisy chains to the Canopus using Firewire 400. The Canopus connects to the video recorder using SCART.
I have DV-PAL DV Converter selected in easy Setup.
The capture is jerky - it runs OK for a few seconds then it'll shimmer or the frame will slip upwards. It's unusable.
Any ideas where I'm going wrong?
Mike

First, check the DIP switch settings on the ADVC-55. For PAL video, SW 1 and 2 should be ON, SW 3-6 should be OFF. NOTEs: Only change the DIP switch settings when the ADVC is disconnected from power. Power is normally supplied by the FireWire cable (unless you bought the optional power supply.) The Mac's Firewire bus is powered even when your Mac is shut down, so you should disconnect your Mac from power before connecting or disconnecting your ADVC from your Mac.
Second, "shimmer" and "frame slips upwards" are usually caused by a signal problem from the tape or deck; or an old or bad tape. Check all your cables & connections. Check your tape. Check the SCART adapter too. If you are using the S-video out, try the Composite out; or vice-versa.
Third, capture 5 or 10 minutes of video. Then open the video in the FCE viewer and play it. If it plays fine there, your video is ok. The video in the Capture Window during capture is not always completely smooth - that's normal.

FCE 4 Froze At The End Of VHS Capture Through DAC-100.

I spent a large part of yesterday copying a 2 hour VHS tape to FCE 4 via my DAC-100.
At the end of the 2 hours I pressed the esc key only to hear a warning "thud" bleep and find that FCE had suddenly frozen.
After I force-quit I found the 25GB file was useless.
I tried again with a 30 minute capture with the same result.
During each attempted capture I had briefly answered an email.
Assuming that my short internet use had caused the end freeze I tried again, not using any other computer function and succeeded.
Whilst using the web is the chief suspect, could there be another obvious cause? (I am sure that in the past I have used the iMac whilst capturing).
The irritating thing was that it waited until the capture was finished before freezing!

That is interesting Armando.
Thanks to your info I can now use Spaces!
Here are the results:-
1. With FCE capturing in Window 1, I can switch to Window 2 and open Mail (or any other app), use it and go back to Window 1. (This works with both camera and converter captures).
The Mail name is still in the menu in Window 1 and I can't bring up FCE's name but it does not matter because pressing esc stops the capture and puts FCE's name back in the menu.
2. For it all to work, I must OPEN the new app in the new window. If the app is already open, even though I "wake" it up in Window 2, it will lock FCE when I go back to Window 1.
3. As mentioned previously, if FCE locks whilst capturing from a camera, I can simply manually stop the camera, FCE will unlock and I get the "End of Tape" message. The capture is successful. But this technique does not work when capturing with a converter.
So, you have shown me that I can use other apps whilst capturing by using Spaces, but it does not explain why I have the original problem.
I have just done some capture tests on my G4 eMac (OSX 10.4.10) and opening other apps during capture does not cause a problem.

I am attempting to convert 8mm video cassettes to dvd using a video cassette player, elgato video capture with rca/usb connections to the mac, editing in imovie and burning on idvd. The picture quality is awful. What can I do?????

I am attempting to convert 8mm video cassettes to dvd using a video cassette player, elgato video capture with rca/usb connections to the mac then editing in imovie and burning dvd-r using idvd. The picture quality is awful. What can I do??????

At what point is the video quality bad? Is it bad on capture? I would recommend using an s-video 1394 firewire converter instead. They capture the video at a higher bit rate. If you have a lot of 8mm tapes to capture, invest in a stand alone DVD recorder. They capture and compress in one shot. If you need to rip it back from the DVD into iMovie again, I would recommend using DVDxDV.

Can I use Elgato VHS Video Capture with my Macbook pro?

Can I use Elgato VHS Video Capture with my Macbook Pro? It comes with a CD on which is the software. My Macbook pro does not have a CD drive. how do i get the software?

Elgato provides a download link to their latest Video Capture software v1.1.5. Supposedly runs on Snow Leopard and later. They recommend Yosemite.

Anyone using Elgato Video Capture with good results?

