Restoring a bunch of VHS workout videos?

[nai1ed]

Okay, my wife has tasked me with transferring all her old VHS workout tapes to DVD or Plex. Luckily being an IT person had already had tons of hardware at my disposal, but I want to get the best possible output with what I have. I recently purchased some additional equipment such as

JVC SR-V101US - This VHS works great and I think will be the main unit.
JVC HR-S3912U - Got this real cheap and works great but no TBC.
Elite Video Broadcast BVP-4plus - Just ordered this, heard it works great to restore color.
Panasonic DMR-ES15 - I read this is the unit to have for its TBC passthrough.

Equipment I already own.

I have a bunch of different capture cards.
Several Hauppauge cards - MCE150, HVR 1600, and HVR1250
Diamond VC500 USB, ATI AIW 9600(AGP) and X600(PCIE), and ATI Theater 650 PCIe. Also have some older ATI AIW Rage Pro and Avermedia 150 PCI cards, plus a bunch of DVR cards for surveillance systems.

I have tons of motherboards and could build a dedicated PC, but I have this HP T620 thinclient with PCIE slot that I'd love to use with the ATI Theater 650.

I guess my questions is would the ATI theater 650 be my best choice? I don't think it supports capture to AVI with virtualdub but I do like the color filters this card has compared to some others I've used. Right now I'm using Pinnacle Studio 12 to capture with. Building a Windows XP machine is a real pain dealing with drivers and updates and software compatibility. As I mentioned earlier, I do like this HP T620 running Windows 7 64bit, it makes for a very slick PC.

Any thoughts?

Thanks

Brian

[sanlyn]

Welcome to the forum.

Quote:

Originally Posted by nai1ed

Okay, my wife has tasked me with transferring all her old VHS workout tapes to DVD or Plex.

You're from IT, right? So am I. I don't trust servers. Also, DVD and servers have two different media requirements. One solution is to capture to a format that lets you archive a trusted and true-copy master and go in any direction from there. That means capture to lossless media.

Quote:

Originally Posted by nai1ed

I want to get the best possible output with what I have.

Are you sure? It might be a good idea to clarify what you mean by "best possible", as a great many people use that exact term to describe entirely different concepts. I ask at this point, because this statement can come back to haunt you when it confuses readers who'd like to reply in detail but can't do so unless they know what you really mean. Many people use such terms without knowing what high quality is, what it looks like, or what it takes to get it.

JVC SR-V101US - Decent player, with good line tbc. Turn off the noise reduction with some tapes unlesss you enjoy working with motion smear. JVC and a few other VCR's are notorious for their primitive dnr, works OK on some tapes, can be detrimental on others. It depends. There are better denoisers in post processing.

JVC HR-S3912U. I have one. No cigar with this one, makes too much noise. Smears chroma and detail, has a real problem with DCT edge noise on most tapes. Just to remind you:

Quote:

I want to get the best possible output with what I have.

Elite Video Broadcast BVP-4plus. If you want to "restore color" to VHS, keep in mind that any color correction you make during capture will be difficult to alter later, if not impossible. Of course you are working with a properly calibrated monitor and histograms that display colors accurately. But the real value for proc amps is assurance of valid video levels and preventing crushed darks and clipped brights. If the terms "black level", "D6500 monitor calibration", "VHS nonlinear chroma response", and "y=16 to 235" don't mean much to you, then you will inflict a lot of damage with a BVP-4. Most of it will require re-capture. I still have my BVP-4 and my Sign Video PA-100 (the latter is far more useful with its LED luminance meter). Besides, as you will discover, color correction with VHS during capture is an exercise in masochism.

Panasonic DMR-ES15 - usually connected for its line-level tbc, which your SR-V101US already has (but you can use the ES15 if JVC's tbc gets in the way. It happens). The ES15 is also useful as a frame-level tbc to insure good audio sync and prevent dropped frames. Turn off the ES15's noise reduction or you'll be posting complaints about posterizing effects, macroblocks and ghosting, which I'm sure you'd prefer to avoid because they're pains in the tush to correct afterwards and the filters required will wreck your videos. One shortcoming of pass-thru units: they're not "complete" tbc's in that they won't defeat copy protection or false-positive signal errors.

Quote:

Originally Posted by nai1ed

I have a bunch of different capture cards.
Several Hauppauge cards - MCE150, HVR 1600, and HVR1250

These are not designed for lossless capture or optimized for VHS source. Don't use them for VHS capture. Let me remind you of this statement:

Quote:

I want to get the best posssible output with what I have.

Quote:

Originally Posted by nai1ed

Diamond VC500 USB, ATI AIW 9600(AGP) and X600(PCIE), and ATI Theater 650 PCIe. Also have some older ATI AIW Rage Pro and Avermedia 150 PCI cards, plus a bunch of DVR cards for surveillance systems.

