This guide is for doing bit perfect (identical to source) captures of the digital PCM track on Laserdiscs. In general you only need a few things, and the process is very simple. The thing that complicates it is that there is a whole slew of audio interfaces, sound cards, and recording software out there, each with their own quirks and processes. This guide is mainly based on the hardware and software I'm using, but it should still be handy for all since the basic concepts will be the same. So I just want to say up front that I don't think this is the way, just a way. If you use something different or have any suggestions please feel free to leave a reply.

1. Hardware setup



The hardware setup for the capture is pretty straightforward: your Laserdisc player outputs a digital signal via its optical output that is routed into your PC and captured via recording software. The thing that is not so straight forward is making sure nothing happens to the signal between the Laserdisc player and the file that ends up on your drive. There are 2 places where you will commonly get snagged when trying to achieve bit perfect capture: the audio interface and the recording software. Even if a cheap consumer soundcard has a digital input, it's unlikely to support a wide range of sample rates and will just re-sample everything to a certain rate (48 kHz for instance). Because of this, it's absolutely crucial you use a sound card that supports ASIO and can pass through 44.1kHz signals without altering them. In general, pro music recording gear is the best option for both analog and digital capture.

2. Audio Device Config

Once your hardware is all setup and connected, the first thing to do is open the control panel for your audio device and make sure everything is setup correctly for 16-bit digital capture at 44.1 kHz. For instance, on my ESI the input method needs toggled between Digital and Analog, and the Digital input can be toggled between several sampling rates for capture. It's possible your device may automatically capture at the right rate, but I would recommend always installing the driver software and double checking things



3.Recording Software
I tried a ton of different software I saw recommended online for capturing bit perfect, and had no luck with anything except for Cockos Reaper. While it's not free, it does have a full featured 60 day trial that should give you plenty of time to decide if its worth shelling out the 60 bones for. I also use it for syncing (a guide for another day), so for me it was more than worth the price tag. There are just a couple things to do in Reaper before you can begin recording:

- In Preferences, set the Audio System to ASIO:



- Back in the main window, confirm the sample rate on the top right is 44.1 (don't worry about the 24-bit, it won't affect 16-bit captures)
- Create a new track with stereo inputs as shown below. Note that even if the track on the LD is mono you still need to capture it as stereo.
- Arm the track for recording and you are ready to record.



- After recording your track, go to File->Render and copy the following settings:



4. So is it Bit Perfect?

Now that you have a recorded track, you're probably wondering if its really bit perfect or not. Unfortunately there's no easy way for us to compare what we recorded back to what's actually on the Laserdisc, but there is a method where you burn a test CD and play it back in your Laserdisc player. Please see my post on the Bit Perfect Testkit for instructions and more information.

https://www.ebay.com.au/sch/cnsystemsaus...ipg=&_from=

This guy will give bulk discounts, and will ship me any quantity of discs for about USD14 in freight, and if buying bulk, will sell most titles for $5 each.

If anyone wants some titles, make a list and I can order them on your behalf and store them here, or capture them on our X9 where we tap the feed directly from the laser, resulting in much higher quality captures than is possible via composite or S-Video.

Hello,

I'm a new member here but I've released a few fan restorations of old Hong Kong martial arts and action films over the past few years.

I've followed the "The Killer - Ultimate Edition" thread on this very forum for a while and I was disappointed to see that the project has been abandoned (for now).

I'd like to try a restoration myself and I've been seeking out the best quality versions that exist.  I've got most of the important releases, particularly the Hong Kong Rescue DVD, the French HKVideo DVD and the Hong Kong Blu-ray.

However, I've been informed that the German E-M-S DVD has the best image quality.  Then I discovered on the thread I mentioned earlier that there's a Scandinavian DVD by a company called "Scanbox" that might be even better.  The member CSchmidlapp mentioned it and he mentioned that that particular DVD was supplied by another member on these forums.

