How to fix green-purple flashes when digitising?
 

Dear Forum Gurus,

When digitising VHS tapes, using the VC500 Diamond, certain colours flash to purple / green. I know that the VCR player and tapes are fine because this issue does not happen when I put the VCR straight onto my TV. Please see attached clips of the tapes playing on my TV (recorded on my phone), and after digitising (using VC500).

I've captured using Power Director, Virtual dub and propriatry software of the second digitizer (Magix) with no joy. On virtual dub I use PAL-I. I am from the UK so it is all PAL over here. The issue is worst when displaying big block colours such as blue skys.

I have tried the following and all attempts have the same issue:
1) The Magix digitiser: https://www.amazon.co.uk/MAGIX-Rescu.../dp/B01M67DRQT
2) Windows 10, Windows 7 64 bit, Windows 7 32 bit.
3) Two different computers.
4) Three different VCR's (all output fine onto my TV).
5) Many tapes from different sources.
6) Different cables. Different USB ports.

My questions are:
1) Is this a known error?
2) Would trying windows XP help?
3) Is this a PAL issue?
4) Shall I bite the bullet and try to buy ATI All-In-Wonder video card? (A post here recommended it).

I've been sitting on my mums tapes since the world was normal and she is wonderung why there is no progress. Any help would be apreciated. Help leading to a satisfactory solution will be rewarded with a bespoke limerick!

Likely timing errors present + cheap capture card.
It would look fine on TV, as TV expects bad source signal integrity. Capture cards do not.

Unlikely PAL issue.

No, XP would not help, in terms of the OS.
But noting that a better ATI AIW card in XP would partially help, but timing error still needs some form of TBC.)

How about a bowl full of Lucky Charms? :)

What a nightnare!

I also use a cheap craptastic stick (VGB-100) and it's great. But I have an ES-15 in the flow.

I'd try a different PAL video standard in VDub.

Get yourself a Panasonic ES-10 or ES-15. Cheap TBC "ish" as the mighty LS would say. :worthy: :salute:

"Buy it, use it, sell it".

I have put my flak-jacket on. :)

Hi Lordsmurf, Hushpower,

Thank you both for your replies.

LS: I will introduce a TBC and report back! Lucky charms could be arranged - although they may be ASCII art charms xD

HP: I did try all the variants of PAL in virtual dub with no success sadly. Thank you for recommending the cheep TBC. Upon initially googling 'time base corrector' I was horrified at the £400-£1000 price range I encountered. I'll give the panasonic a try and hopefully I will get acceptable quality :)

Can I ask - were you able to watch the clips I uploaded? The site says 0 downloads.

Thanks again for your guidance. What a friendly site!

I think it's site bug. The counter doesn't work properly.

I reckon an ES-10 or 15 would improve that significantly. I won't promise anything though. If it doesn't work, you can blame me, then I'll blame LS! :D

If you'll take a close look at the images in this post, the first and third images (without TBC) have some mild red and green lines, which the second and fourth images (with TBC) do not have.

OK - I've gone ahead and ordered an ES-15. Hopefully it will solve most of the issue.

Traal, thanks for the link, I see the colour issue present in the screengrabs. Looks familiar!

My set up will look like this:

Proline DVCR100 -> svideo -> ES-15 -> svideo ->Magix USB stick -> windows 10

Thanks all. I Will update you guys on how it goes :)

The ES-15 is an interesting gadget. I have three VCRs hooked up to it, 1 via S-Video In and the other two composite (mine has two SCART sockets I'm using for the Composite In), with the one S-Video out to a S-video splitter 1/to my USB capture card and the 2/other to my PCI Phillips capture card.

And there's a another input on the front, complete with a DV/Firewire socket.

-- merged --

It has certainly improved my VHS quality.

Just done some tests after making my "interesting gadget" claim above.

Every input (1-4) is processed by the ES-15. I have seen written that only input 2 is processed.

Interestingly, my ES35 VHS/DVD Recorder does exactly the same processing when outputting VHS through the S-Video port or the "DVD Priority" Composite output, meaning that the ES-15 is superfluous if paired with an ES-35. No ES-35 processing takes place on the "common out" Composite output.

TechnicolouredVHS, here's some video improved by the ES-15 (ES-35 does the same, as it turns out). Watch the left edge of the water shot, then the wobbly aeroplane.

Yes I see how the video has been 'stabalized' by the ES-15. The original footage of the plane looks like it's been filmed free hand xD

Once I've set up my chain I'll post my results here. I hope to have this done by next weekend maybe?

Thanks guys!

-- merged --

Hi Lord Smurf, Hush power!

I've had great success with correcting the timing issue with an ES-15. I owe you both poetry. I went down a rabbit hole with cables and connections and am in the process of preparing captures comparing various configurations.

