Best settings? (VHS/Hi8, VC500, JVC SR-VS30)

[uselessunderstanding]

I used Notelu video from youtube: The ULTIMATE VHS Capture Guide as starting point. I messaged lordsmurf on reddit and he was kind enough to refer me to this forum as a best place to learn. I have wanted to digitize my home videos from vhs and hi-8 tapes so many times over years the last time I tried about 5 years back it was through a dvd recorder and worked out for the most part on the ones I tried but lately I've had time to sit down and look closer at virtual dub capturing and done some tapes and then done a test using settings from another video to deinterlace using a script with avisynth and QTGMC. Everything worked it took awhile but I wanted to fine tune my settings a little on the capture side to get the best possible out of everything. I first had some issues with timing being a little off and then even worse at the end of the a longer video but after seeing one of our posts on the forums I was able to resolve it. So I'll start with what I have I own a diamond capture card VC500 and I was successfully in using it with virtual dub. I started with a Hauppauge live2 from my work but it had timing issues but I had the same issue with the diamond until I changed a setting. The deck that I'm using is a JVC SR-VS30. Through work I also have access to a Elgato Video Capture. Not sure if one is better than the other but I thought I'd ask? Overall I didn't notice anything different between Live2 and the Diamond in my testing

My first question is regarding the timing settings here is a picture of my settings:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1XIO...ew?usp=sharing

lordsmurf further explained on reddit that I should make sure drop frames the first check box is checked because if it drops frames I will actually see the counter but if it is unchecked it will still drops frames but I won't be able to tell is that correct so from now on I will have that checked.

Everything was smooth on my first few tapes one my other tapes is in bad shape in the early part so it dropped a few frames but the rest of the tape was good expect for the current tape on my on that dropped 6 in the begging So should I also check insert null frames?

I am capturing using the huffyuv codec (On VirtualDub 2 32bit) and no compression on audio to get the best quality and then later when I deinterlace with that other guide I compress to x264 . So the next question is regarding the colorspace as seen below not sure which was is best I tried both UVYV and YUV2 and didn't notice any difference:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1uNJ...ew?usp=sharing

Here are codec settings let me know if I should change anything here. When I deinterlace I have to convert to ConvertToYV12 on the second line of the script:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1zO6...ew?usp=sharing

https://drive.google.com/file/d/18_J...ew?usp=sharing

My last question is regarding the best settings for the deck. LordSmurf had a similar post on another JVC deck. I didn't change any settings expect to turn off superimpose when I captured the first few tapes. They were in good condition so no issues. The bad tape had some frames jumped and started running upwards and more noticeable wobble. I turned off Digital TBC/NR and it automatically turned ON Video stabilizer which made it not jump up but was little wobble on the previous bad jumping parts like you could tell the date was shaking. Is this the best way to go about capturing bad tapes?

Here are the menu from that device:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1klSQGvbHgclAQlfJW2nUqM1EqzPwM_0K/view?usp=sharing

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1CVG...ew?usp=sharing

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1rMb...ew?usp=sharing

Look at an old post on here that I was looking at: http://www.digitalfaq.com/guides/vid...k-hardware.htm

Picture control Auto for the most part

S-vhS mode should be OFF since its not a s-vhs

Digital TBC/NR should be on in most cases

Digital R3 should be OFF? I left it on but wasn't sure.

I'm getting confused on what I should change as so far only the bad tapes had some minor spots had issues which I can possibly edit out later but let me know if what is best sorry for the long post but I appreciate any help.

[lollo2]

Quote:

My first question is regarding the timing settings

I cannot answer because for me VirtualDub in Windows10 produces asynchronous capture with Hauppauge USB Live-2. I use AmarecTV.

Quote:

the next question is regarding the colorspace as seen below not sure which was is best I tried both UVYV and YUV2 and didn't notice any difference

They are equivalent, only a different position of the stored data. YUY2 is preferred for HuffYUV compression and AviSynth processing, don't know why.
https://www.virtualdub.org/blog2/ent...r,%2FU%2FY%2FV.

HuFFYUV codec settings are OK, not clear to me about convertToYV12 and deinterlacing. Better to use QTGMC and AviSynth for this operation, no lossy
convertToYV12 is required with latest versions.

Quote:

My last question is regarding the best settings for the deck

In general TBC/DNR is always on, except if you see problems with some tape.

Concerning Video Calibration (B.E.S.T.) I have it always on, but 99% of my tapes have been recorded on the same machine with that option on.
It has an impact on the characteristics of the captured video!

About Edit and Digital-3R most of the people like Edit=on and D3R=off. I use this setting only on few tapes, preferring Edit=off and D3R=on.
The other 2 combinations produce inferior results.

Some of my experiments and useful comments from experienced people here:

http://www.digitalfaq.com/forum/vide...s-jvc-vcr.html

https://forum.videohelp.com/threads/...re-%28again%29

Edit: In any case, try the different settings on your videos, and judge yourself!

[uselessunderstanding]

You guys are super quick on this forum, I appreciate the response and the clarify of things. Understood, I'm no longer having time issues in Virtual Dub so I'll stay with it but I've just installed AmarecTV upon your recommendation so I can experiment with that program later on by capturing one of the same tapes to see the similarities and differences.