I've got some VHS tapes that I want to edit in iMovie '11 (and/or FCE).
Viewed on a TV monitor, the image quality of the tapes varies from acceptable to very good - but I am very disappointed with the quality of the video once imported, using Elgato Video Capture, to my MBP. It is very indistinct and washed out. Only the audio remains as clear as the original.
Anyone had any success with using Video Capture to convert old tapes?
Any advice and/or feedback would be much appreciated!

conran wrote:
Thanks Coolmax - I tried that, but no discernible improvement unfortunately.
These are the tech specs from the Elgato site:
Video resolution: 640×480 (4:3) or 640×360 (16:9)
Video format: H.264 at 1.4 MBit/sec or MPEG-4 at 2.4 MBit/sec
Audio: AAC, 48kHZ, 128 kBit/sec
I've tried both H.264 and MPEG-4 without much success. The resulting footage is always extremely grainy and 'muddy'. Any other ideas?
If I understand this correctly, Elgato can save your footage either in H.264 or MPEG-4 and you tried both. If the original file plays with ok quality and the resulting footage after being finalized by iMovie 11 look worse, I think we need to determine what are you finalizing to?
In "Export to Quicktime", you can choose the compressor to "none". Do this with a short clip as the resulting file will be big. Play back this video.
If there is a degradation in video, then you know it is iMovie 11 process that is causing it. From here on, you can further compress the video using Handbrake and adjust the settings to give best quality vs size.
There are software available on the PC side that can enhance and resize an already weak VHS captured footage and make it look better before you import it into iMovie 11. But this require quite a bit of computer horsepower to complete it in any acceptable time frame.

I can capture with iMovie 6, but not with FCP 6.0 ('no data from device')

I didn't have any problem with FCP 5, but am getting nowhere with FCP 6 using the same settings (I think). FCP seems to see the camcorder, but can't control it and, even if I manually start the camera, reports 'no data from device' when I do a 'Capture Now'. Device control isn't critical, but I'd sure like to find out why it doesn't see the data stream from the camera (Sony HDR-HC7 / FW400). I must be missing a setting some place, but sure can't find it. On the other hand, I have full device control and zero dropout capture with iMovie (exact same hardware configuration). Any ideas?

Wolfgang Matzl wrote:
canopus works fine, as well as all other devices.
i have tons of tapes and tried a few, none worked.
i tried to capture on both my new imac and my mbpro, no way.
but now i'm sure there is something wrong with the sony handycam, i tried to import with my old final cut studio, and it's not possible, also. fc pro says: waiting for timecode.
so i'm confused now. does the sony dcr-trv not send a timecode? maybe, and this will explain the troubles. but on the other hand i imported successfully some footage with exact this device.
maybe i used the canopus then to correct the timebase, i can't remember how i did it. but this would mean i have to accept loss of quality, since i have to connect the sony with s-vhs with the canopus and convert it.
right now i'm importing a tape with imovie and will have a look how the result is, but as far as i remember, the audio has to be re-rendered when importing in fcpx…
My finger is pointing to a Timecode issue.
Is timecode enabled in the camera?
Is it continuous on the tape?
Al

Can I capture with Final Cut Pro and edit in Premiere Pro?

Since it appears that Premiere has issues with capture - at least for me but as I see it for others as well - and that I can capture with iMovie, can I consider using Final Cut Pro for capture - then cross to Adobe Premiere and the suite for editing, finalizing ? Or is there a problem to copy the shots/files from one program to the other (would they remain identified clearly so I could just import shots into Premiere afterward ?)
Thanks
Rob

Hi Rob,
When you capture HDV in FCP it creates a specific Apple HDV codec. This is a codec that is only available if FCP, Motion or Compressor is installed.
The two workarounds would be to use Premiere Pro on the Mac with one of the above mentioned apps installed on the same system or convert to a codec that can be read in Premiere.
Best,
Peter Garaway
Adobe
Premiere pro

VHS Capture via the Blackmagic Deck link Extreme 2 card

Is this even possible? I'm trying to capture VHS video with the extreme 2 card and all I get is an image that looks like old time film with the jumping of the frames like it is being hand cranked. I have better results with an anologue to digital converter via firewire, but I thought that the extreme card was suppose to be able to capture pretty much anything.
Cannot figure out the settings to make it a smooth capture.
Help me, I'm melting.

