Lines in captured video?
 

Hi all,

I am new to this so hopefully someone might be able to help me understand what's happening in some captured video files from 8mm video in PAL using composite video.

I have set my capture card to 720 x 576 which I believe is the correct resolution.

However the captured files have some strange video at the very bottom which is not shown when I connect the camera directly to the TV.

On the right hand side of the video there is also a black part with lines that seem to stick out from the original video, these lines look like they are running up the screen. On the left of the video it is similar except the black form the edge makes 'lined' in the video.
Maybe the lines are not aligned/synchronised? I do not see this when connected to a TV either.

Watching the videos there are also lines visible, these are easy to see when there is some motion.

Some images of what I am seeing are here https://imgur.com/a/ezPvUM2

From what I have read on the forums here TBC and DNR are good things to have however my camcorder does not have these.
Could that be the issue?

Or is this just how the captured video should look?

The margins you are referring to called overscan, The reason you don't see them on TV because TV doesn't display the entire frame. The bottom stripe called video head switch (the signal that tells the camcorder/VCR to switch from head A to head B on the video drum), The sides are called the padded 16 black pixels inserted by the capture card, the top is where teletext, Macrovision and caption all reside. You should crop the sides down to about 704 which is the theorical horizontal video resolution, and mask top and bottom portions. And yes the lines are not aligned with each other, it's called line timing and to fix that you need a camcorder built in line TBC, You also have dull chroma and that can be slightly sharpened by using S-Video out instead of composite.

Adding to what latreche34 mentioned, the lines throughout the main image (combing) are caused by interlacing and they should be there when you're not viewing a deinterlaced version.

Something you should fix: the contrast level of your capture is set way, way too high.

That looks like a standard VHS capture. I just crop all that rubbish on the sides and bottom away in my editor, maintaining the 4:3 aspect.

The alternatives to a camera with a line TBC are either a dedicated TBC or the poor-man's TBC, being a DVD recorder which can be used as a passthrough to straighten up the wobbly lines (evidenced by curvy side black edges). The Panasonic ES-10 and 15 are examples. Depends on how many tapes you have to do and if you are happy without; "Every Man/Woman has his/her price".

As per msgohan's comment, it does look a bit bright. You should be able to lower the brightness and/or contrast using the device's Proc Amp/Levels controls. What capture device are you using?