Your best bets are the VC500 and, even better, the AIW 9600 -- the former being a big favorite worldwide for many years, the latter being one of the best analog-to-digital capture devices ever made by anyone anywhere. The others are second-rate or worse and not representative of the high quality that ATI had to offer over the years.

Quote:

Originally Posted by nai1ed

would the ATI theater 650 be my best choice?

No.

If you don't want the VC500 or the AIW 9600, there are many buyers in our forum marketplace who are dying to get their hands on either product and put them to use -- although you can buy a brand new VC500 at budget rates on Amazon these days.

Quote:

Originally Posted by nai1ed

Right now I'm using Pinnacle Studio 12 to capture with.

The general consensus during the life of this forum and other advanced video tech sources is that Pinnacle is to be avoided. In particular, if you want high quality lossless capture and you were serious when you used the word "restoring" in your thread's title, then I'd suggest that pinnacle won't give you what you say you want.

Quote:

Originally Posted by nai1ed

Building a Windows XP machine is a real pain dealing with drivers and updates and software compatibility.

What XP updates? The XP update server was shut down years ago. Anyway, that decision clarifies a great many issues. I take it this means that you really didn't mean it when you wrote:

Quote:

I want to get the best possible output with what I have.

What about those Windows 7 updates, by the way? Are they more fun to shut down and reboot than they were with XP?

Quote:

Originally Posted by nai1ed

I do like this HP T620 running Windows 7 64bit, it makes for a very slick PC.

Win7 makes for many limitations and workarounds when it comes to video restoration work, particular since a lot of excellent (and mostly free) video apps won't run in Windows 7. Most of the good stuff for video is 32-bit anyway. But Windows 7 users (including me) have made mods and concessions that get the job done, and recommended capture devices like the VC500 have Win7 drivers. XP is still king of the hill for VHS capture hardware, but it's doable with Windows 7 and the right hardware and software.

I saw no mention of VHS cleanup. Likely you won't require a great deal of it with clean retail tapes and your SR-V101, but there are those occasional nightmares, even with retail. No mention here of how to repair common VHS defects. Repairing them is what is meant by "restoration". You'll want to clean up ripples, dropouts, spots, head-switching noise, chroma displacement and bleed, projector hop, sloppy interlace combing or bad telecine, aliasing, rainbows and other chroma noise remnants, and residual tape noise (vague "floating grunge"). Not every retail tape is a masterpiece of lab work, and some tape surfaces don't hold up so well after much playing. The noise reduction in VCRs can't clean up everything -- there are thousands of forum posts to prove it.

If you're serious about levels and color correction, capture-time YUV correction is often far too basic for the kind of color problems you get with VHS. If you really want that high quality output you mentioned, post processing color is far more flexible and sophisticated and easier than you'd think, even with the hundreds of color adjustments available in Avisynth and VirtualDub alone. The color controls in Pinnacle and most budget editors are not only inadequate, they're useless with VHS color problems. On the other hand, over-priced bloatware like Adobe Premiere is a lot to pay to use only 15% of its software just for color work, even if its color controls are superbly designed, but that and the free DaVinci Resolve or pricey ColorFinesse are overkill for your purposes. For most of us, the combo of Avisynth and VirtualDub are more than adequate for cleanup and color work.

Whatever you decide, good luck. If you encounter problems, don't be afraid to post questions or samples of video work that's giving you troubles.

[nai1ed]

Thank you so much for the reply. You've given me lots of good advice and I greatly appreciate it. I think I'll put together a system with the ATI AIW 9600, but I may also try using the VC500 with my HP T620. I had already done a capture with the VC500 and the Theater 650 and I noticed the colors were much more vibrant with the 650. (But that was using Pinnacle Studio).

When using Windows XP, are you just staying with SP2? I'm assuming .NET will need to be installed as well. I don't plan on browsing the web with it, but I would like to access my NAS on the network.

Also, do you recommend using the Panasonic ES15 to record DVD's, or just use as a passthrough?

I do a lot of video editing at work with TMPGENC Master Works 6, but I'm not too familiar with Virtualdub or Avisynth. Is Avisynth the best tool for fixing bad VHS tapes?

Thank you

Brian

[JPMedia]

The ES-15 should only be used as a pass-through. Make sure to turn off Noise Reduction in the menu before using the ES-15 in your workflow.

There are many better options if you're looking for a stand-alone DVD recorder. Specifically you should look for a model that uses the LSI chipset.

A list of such players can be found in this thread: http://www.digitalfaq.com/forum/vide...ipset-dvd.html

[nai1ed]

Thanks for that list. I noticed the Panasonic ES20 is listed, is there a big difference between the ES15 and ES20? Seems a bit redundant have these 2 DVD recorders stacked up. My goal is to use Virtualdub and Avisynth to cleanup and fix some videos that need it, but if the tape already plays perfect on the VHS, why not save time and dub it directly to DVD. I really don't want to spend an aternity converting all these VHS tapes, but I also want good quality.