What settings are you using in FCP? What Easy Setup? How is the deck connected?
I don't know the Decklink software interface all that well, I use AJA. But with the AJA you have to tell the card via the AJA Control Panel what connection you are routing to the card and which it should use. It might be expecting a Component signal and you are feeding it a composite one.
Shane

VHS Capturing Snag

WHILE capturing vhs through an analog capture deck, many videos hit a snag, where they will freeze sporadically on an individual shot and hold for a few seconds and then continue recording. id say this happens about every 5 minutes..any thoughts?
Thanks

What type of converter are you using?
And, what type of drive are you trying to capture to? Is it, by any chance, a USB drive?
If you are monitoring the capture directly from the deck that you are capturing from, then it might be a problem with the deck, although that isn't likely since you say it is happening with different types of tapes.
Most converters, like the Canopus models, have analog inputs to connect your deck, and a firewire output to your computer. There could be a problem with the converter, but it sounds like it might also be a problem with the drive you are trying to capture to, if the lagging you are noticing is being monitored in the FCP log and capture window.

Will FCP capture with this?

will a Sony GV-D300 Video walkman capture with FCP on leopard?
http://www.freetradephoto.com/SonyGV-D300Videowalkman.htm

I've had similar problems with short duration (less than 10 mins) DVDs from HDV from a JVC camera and H264 from Canon HD DSLR edited in Apple ProRes SQ.
After much mucking about with settings, and I'm not absolutely sure why this works I found the best results were obtained by first of Exporting a Quicktime from FCP with same settings.
Bring this version into Compressor, use the "DVD Best Quality 90 mins" setting but change the settings to "One Pass VBR Best". You can raise the "Average bit rate" slightly but don't play with the maximum bit rate, this can cause problems with some DVD players, and not necessarily the one you are using for testing.
Get yourself some re-writeable DVD-RWs for testing.
For me the results of using these settings on short duration DVD productions are enormous, the 2 Pass created results comparable to VHS quality. It was more like cooking and trying different herbs and spices to flavour the meal. Don't get me started on compression and delivery for the web...

Strange Problem capturing with Apple Intermediate Codec

We have the following problem:
We capture with a blackmagic decklink studio card (but I could reproduce the same problem using a MacBook Pro and the internal camera) with a MacPro and CS4. When capturing a live video feed (1280x720) with the apple intermediate codec (set to 29.97fps or to 59.94fps) everything seems to work just fine. But the resulting videoclips happen to be exactly ONE half of the total capture time. So if we capture in Premiere for about 1 our the clip is only 30 minutes long. If we capture for 10 sec., the clip will be 5 sec. long. It's not that the captured clips play with double the framerate. Half of the actual footage is missing.
Any suggestions?
By the way: we live in a PAL50Hz country, but our video signal that needs to be recorded comes in as a 60hz signal.

