Kramer VP 728 good for VHS transfer?
 

I am a photographer/videographer but have never done any analog capture before. I had bought a BlackMagic Intensity Shuttle USB 3.0 a couple years back for an HDMI input device (I know many say this is a terrible device for analog). Had the same problems other have had with black frames and "dirty" signal. I was thinking about buying a TBC SVHS player but them remembered the Kramer units I used to use when I did some work with a production company. I picked up a Kramer VP 728 on Ebay for $45. 4 Analog inputs, 2 HDMI inputs, HDMI out. It definitely solves the black frames and flickers problems as it has a built in TBC and also deinterlaces.

A quick search on this forum for Kramer did not show a lot of results. I know Kramer is well respected and makes production grade stuff. Anyone here using Kramer units for VHS capture? There are a ton of them available cheap on Ebay and they are cheaper than a high end VCR these days. Or maybe there is a reason nobody seems to use them :)

My other question is: The Kramer can output whatever I want from 480 to 1080 I and P in a variety of framerates. Would it be best to to take the 59.94 I signal in and covert to 720 30P in the Kramer before capture? And then let Davinci Resolve upscale to 1080p? There would seem to be no advantage to capturing beyond 30fps or is there? Not really happy with the capture options for BM Media Express, the AVI YUV are uncompressed and ridiculous in size, but the AVI Motion Jpg is too punchy and blows out highlight detail. I have settled on the Quicktime DVCPro HD, much bigger files than needed but better dynamic range. Hoping someone using similar equipment will share their workflow, I have been reading posts here for weeks and learning a lot. Thanks!

The first couple test tapes don't look great but I have to remember what the original source is..The Kramer does seem to do a lot of "processing" , smoothing, denoising, etc.. I need to play with those setting some more. This is all just consumer grade regular VHS home movie stuff I am converting.

My experience with the intensity shuttle is that it can work okay for component and hdmi sources, but as you have noted, the composite and s-video inputs do not handle video from unstable sources at all. (HDMI is already digital, and component will pretty much always be from a stable source other than possibly raw betacam output.)

I don't know anything about how the kramer performs, but maybe they actually did put some decent hardware in there. I would generally suggest capturing analog SD as 480i/576i and do any deinterlacing and upscaling in post, as it can be done better in hardware but YMMV. It's not entirely clear if it supports direct 480i/576i output without scaling/deinterlacing though.

And yeah, media express didn't have good alternatives for codes last time I used it on windows. For whatever reason you can't use any vfw or directshow or similar codecs that are installed on the system, only a few options that are bundled, like MJPEG or uncompressed. I ended up using amarectv instead (used to use virtualdub but that stopped working properly with the BM card after some win10 update.) which lets you use whatever codec. Generally you want to use a lossless codec like huffyuv, lagarith or utvideo. On macos I think BM Media Express supports prores which is probably the most convenient option on that system, and gives mostly lossless in practice video on the higher settings.

The HDMI signal is good from the Kramer unit. Very stable, no jitters..does seem a bit processed. Skin looks very smeary smooth. Hard to know if that is just from the cheap consumer cameras of the day.

The more I think about it, software has obviously advanced greatly in the past few years. Probably better to let Davinci do any up-converting instead of 20 year old Kramer technology.. I either have stumbled onto a great value TBC unit or maybe there is a reason not many know of the Kramer units? I think I need to find another capture program that works with the Intensity Shuttle with more codecs...

Not the same whatsoever.
- S-VHS VCR with line TBC (stable image, cleans image)
- external TBC meant for broadcast sources (not consumer sources like VHS)

That won't look good.

For broadcast/studio sources, in broadcast/studio situations, Kramer is respect.
For consumer sources, it is not. (Aside from the FC-400 models, which was designed with consumer sources in mind, but is weaker than DataVideo/Cypress gear.)

There's a reason for that -- mostly worthless.

Upsizing in older hardware will screw up quality.

Great color correction software, craptastic at everything else. So-so editor, if you can live with compressed output.

If you want quality upsize, that's what Avisynth is for (rpow2 nnedi3, to be exact).

Capture interlaced as interlaced, so 29.97fps (59.94 fields).

Yes, use lossless compressions.
uncompressed = 75gb/hour, lossless are half to third that data rate.

VHS max DR will be had with 4:2:2

Having the equipment, and suggesting it for use, will be separate things. This site has a lot of gear, for R&D, including stuff that is not recommended. That's how we were able to learn it's not recommended. I've done a lot of video hardware testing in the past 25 years. User complaints, and clueless suggestions, are often why those tests were done.

Yes, but never use that as an excuse. "only VHS" is dumb, as analog tape can look farther better than people sometimes understand. The quality issue is user error on their end, using bad gear that yields bad quality.

Thanks for all the info. I understand a lot of the photography/video world, but next to nothing for analog conversion. Can you tell me a bit more what the Kramer does poorly with consumer VHS video? I am assuming you are saying detail is lost or the conversion is not good in some way..just curious where it falls short.

Looks like the 480 and 576 outputs options on the Kramer are both progressive. Not sure if I can output something close to a native size interlaced file. I will have to do some more checking. I know I can create custom output resolutions.

Now about Davinci Resolve... That I will disagree with you. 5 years ago people said Davinci Resolve was a great colorist piece of software but a poor editor. Now it is as fully featured as anything out there. With Fairlight Audio and Fusion incorporated into the past couple versions it is truly a full featured editor. Full control over output and a variety of codecs (DNXHD and others), so I don't see any problem there. Maybe for upscaling it is not the best..that I certainly don't know, but as far as an NLE, it is growing very fast and will continue to steal Adobe Premiere customers every year. Their pocket cinema cameras are great. I have the Pocket 4k, great camera.

I have heard everyone say that analog capture requires going down the rabbit hole... lots to learn and great resources here. Thanks.

VHS is a Polaroid camera.
Kramer is large format film.
What do you think would happen if you tried to dunk a Polaroid print into film developer, expecting it to also give good quality, or better quality, or whatever? Nothing good.

Understand now? :)

No.
Neither.

Consumer formats are inferior and dirty. That noise/chaos confuses pro equipment that expects better signals. The signal properties of consumer formats are wholly different from pro/broadcast signal properties.

Another analogy.
Both formats are video right? The same, right?
Well, a dog and your wife/girlfriend are both mammals. They can both eat snausages, right? :laugh:
Of course not.

This item is therefore disqualified for consumer analog format conversion. This is not what it was meant for, nor will it perform the tasks needed. Wrong tool.

Do not do this.

Until it can support in/out formats available in pretty much everything else, still no. It's a tool useful only in niche workflow. If you deviate from the specific intended use, things go sideways really quickly. I wish it were not the case, but it is what it is. Many editors have come and go over the years, all of them with limitations. Resolve is the "it" software of the moment. That moment will pass. Whether it stays in the market entirely depends on how well it evolves to be less niche.

I can do whatever I want in Premiere or FCP, but not Resolve.

Yep.