Thanks

Brian

[lordsmurf]

Quote:

Originally Posted by nai1ed

Thanks for that list. I noticed the Panasonic ES20 is listed, is there a big difference between the ES15 and ES20?

The ES10 and ES15 are good for TBC(ish) passthrough. But the ES20/25/etc are either so weak as to be useless, or have no TBC(ish) properties at all.

Panasonics further give lousy recording quality on most all of their units. At very most, to be generous, I'd consider an LSI-based Panasonic, but only when using it in XP 1-hour recording mode, maybe 2-hour SP at worst. I forget which is the ES units used LSI, and which did not, but that info can be found in the forum from years past. I'm thinking it was just 1 model, and it was the ES25.

So the ES20 model is mostly/entirely useless.

I've not had time to read the whole thread yet, but wanted to make the quick important reply.

[nai1ed]

I see. So anything after the ES15 is pointless. I do have a Toshiba DVD recorder VHS combo DVR620, but the VHS doesn't play all that well. I was hoping to dub some of these VHS tapes to DVD that play just fine, but I'm not sure which DVD recorder I should use.

[sanlyn]

Quote:

Originally Posted by nai1ed

I think I'll put together a system with the ATI AIW 9600, but I may also try using the VC500 with my HP T620. I had already done a capture with the VC500 and the Theater 650 and I noticed the colors were much more vibrant with the 650. (But that was using Pinnacle Studio).

The ATI 650 has AGC issues. You don't want a master capture that is lossy DV with plastic color and uncontrolled artificial gain. A master is supposed to be as near as one can get to a transparent, unaltered digital copy of the original. From there you can do anything you want. I'm suspicious of the term "vibrant color" because it has no objective meaning and doesn't say anything about safe or unsafe chroma levels, for which there are definite limits in digital video. If you aren't using a calibrated monitor when making corrections, display of the same video on other devices can be a problem.

My main capture PC is a home built XP/Sp3 with an ATI AIW 9600XT card. I have a secondary Win7 PC that uses the VC500 and once used a Hauppauge USB-2 (but the USB-2 clipped blacks, which I didn't care for), and an older helper XP/Sp2 with an AIW 7500 for capture.

Quote:

Originally Posted by nai1ed

Is Avisynth the best tool for fixing bad VHS tapes?

Yes. "Editors" can't compete with it for video repair and mods. VirtualDub is the easiest way to run Avisynth filters, while VDub itself has over 200 filters of its own that can be quite handy. Don't think of these two apps as editors but as "video processors'.

Quote:

Originally Posted by nai1ed

is there a big difference between the ES15 and ES20?

The ES20 is a visibly cleaner recorder with its LSI processor, but its tbc isn't nearly as effective as the ES10/ES15. You can make a fairly neat DVD from a pristine tape with the ES20 and other LSI-chip DVD-R's, but you'll have to figure out if you want to live with highly visible head-switching noise at borders and some very visible VHS defects such as chroma bleed, dropouts (spots and horizontal ripples), color shifts, and other common VHS glitches. MPEG is a final delivery format, not designed for edits or image mods without incurring quality hits and re-encoding loss. The ES20's dnr (like similar dnr on other recorders) can cause ghosting if left enabled.

In any case, you shouldn't record noisy VHS tape direct to DVD in a DVD-R at no less less than 6.2kbps Variable Bitrate, which is about 90 minutes per DVD disc. The absolute max would be 4.6kbps VBR, or 2 hours of DVD program. Unfortunately, without cleanup the usual VHS noise eats lots of the encoding bitrate, even if the result "looks" fairly OK, so details and motion rendering get relatively bitrate-starved.

[nai1ed]

What I meant by vibrant color on the ATI 650 is that the video was noticeably brighter. I did a capture of a video workout on the beach with the ATI 650 and the VC500, and on the VC500 it looked like it was late evening, but on the ATI 650 it looked like mid day.

One thing I did noticed is that I can't make any adjustments with EzGrabber. How do I make color adjustments on the VC500? The menu's wont let me make changes.


Here is my current setup -

[sanlyn]

No one recommends using EZGrabber for capture. It's installed so that other capture programs can use its capture drivers. The capture app most people use is VirtualDub. VDub hooks into the VC500's proc amp controls. Brightness, contrast, etc., are controlled with the proc amp controls and checked with the input histogram. http://www.digitalfaq.com/forum/vide...-settings.html

[nai1ed]

Oh, I see. I thought I had to make the changes in the EzGrabber. Maybe you can help me with some Virtualdub Filters though. I have my wife's High School graduation tape from 1991 and the quality looks bad. Lots of color banding and color bleeding.

Here is a screenshot taken from VLC.



