VHS to DVD?

[soulman]

Hi,

I have a VHS tape which I would like to convert to DVD.

I have a Leadtek TV2000XP tv tuner card, which has an S-video connector on it, however, the VCR doesn't have an S-video connector, only composite video (RCA).

I also have a Sony DCR-HC21 camcorder, which has a DV firewire connection, and an i.Link firewire cable, but the VCR does not have an i.Link connector.

Any ideas?

Thanks!

 

[titanium]

Hi,

I have a VHS tape which I would like to convert to DVD.

I have a Leadtek TV2000XP tv tuner card, which has an S-video connector on it, however, the VCR doesn't have an S-video connector, only composite video (RCA).

I also have a Sony DCR-HC21 camcorder, which has a DV firewire connection, and an i.Link firewire cable, but the VCR does not have an i.Link connector.

Any ideas?

Thanks!

Plug the RCA cables from your VCR to your camcorder's A/V ports; plug the firewire cable from the camcorder to your computer's firewire port (if you don't have firewire, buy a firewire card - they are dirt cheap).

Play the VCR tape, it will pass through the camcorder and you can save the output on your machine using any DV capture software.

 

[arf9999]

Plug the RCA cables from your VCR to your camcorder's A/V ports; plug the firewire cable from the camcorder to your computer's firewire port (if you don't have firewire, buy a firewire card - they are dirt cheap).

Play the VCR tape, it will pass through the camcorder and you can save the output on your machine using any DV capture software.

If the camcorder has AV input, this will work (you need to set the camcorder to VTR mode). I'm not sure if the HC21 has this feature tho' (AV pass-through to digital). Some of the lower end camcorders do not have it.

Another solution: find your tuner card accessories, usually there is a S-Video to composite (RCA) converter plug supplied.

edit: Third solution (inelegant but for VHS quality shouldn't be so serious), use the RF output of the VHS machine and use the tuner of your capture card.

 

[soulman]

If the camcorder has AV input, this will work (you need to set the camcorder to VTR mode). I'm not sure if the HC21 has this feature tho' (AV pass-through to digital). Some of the lower end camcorders do not have it.

Another solution: find your tuner card accessories, usually there is a S-Video to composite (RCA) converter plug supplied.

edit: Third solution (inelegant but for VHS quality shouldn't be so serious), use the RF output of the VHS machine and use the tuner of your capture card.

Hi

My camcorder only has AV OUT so will it still work?

 

[arf9999]

Hi

My camcorder only has AV OUT so will it still work?

no. better to use one of the other solutions.

 

[soulman]

If the camcorder has AV input, this will work (you need to set the camcorder to VTR mode). I'm not sure if the HC21 has this feature tho' (AV pass-through to digital). Some of the lower end camcorders do not have it.

Another solution: find your tuner card accessories, usually there is a S-Video to composite (RCA) converter plug supplied.

Where can I but a S-video to composite (RCA) converter plug? Hi-fi corporation?

I looked through my stuff and can't find it.

Unfortunately the HC21 doesn't have AV IN (I just discovered this 5 minutes ago while paging through the manual), I should have spent a bit more and got the HC42 lol.

BTW, is the quality of video obtained from a VCR-PC tv tuner card setup (RCA connected to VCR on one end, S-video connected to tv tuner card on the PC) at least the same as that on the VHS (the videotape is 13 years old)?

edit: Third solution (inelegant but for VHS quality shouldn't be so serious), use the RF output of the VHS machine and use the tuner of your capture card.

Ok, now this sounds interesting, but I don't think I have a cable for it? Which cable do I use, or where can I buy one from?

 

[arf9999]

Tuner card should have a standard RF TV aerial plug (like the back of a TV) or possibly one of those screw in F-type connectors (like the DSTV decoder LNB input ).

So, you should be able to just use the cable that runs from your VCR to your TV (like this ), or alternatively, you may need to make up a cable for the f-type-
connectors are available from any hardware/Game/Dion electronics store.

edit: Is the VHS a home taped one, or a purchased movie? Purchased movies will be more difficult to copy because of Macrovision encoding.

 

[soulman]

Tuner card should have a standard RF TV aerial plug (like the back of a TV) or possibly one of those screw in F-type connectors (like the DSTV decoder LNB input ).

So, you should be able to just use the cable that runs from your VCR to your TV (like this ), or alternatively, you may need to make up a cable for the f-type-
connectors are available from any hardware/Game/Dion electronics store.

edit: Is the VHS a home taped one, or a purchased movie? Purchased movies will be more difficult to copy because of Macrovision encoding.

Thanks!

Ok now I managed to find a S-video-RCA cable (came with graphics card). The RCA end of the cable is female. Just to test, I inserted one end of the cable that runs from my DVD player's AV video OUT to the TV's AV video IN, into the female RCA cable. I then connected the S-video part of the Svideo-RCA cable into the TV's S-video connector.

I turned on the DVD player and TV, and the picture is black+white, with lines going diagonally across the screen (like a wafer design)

It should work, but how can I get it to be color and remove the lines?

edit: it's my birthday video (age 5) and starting to show artefacts so I decided to put it on DVD before it gets any worse.

 

[arf9999]

Sounds like your Tuner card is set to NTSC, in the settings for the tuner card, adjust it to PAL or Auto.

 

[zefram]

I turned on the DVD player and TV, and the picture is black+white, with lines going diagonally across the screen (like a wafer design)

It may also be the cable doing the black & white. The lines, i'm guessing is interlaced. Go check out www.100fps.com, and see if it's the same. If it is, you could try deinterlacing (as explained on the site).