Hi,
Well I did some googling...and I would bet that the problem is the 50hz vs 60hz...
Unfortunately most if not all info I got that even BRUSHES on this subject with the sort of material you're dealing with is the opposite....where they are in 60cycle land with pal stuff....rather than in pal land dealing with 60hz ...
This is a lot of misc stuff but if you get a little bit of info from various posts and make some notes you might be able to get an idea how to solve the problem...
In particular I was looking at how frames are flagged and new frames are created later ...( toward very end of these posts - the last four or so )
Also noted some timecode reading that was "doubled"....so if your deck thought you had a specific length and then it read the timecode doubled, it would be your problem in a nutshell... have you checked the last frame you captured and compare that timecode to the overall length ??
anyway, here is a TON of stuff to breeze through...good luck...
THIS IS EDIUS RELATED..so keep in mind re: specific presets etc
Steve Sherrick
03-03-2008, 11:14 AM
Hi chaps,
Can I just confirm that the SDI/HDMI outputs are only live in build 14? I'm on 13 and going SDI - HDLINK - DELL24" gives me nothing. I'm in PAL land so have tried switching between 50hz and 59hz in camera.
So do I need build 14 or is it something else?
Cheers
Jeff Brown
#708
I'm in NTSC land but that same setup gives me picture just fine. Which Dell model is it? Is everything set up right from the camera side?
Jeff Brown
03-04-2008, 12:42 PM
Hi Steve,
I believe so. Set to Preview in th viewfinder settings, plugged in on preview mini sdi, cam set to 50hz..
Anything I'm missing?
Cheers
To counter this, the AJ-HD1400 offers two modes specifically for this called '25(SD)' and '25(HD)'. They output the 25fps signal with new timecode on a 50Hz carrier (only over SDI/Analogue the Firewire doesn't work in that mode).
It only works with 25fps material too, any other 'offspeed' rate has to be dealt with separately with the deck operating in 59/60 mode.
When operating in either of these 25 modes, the deck generates new 25fps timecode from the tape (although our tests have indicated that it is frame accurate of multiple playback passes).
Basically, Varicam, while a very nice idea, has only ever been properly designed to work in a 60Hz environment. It is pretty much a nightmare in 50Hz environments.
I think I may have found the cause of the problem.
For some reason when I started my project it had a Device Control profile set to 720p50 (rather than the 1080i50 that the deck is operating in).
What this seems to have done is double the frame number on any clip it encountered. So if I took a clip with in marked at 01:02:40:22 and dropped it in the Log and Capture tool the In Point that FCP decided to look for was 01:02:40:44 (which isn't going to exist on a 25fps timecode obviously).
Since you are using Pal
Go :
Generic OHCI HD 50hz -> 960x720 25p over 60p
Because if I am right you can't do Pal over 60hz but you can do PAL over 60P at 50hz.
( but I could be wrong)
But the other problem is that you are using an ntsc profile to capture pal recorded footage.
50 hz 960x720 over 60P yields a frame rate of 25 progressive
60 hz 960x720 59.94p yields a frame rate of 59.94 progressive which is far from your original footage . Mostly used for countries using natively ntsc
Neither myself, nor Ricksta (I don't think) are using NTSC-rate profiles.
The Preset setting I've been testing with is:
Generic OHCI HD 50Hz 960x720 25p over 60p
Indeed, I've just tried what Rick mentioned, and with the deck in 59.94Hz operating frequency, I can capture with all three 720p 59/60 input settings. This is technically wrong however, as the tape has been recorded at 60Hz. But like I said before, until Rick hears from the big geeks at Panasonic about this, I don't know what the real outcome of that difference in frequency is.
I've also tried a 50p over 60p project setting (as 720p50 is what I will be editing with in Avid) - but, predictably, this works but gives me double-speed footage. Which, while amusing, isn't a lot of help for me
A large part of the problem I'm facing here is to do with the Varicam format. It will record any framerate from 1-60fps. It has to operate and a system-frequency of 59.94Hz or 60Hz. That is what Rick and I are referring to. The limitation I face is that the Varicam format is not widely supported for PAL-based rates (25/50) as it requires communication with a deck operating in an NTSC-based system frequency (either 60Hz or 59.94Hz). This difference (between project/timeline framerates, and deck operating frequencies) is enough to ensure that IEEE1394/Firewire/OHCI capture is not possible in these modes in Final Cut Pro, Avid (any version) or any other NLE I have found.
We realise that the framerate and frequency we're working in has to be 50-based, and we're not making any mistakes in that respect.
So far Edius is the only NLE on the market, that I have been able to find, that supports Firewire capture from 60Hz DVCPro HD material in a 50Hz based framerate.
When you have captured the file in that project select a clip in the bin press alt+enter go to video info and tell me what the framerate is .
In a 50p over 60p project, when I capture footage shot 25p over 60 with the 'Constant Rate' capture profile I get a clip in the bin that is 50fps, but that plays at doubletime - which is what I'd expect.
I can change the framerate in the properties to 50fps, and it plays at the correct rate, but I'm not happy with the way to refactors the timing in that mode. It seems to create interpolated frames to fill the gaps, which provide an unusual appearance that I don't really like.
At present if I capture into 25p over 60p project, then import the resulting 25p footage into Avid, Avid doubles up the frames to produce 50fps material.
Some clarification here. The Varicam does indeed record at a constant 60fps. If the frame rate is set to 25fps for example it simply flags the active frames. This flag is carried in the vertical interval data. The reason for this system, is as suggested, it is very difficult to vary the speed of tape in a helical scan recording system. With the advent of solid state recording that Panasonic introduced in the AG-HVX200 it is now possible of course to only record the active (native) frames and this would be called 25pn for example.
Originally with the Varicam you used to use a device called a Frame Rate Converter. This box contained a hard drive with HD-SDI I/O. It would recognize the active "flagged" frames in the incoming signal and buffer them through the hard drive and then play them out at the correct frame rate.
More recently NLE's such as Avid, FCP and Edius have incorporated this flagged frame recognition and perform the extraction automatically. Thus when I tested a 25fps Varicam ingest on a 25 Frame timeline I am getting realtime playback. If I had recorded at 50fps and I placed that on a 25 frame timeline I would have very smooth half speed. Also the newer DVCPRO HD decks such as the AJ-HD1700 and AJ-HD1400 have the ability to decode "on-speed" frame rates such as 30fps, 25fps and 24fps.
The issue that Dylan is facing is that the NLE's will not accept a firewire input at 60Hz, they only accept it at 59.94, this is a .001 frequency difference and should be negligible. The other alternative is to ingest via HD-SDI via a Black Magic or AJA Kona card etc. These boards also support the variable frame rate function.
I hope that this helps clear things up a little.
Rick Haywood
Manager Broadcast & Display Systems
Panasonic New Zealand Ltd.
Further to what Rick is saying... The issues with most NLEs for PAL users is the disparity between the 59.94/60Hz operating frequency of the deck and the 50Hz based framerates the applications are working with in PAL framerates.
As for the constant 60fps - it is indeed recording 60 images per second to a tape, but as I said before, only a certain number are unique - only the flagged frames. In 25fps, the camera samples the sensor 25 times a second and records that frame to tape. Essentially you get frame 1 recorded for 2 frames, frame 2 recorded for the next three frames, frame 3 recorded for 2 frames, etc... The first frame with each unique image is 'flagged'. To rebuild the recorded framerate, only the flagged images are captured.
The big bonus of Edius for me here is that it can capture the PAL framerates from the 59.94Hz deck over Firewire directly. Something that Avid and FCP are unable to do.