I used virtualdub with the VC500 to capture a short video in AVI uncompressed.

[sanlyn]

Quote:

Originally Posted by nai1ed

Oh, I see. I thought I had to make the changes in the EzGrabber. Maybe you can help me with some Virtualdub Filters though. I have my wife's High School graduation tape from 1991 and the quality looks bad. Lots of color banding and color bleeding.

Here is a screenshot taken from VLC.
..............
..............
I used virtualdub with the VC500 to capture a short video in AVI uncompressed.

Thanks for the image.
Several problems here. No one would apply filters to a still image, as there is no way to judge noise characteristics with non-moving media. Second, there are obviously crushed darks and blown-out highlights and hot spots (i.e., clipping) because of the YUV->RGB conversion when making the png. Third, you shouldn't be capturing uncompressed -- it's a drag on your CPU, makes overly big capture files, and it makes it really tough to get a decent upload size for video samples. VHS is usually captured to YUY2 color and compressed with huffyuv real-time lossless compression, which can actually load from the capture stream into an avi file more easily than an uncompressed stream.

If you captured in RGB, the clipping damage is already done and can't be repaired. The still photo appears to be from a dubbed tape (multi-gen tape copy), has seriously bad dct and sharpening halos (black halo on the left edges of objects, bright halo on the right edges). Chroma is corrupt (there are no clean whites or grays, most colors have a heavy cyan or green color cast). Corrections when working from a still image such as this would not be feasible. Any color correction, if possible, would first have to be done in a YUV capture medium that has not been converted to RGB..

How to create a short sample of 5 to 8 seconds or so (with motion of some kind) using VirtualDub: Open the avi capture in VirtualDub. Use the navigation and start/end controls in the lower left-hand corner of the VirtualDub window to mark the start point of your short sample, and use the "Edit' menu items to delete the video portion at the left of the starting point. Then use the same controls to mark the end point of the desired sample, and the edit menu controls to delete the portion of video that follows the end point.

After you have set up your sample, click "Video...", and in the dropdown menu that appears, click "Direct stream copy". Then click "File..." -> "Save AVI...", and give your sample a name and location.

In order to upload a sample, go into "advanced" viewing mode in a forum Reply window and click the "Manage Attachments" command button. Follow instructions on the upload dialog window that appears. The upload might seem slow because submissions are scanned for viruses and other problems during the upload process. Give the upload a few minutes to complete. The file size limit for video samples is 99MB. If your capture is uncomporssed RGB, then file size would be 3 to 4 times the size of a losslessly compressed AVI.

[nai1ed]

I will try this tonight and upload a 5 second sample.

Thank you

[nai1ed]

http://www.digitalfaq.com/forum/atta...1&d=1542850176

I uploaded a sample, but this time I used my ATI AIW 9600 but followed your instructions.

Thanks

Brian

[sanlyn]

Thanks for the sample. I'll take a look and post details as soon as I can. Perhaps other readers might have a look as well.



Obviously, not a tape that's in the best condition. At first look, however, it's just as obvious that it's made worse by capturing with uncontrolled and illegal (i.e, digitally unsafe) input signal levels. The image below shows a sample frame with its black borders and head -switching noise removed, and a YUV levels histogram attached at the right-hand side.



Take a look at the right-hand graph and the white bar along the top of the graph. Note the bright yellow at each end of the white bar. The yellow indicates clipped (i.e, destroyed) data. Detail is already sparse, but throwing away parts of the signal doesn't help.

Later I'll see what I can do with what's left, but even with video as poorly taped as this you should learn to control your input signal. There is nothing an encoder can do with the yellowed-out data except waste bitrate on large areas that have pixels with no recognizable information. Controlling the input signal with proc amp settings is discussed in the latest Guide in post #4, while measuring the input signal with VDub's capture histogram is explained in post #3 . Most users would measure a couple of minutes or take quick "spot readings" of tape before capture, and then set level controls to handle worst-case scenarios of data leaping off the histogram.

I'll post more details later. Thanks again.

[sanlyn]

Some quick initial color balance corrections.



But I think you can see there's a lot to be desired and a long way to go.
More notes, later.

[nai1ed]

So when looking at the histogram, I should adjust levels so they are just a tiny bit in the red?

[sanlyn]

The levels will vary from minute to minute -- not so much with retail video like workout tapes, but home videos can get crazy. Most people just sample a few seconds of tape at random spots, then adjust for worst-case scenarios. A little occasional overflow into red can be corrected later if necessary in post cleanup, but when red starts smashing against the left or right walls you're in trouble.

[nai1ed]

I noticed when doing a capture I was getting lots of dropped frames until I disable audio playback. Is this normal? Also, which filters do you think would be best for this project?

Thanks

[hodgey]

Yeah that's normal, virtualdub doesn't handle audio playback well in capture mode.