Viability of cheap VHS capture

[crissrudd4554]

I tried something different. I hooked the composite cable from the VCR to the In portion of the DVD Recorder and the composite cable from my USB device to the Out portion of the DVD Recorder and guess what....SUCCESS!!

[spoRv]

I TOLD YOU!

[crissrudd4554]

One problem it does have is the video is about a split second out of sync but I'll probably just fix this in an editing program.

[crissrudd4554]

Well I have a new problem (sorta). None of the actual softwares I'm using are capturing fully the way I want. Let me elaborate. Of the devices I have at present the WinTV HVR 850 or the 950q is what I'd like to use but none of the programs I've been able to test them with don't seem to capture properly. I've tested this on WinTV 8, PowerDirector, and Pinnacle Studios (2008 version). A couple other programs I tried did not pick up the device. WinTV 8 the capture was out of sync by about 4 frames and the software only seems to pick up the 850 device, PowerDirector still gives me those white lines I had brought up a while back, and Pinnacle keeps telling me there's an invalid device and to check my cables when I set it to MPEG and a jittery type video if I set it to AVI.

I was successful in capturing with a Gigaware capture device using the '08 Pinnacle Studios but the audio was loud and would not change even after I went into devices to adjust it and the beginning was slightly out of sync. A Corel VideoStudio program I purchased picked up the Gigaware devices signal but not the WinTV. I'm not sure the Corel program would have been the route I would have wanted to go with since a test video I captured with that program using the Gigaware USB gave me that overlap effect i've been trying to avoid (https://fanrestore.com/thread-724.html).

So anyways my question is in regards to any softwares, not devices, for video capturing you guys recommend. No VirtualDub please. It would not pick up the WinTV device when I tried it and also I had tried it once a few months back with another device and it had the overlap effect. I also don't want the videos to be re-encoded so basically any free software is likely not gonna do me any good. I even tried some of the other WinTV discs I have and from the looks they would not pick up my VCR unless the software was registered which their site won't even let me do. Any suggestions??

If not this will likely be my route. Capture with the 850 using WinTV 8, place the exported video in Corel VideoStudio and sync the audio properly, render that as an mpeg, then burn to DVD with DVD Architect. However, rendering the video will likely give a slight quality loss and I want to retain as much of the original exported videos quality as I can. If anyone has any suggestions I'd appreciate it.

[Evit]

I just bought myself a 6-heads Panasonic S-VHS VCR for a suprisingly good price. Anyone wants a Super VHS captured?

[crissrudd4554]

I think I've (hopefully) found what I've come down to.

VCR:

1999 General Electric

Capture Device:

WinTV HVR 950*

TBC Unit:

Panasonic DVD Recorder ES15

Capturing Software:

Roxio Creator NXT (2012 Version)*

*Possible subject to change

[crissrudd4554]

*Possible subject to change

Who called it?? lol just kidding anyways I'm currently up to this.

Capture Device(s):

Video: Dazzle USB (2016 version)
Audio: Dazzle USB (2008 version)

Notes:

The WinTV 950q gave me a video that had slight delays in a few places while the 850 and 950 gave me a video that had the audio about two or three frames ahead of the video. Also the 950's audio was a bit loud for my liking.

I had tried a Gigaware capture device. Video wasn't too bad but like the 950 and the 2016 Dazzle the audio was quite loud and seems to have similar static noise that the Dazzle has. Attempts at having two devices running together in the Roxio program I am now using proved unsuccessful including some run ins with the blue screen of death! However the program did allow me to have both Dazzles running together the results of which appear good to me so far.

Will resume tomorrow.

[crissrudd4554]

Figured I'd share some examples of the fruits of my labor Currently I'm torn between two methods. On Windows I use Roxio Creator NXT 4 as the capture software while the devices I use are either the 2016 Dazzle or ION Video2PC device for video and 2008 USB VIDBOX for audio. On Mac I'm presently using the EyeTV 250 device. Below are examples from Phantom of the Opera '43 (Top Dazzle/VIDBOX capture, bottom EyeTV 250).


















The Windows capture has better framing and more detail while the Mac capture IMO has slightly better coloring. Next is NeverEnding Story (Top Ion/VIDBOX capture, bottom EyeTV 250).


















Same deal. Windows capture has better framing and detail while the Mac capture has slightly better coloring. Another thing that appears more presently in the Mac capture are some motion effects (look above the Phantom's shoulders and to the left of Atreyu's bangs).






While the audio syncing between both are generally good, I think the EyeTV capture might be more accurate. I say this because I compared a scene from the Phantom captures to a snippet of the same scene on the documentary on the official DVD (I used the scene from the doc as it appeared to be of the same film source as the VHS print). The EyeTV capture actually synced up better with the documentary snippet than the Dazzle/VIDBOX capture did (makes sense since the Windows capture is of two devices running simultaneously). The EyeTV 250 capture also appeared to have closer syncing to a few other DVDs I had lying around of prior attempts.

So its a tough call. Perhaps I'll do one of each like I did with these two though likely I'll just go the Windows route due to the better picture quality. Thanks for your time guys!

[spoRv]

I think there are some basic settings in the capture software - brightness, contrast, saturation etc. - tweak them, preferably using a test pattern (if you are lucky you could find one at the end of some VHS tapes).

[crissrudd4554]

Figured I'd share some more grabs. Currently torn between the WinTV-HVR-850 and the combo deal of either the Dazzle or Ion with the VIDBOX. Leaning more towards the former. The quality is a tad lower than the Dazzle but not to a major degree. I did Phantom again and both files were still 5.52gb. My only hesitance in using WinTV is the devices tend to get glitchy after a while. I know from using countless EyeTV Hybrids and I had already tested the WinTV 950 and it was glitchy. Anyways I have some grabs. First is the Dazzle capture, second the WinTV capture, third an EyeTV Hybrid capture I did 5 or 6 years ago (no TBC), and the last are from two separate DVDs. One a bootleg Phantom DVD I got off ebay a year or two ago, last from the Phantom documentary from the official Phantom DVD.