Capture with QT import to Final Cut ?

Capturing video from DVCAM deck with Quicktime 7 is a breeze- speedy and efficient - however trying to import the clips into Final Cut brings error messages ( frame rate etc ). Only way is to re export the moviefrom QT then re import into Final Cut taking valuable export time and negating the reason for doing this in the first place. Anyone any answers ? Also why is QT capturing with a variable frame rate ( not locked ? ) and can ANY application read these "captured" movies or are they just QT dependent ?
Interested in any comments/solutions/workrounds?
Thanks

I tested it and Device Native with a DV feed gives an MOV with a DV/DVCPRO - NTSC, 28 megabit track. It also stores a sound track which is PCM 16 bit 48KHz track. That's with a Hollywood Bridge converter.
With an HDV camera doing HDV/DV, the track is the same type, but how the picture looks depends on the camera setting. It can either be letterboxed or anamorphic. Curiously the bit rate is different for the two, with letterbox being the usual 28 megabits, but the anamorphic is 21 megabits.
In any case, QuickTime Player does an awesome job of recording native DV. However, sure enough FCP complains saying that it's a unknown file type. iMovie brings it in but has to convert it first.
I'll ask the authorities about this...
iMac G5 1.8 GHz Mac OS X (10.4.5)

Red giant shooter suite - vhs capture - order of tools

Hello everyone,
I have some VHS captures that I want to improve. While I understand that VHS is an already limited format, I wanted to improve it a bit using the shooter suite tools.
My question is: in what order should I apply instant HD, denoiser 2, and frames? My aim is for turning the content into 1080p 24 frames per second. Also, if any one has any recommended settings, it is greatly appreciated.

I think your aim, 1080P is too high. VHS effectively is around 240 - 280 vertical resolution. Even 720 may be very high already.
Using SSuite 12.6.1 you still can't make up what isn't there to start with. You can somewhat limit the damage, but that is all.
I would start out with Instant 4K, with the quality setting to 20+, then Denoiser 2 or alternatively Neat Video, and finally Frames. You may skip Frames altogether by exporting with the same framerate as your source material, to keep quality loss to the minimum.

VHS Captured With DV Converter Judders In Compressor/DVDSP, OK In iDVD.

Similar Messages

Maybe you are looking for