Please watch this space and hopefully in the coming days I will have some interesting results to share!

My sincere gratitude,
TechnicolouredVHS.

Hushpower, I took a look at the wobbly airplane and, at 0:24 in the video, the left and right wobble has been replaced with a horizontal stretching and contracting.

TechnicolouredVHS, I'd be interested to see if the ES-15 solves the green/purple problem.

It should, the reason the color is messed up is that the capture card loses track of where the line starts. The start of the each line (which you don't see normally as it will be cropped off) contains the reference color signal (color burst) whatever is trying to decode the color needs to get the hue of the color data in the line correct. The Video decoder in the ES15 and your TV is much better at this.

That's great news, TechnicolourVHS, Lordsmurf can rest easy! :D

traal, yes, stepping through each frame, I see that stretching now. Miles better than without the ES-15 though.

It works fine. It's not instant, but works on a cron. So the numbers may not be updated for at least 24 hours.

The ES10/15 is not a TBC, but TBC(ish), and may suffice for this exact problem, from this exact person, using this exact setup.

Hello all,

compare.png shows three setups.
Left: DVCR (PROLINE 100) -> composite* -> Magix USB stick
Centre: DVCR (PROLINE 100) -> composite* -> ES15 -> composite -> Magix USB stick
Right: DVCR (PROLINE 100) -> composite* -> ES15 -> svideo -> Magix USB stick (comb filter OFF)
I have uploaded the corresponding videos so you can really get a good look. Noise reduction on 'automatic'** for all.

Left (PROLINEDVCR100_compo_MAGIXUSB.avi) shows the original colour problem. Purple and green splattered about. Bleugh! Wakk!
Centre (PROLINEDVCR100_compo_ES15_compo_MAGIXUSB.avi) shows the ES-15 fixing the colour problem. Great Success!! :congrats:
Right (PROLINEDVCR100_compo_ES15_svid_MAGIXUSB.avi) is rather interesting. It shows a colour / contrast improvement (less posterisation?) just by using an S-VIDEO cable from the ES-15 to the usb stick. This surprised me as I thought the earlier composite cable in the chain would be the limiting factor. Note that comb filtering was OFF in the ES-15 when I recorded this. The comb filter separates the chroma and luma information on the composite input (making it more like an s-video input) of the ES-15 *if* it was on. I tried with comb filter on and saw no difference (available upon request).

Inspired by the improvement of using the s-video cable, I tried to go further. The PROLINE100 has a scart connection at the back (an EU standard that can be composite or svideo or other depending on the capabilities of the device). I bought a scart to s-video adapter*** and tried it out. anomoly.png is the result. The luma is there but not the chroma. This is either because the PROLINE is incapable of handling s-video on this scart-out connection, or because i bought a cheep adapter/cable, or because the s-video-in on the ES-15 is a dud. So.. I've bought a second adapter which arrives tomorrow. I will try it and post to see if I can get yet further improvements, and hopefully conclude this adventure :)

In Short:

• ES-15 has solved my problem!
• Unexpected(?) gains from s-video cable
• Final cable test tomorrow
• Sorry for stating obvious facts throughout post - It's all new to me :)

Thank you al very much, my nan is going to really appreciate seeing these old tapes.
TechnicolouredVHS.

*composite is actually a scart to composite connection.
**From manual: Automatic:Noise reduction only works on picture input from a video tape.
***https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/...Y327_QL65_.jpg

The reason you are getting B/W with the scart -> svideo adapter is that Luma/Brightness and composite signals share the same pins on the SCART sockets. As such, scart outputs and inputs have to be switched between them manually on devices that support it. For VCRs S-Video is something you normally only get with Super-VHS decks and some DVD-Recorder combo decks (though in the the latter case it's output from the internal digitizer connected internally to the VCR part via a composite connection).

The DVR will decode the composite signal into digital component data internally already, so there's normally no point mixing it together again by using composite out. Using S-Video avoids that extra step.

Thanks for the further update, TechnicolouredVHS.

On my ES15 (Aussie version), the AV2 (Scart) input port can be selected, in the Settings, to receive S-Video. I have one of those cheap Scart adapters with red, white and yellow RCAs and an S-Video socket. The ES15 will take S-video through this adapter. Mind you, you can just use either AV3 (on the front) or AV4 to input S-Video.

If I have AV2 set to receive "Video" (as opposed to S-video) a greyscale signal is displayed.

I forgot to add, while it's not the reason you're getting B/W image on S-Video in in this case, on my ES10 the color doesn't work on any S-Video inputs (likely due to a faulty video input switching IC from what I've gathered) so it is something that can happen on these units.