I'd REALLY appreciate it if someone could supply that DVD to me so I could try to work on my custom version.  If you could upload it to any file sharing platform, making sure to upload the untouched ISO or VOB files.  I'd be willing to trade for it (I've got some pretty rare stuff in the same genre you might be interested in), whatever would be worth it to you.

I've become fairly proficient with some pretty advanced restoration software and I really feel I could create an excellent version of this film.

I've even been experimenting with some cutting edge machine-learning upscaling techniques that I'm eager to try out on this film.

Is it possible someone could pass along this DVD to me?

I'm pretty sure this is the DVD I'm looking for:

https://www.huuto.net/kohteet/the-killer-dvd/495072005

https://kuvat.huuto.net/v1/00e0/e011edd7...6-orig.jpg


If anyone has the German E-M-S DVD, I'd be interested in that as well.  I'm only going on the comments of CSchmidlapp who suggested that the Scanbox release has a higher bitrate, or less compression artifacts.

Thanks!

Regrade from the HDR WEB-DL with removed yellow tint and a bit brighter. Care was taken to not blow out any highlights, however they are strongly compressed the brighter they get. AVISynth script included for your own adjustments or your own encode, for example when the HDR Remux comes out.

Bitrate was kept low for this initial version because it's not based on the HDR Remux, merely on a HDR WEB-DL so far.

Here's a comparison (top normal SDR WEB-DL, bottom regrade from HDR):



Normal screens:



Available on the blu place.

I have this Blu-ray, but my computer is currently on the fritz, so I have no means to rip the isolated score at the moment.  Would anyone with the means be willing to get this up for me?  Just a single file is fine - no need to split up anything.  Thanks in advance.  I can do this myself in a few weeks if need be.

The final shootout scene had to be desaturated in order to lessen the red of the blood and make it suitable for the Ratings board in the 70s.

There are some production stills online that give an idea of the actual colors during that scene. Interestingly enough the color grading of the Criterion Laserdisc looks quite a bit better than the DVD and the reds in the final shootout actually look red.

I think it's a shame the scene had to be messed with and I think with creative talent and robust programs it may be possible to change that scene.

Anyone interested in attempting to color grade the final shootout scene to more closely match the laser disc (and perhaps the production stills)?

Hi guys,

For a project, I think I can fix blow out highlights in a particular master, by adding a second layer on top of the original, where I changed the contrast and luminosity so that highlights come back.

However this top image is of course very dark.

How can I in Resolve only use the luma and chroma portions on this overlay ie how can I remove the actual image only leaving out the color?

So that my layers goes: 1/ Master normaly color timed 2/ Overlay of the color only manipulated to fix the errors in 1.

Thanks if anyone can help. This is a resolve project.

Some of you may have noticed, but there have been problems with e-mail notifications (account activations, PM responses etc.) during the last week or so. This was the final nail in the coffin of the current hosting provider for me, so I'll be looking to change it as soon as possible.

It will most likely happen on this Saturday, or Sunday. During the process, some people will keep seeing old instance of the forum, since DNS changes can take 24 hours to propagate, sometimes even more. To avoid people posting to this old instance (and these posts not being moved to new instance), it will be completely locked with some kind of information message. Hopefully the new service will be better.

Here's an article about it: https://outline.com/4qn3VX

Someone bought those tapes from the NASA decades ago and now it's being auctioned off to the public. Have to say I'm happy they still exist, but also sad that there's no guarantee that whoever buys it will do a proper restoration and make it available to the public. I sure hope the guy owning them made a good digital copy of them before this auction, otherwise I have to say it's kind of irresponsible to do this.

The auction itself: https://www.sothebys.com/en/buy/auction/...?locale=en

What do you think, guys, can we raise the money?

Hi guys,

I have a bunch of tapes I would like to digitize on the mac and share.

I have a pristine VCR, all I need it seems is a video capture dongle (rca or other to USB)

Anyone could advise me on what to buy?

THX