I personally don't like to resize or deinterlace. It changes too much of the video IMO.

Hope it helps.

 

[soulman]

Sounds like your Tuner card is set to NTSC, in the settings for the tuner card, adjust it to PAL or Auto.

Hi there,

No, it can't be. I connected my DVD player to my TV using a composite (connected to DVD, AV video OUT)-> S-video (TV s-video jack) adapter cable.
I didn't connect anything to my PC, was just testing out the cable before I move the video machine from one end of the house to the lounge where the PC is.

Ok, so I can't use my camcorder since it doesn't have AV IN.

I can't connect my VCR to my PC because the VCR doesn't have an S-video jack and a RCA-Svideo adapter gives a black-and-white picture with no sound.

I can't connect my camcorder to my VCR using an i.Link firewire connection since the VCR doesn't have firewire.

Is there any other hardware like Dazzle or canopus that I can get locally, cheap? I'm looking for any solution that'll cost me about R300-R400, if that's possible.

I thought about sending it to a professional to have it converted to DVD but I have many more tapes and ~R260 per tape is a bit too expensive! If it where cheaper...

 

[zefram]

Both the yellow RCA and S-Video will give no sound. It's only for video.

Have you tried the normal aerial connection? With the aerial connection, you'll get sound as well.

 

[soulman]

If the camcorder has AV input, this will work (you need to set the camcorder to VTR mode). I'm not sure if the HC21 has this feature tho' (AV pass-through to digital). Some of the lower end camcorders do not have it.

Another solution: find your tuner card accessories, usually there is a S-Video to composite (RCA) converter plug supplied.

edit: Third solution (inelegant but for VHS quality shouldn't be so serious), use the RF output of the VHS machine and use the tuner of your capture card.

I used the RF option, and it works!, but now how can I optimize/enhance the video? It's 13 years old, and there it looks like there may be a deinterlace problem since the video looks a bit wobbly if you know what I mean. And also to adjust the levels (like in photoshop, auto adjust levels)

I encoded it in MPEG2, Optimal quality, using my TV tuner software and codec. Quality looks better on monitor than on TV, probably because of resolution though,

Also, at the bottom of the video, there is a weird pattern going on, what's a good, quick, efficient tool to crop out that part or fix it?

Thanks for all the help!

 

[arf9999]

I used the RF option, and it works!, but now how can I optimize/enhance the video? It's 13 years old, and there it looks like there may be a deinterlace problem since the video looks a bit wobbly if you know what I mean. And also to adjust the levels (like in photoshop, auto adjust levels)

I encoded it in MPEG2, Optimal quality, using my TV tuner software and codec. Quality looks better on monitor than on TV, probably because of resolution though,

Also, at the bottom of the video, there is a weird pattern going on, what's a good, quick, efficient tool to crop out that part or fix it?

Thanks for all the help!

wobbly bit is "jitter" and is caused by frequency problems of the signal (you did say the tape is old!). I don't know any solutions off hand, but let me check...

edit: okay, found this http://www.dscaler.org/ , I'm not sure if it will solve all your problems, but I'm fairly sure that it will improve the capture quality.

No, it can't be. I connected my DVD player to my TV using a composite (connected to DVD, AV video OUT)-> S-video (TV s-video jack) adapter cable.
I didn't connect anything to my PC, was just testing out the cable before I move the video machine from one end of the house to the lounge where the PC is.

That cable will not work on your DVD player & TV!! It is especially made up for the tuner card. The signal that you will get from a DVD player WILL be monochrome because the TV is not getting the chroma signal through the cable.

Using the S-Video/Composite cable converter is a better solution than the tuner one as you are not converting the signal as many times - and it is likely to give you better picture quality.

 

[zefram]

You don't want to run too much filters on the video. If you must, use as little filters as possible.

If you're gonna crop it, you'll need to recompress it. With recompression, you will lose some quality (unless you save lossless, wish will leave a very large file).

Beware of deinterlacing filters: they can mess up the motion. (like i said, go look at www.100fps.com)

I recommend avidemux for basic crop and other filters (like brightness).

Also, like in your case, if the video quality is bad, you may loose A/V sync once you recompress (e.g. run filters). I recommend you use the video just like it is now. That way you will not loose any more quality.

 

[Claymore]

I have a Leadtek TV2000XP tv tuner card, which has an S-video connector on it, however, the VCR doesn't have an S-video connector, only composite video (RCA).

Use composite-in on the TV2000XP. That should do the trick. That's how I recorded a number of videos.

 

[soulman]

Use composite-in on the TV2000XP. That should do the trick. That's how I recorded a number of videos.

I have these jacks on my TV2000XP expert card:

-FM radio
-TV (RF input)
-Audio in
-Audio out
-Remote control
-S video

Should I connect it to audio in?

 

[soulman]

wobbly bit is "jitter" and is caused by frequency problems of the signal (you did say the tape is old!). I don't know any solutions off hand, but let me check...

edit: okay, found this http://www.dscaler.org/ , I'm not sure if it will solve all your problems, but I'm fairly sure that it will improve the capture quality.


That cable will not work on your DVD player & TV!! It is especially made up for the tuner card. The signal that you will get from a DVD player WILL be monochrome because the TV is not getting the chroma signal through the cable.

Using the S-Video/Composite cable converter is a better solution than the tuner one as you are not converting the signal as many times - and it is likely to give you better picture quality.

ok thanks. ill try that

 

[soulman]

Ok, now how can I get rid of that blue/green stuff/patterns on the video (look at the walls especially)?

Thanks