Ok, that makes sense on the colorspace. Sorry, I meant I was running a script for QTGMC using AVISynth not directly VD2. You can see on line three I have convert so that's the reasons I asked what I should be capturing in , Here is the script:

SetFilterMTMode ("QTGMC", 2)
FFMPEGSource2("raw footage.avi", atrack=1)
ConvertToYV12()
AssumeTFF()
QTGMC(preset="Slower" , EdiThreads=1)
Prefetch(2)

Thanks for the additional info and links on the settings. I'll let you know how things turn out. Be Safe!

[lollo2]

Edit: do not use VD2 for capturing, but VirtualDub 1.9.11, last good release for capturing

With QTGMC 3.364 no need to convert color space:

SetFilterMTMode ("QTGMC", 2)
AviSource("raw footage.avi") #FFMPEGSource not required; in addition it could skip some frame
AssumeTFF()
QTGMC(preset="slow", EdiThreads=1) #experiment if preset="fast" gives same quality
Prefetch(2)

Always check the levels with the histograms before processing

[lordsmurf]

QTGMC's "slower" blurs footage.

There's rarely a need to go slower than "faster" (which is still several away from fastest settings, not to be confused with a "fastest", and "faster" quality is still good). The speed of QTGMC doesn't determine quality. It determines the underlying filtering. That can be bad at fringe ends. I almost never use anything slower than "medium".

SR-VS30 is a good deck, if in good condition. That last caveat is the trick, as many are abused. (Ignore the DV, it's crap, JVC DV players had flawed, it will eat tapes.)

- Picture mode / B.E.S.T. = NORM/AUTO in almost all cases. EDIT disables all filters, so you get more chroma noise, and it cannot be removed with software without incurring more filter loss.
- 3R/R3 = OFF, lousy simpleton "sharpener" using old tech/methods
- Stabiliser/zer = OFF, with few exceptions.
- TBC = ON, almost always, few exceptions

In the future, attach images to the forum, don't hotlink. Google is really slow just to load images. I could have answered quicker had the images been on-forum, they would not load on my tablet.

[uselessunderstanding]

Quote:

Originally Posted by lollo2

Edit: do not use VD2 for capturing, but VirtualDub 1.9.11, last good release for capturing

With QTGMC 3.364 no need to convert color space:

SetFilterMTMode ("QTGMC", 2)
AviSource("raw footage.avi") #FFMPEGSource not required; in addition it could skip some frame
AssumeTFF()
QTGMC(preset="slow", EdiThreads=1) #experiment if preset="fast" gives same quality
Prefetch(2)

Always check the levels with the histograms before processing

Really, glad I asked you about the script, I will implement those tips and I have gone ahead an installed the recommended Virtual Dub Version. I'm reading a little about how to understand the histogram.

Quote:

Originally Posted by lordsmurf

QTGMC's "slower" blurs footage.

There's rarely a need to go slower than "faster" (which is still several away from fastest settings, not to be confused with a "fastest", and "faster" quality is still good). The speed of QTGMC doesn't determine quality. It determines the underlying filtering. That can be bad at fringe ends. I almost never use anything slower than "medium".

SR-VS30 is a good deck, if in good condition. That last caveat is the trick, as many are abused. (Ignore the DV, it's crap, JVC DV players had flawed, it will eat tapes.)

- Picture mode / B.E.S.T. = NORM/AUTO in almost all cases. EDIT disables all filters, so you get more chroma noise, and it cannot be removed with software without incurring more filter loss.
- 3R/R3 = OFF, lousy simpleton "sharpener" using old tech/methods
- Stabiliser/zer = OFF, with few exceptions.
- TBC = ON, almost always, few exceptions

In the future, attach images to the forum, don't hotlink. Google is really slow just to load images. I could have answered quicker had the images been on-forum, they would not load on my tablet.

Thank You so much for the additional breakdown on the settings lordsmurf. The deck is in relative good shape. Sorry about that I didn't realize until after my first post and it clearly says that below the reply area but going forward I will definitely attach them and not hotlink.

General question so far I'm really happy with the Diamond VC500 capture device, but is the Hauppauge Live 2 or Elgato Video Capture devices any better? Not sure if you can answer that but I thought I'd ask in case you've heard anything.

[lollo2]

If your Diamond VC500 uses Conextant CX23102 IC is very very similar to Hauppauge USB Live-2. But it had several revisions during the years, so is difficult to establish it.

Some sample of Hauppauge USB Live-2 captures here: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCMs...h1MmNAs7I8nu4g

A Elgato / Hauppauge USB Live-2 comparison here: https://forum.videohelp.com/threads/...Raw-Comparison

[uselessunderstanding]

Thank You for that information and examples. On the current tape I'm on there are 6 drop frames in the early part but none in the rest which is very very low is best to have insert frames checked from what I'm reading on the forum if the insert frames is low it should be ok?

[lollo2]

I accept 0 (zero) dropped/inserted frames in my captures, but that's because a manic approach. If I am missing or duplicating a frame I re-capture the entire video, and consider it a tape fault if the third capture shows the dropped/inserted frame at the same instant in time (it happens).

More realistically, you should not care about few dropped/inserted frames. If you wish, you can re-capture just the critical segment to check if the drops/insertions are still there, and eventually combine the 2 good segments in AviSynth.

Be also aware that has been reported that sometimes the capture softwares/cards do not tell 100% the truth about what they drops or inserts:

https://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?t=163958
https://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?p=1463163
http://www.digitalfaq.com/forum/vide...d-dropped.html

Difficult to assert for sure, but multiple captures and analyzing them frame by frame may help. Boring...

[lordsmurf]

Even "a few" drops/inserts can cause problems, loss of audio sync.
And "a few" is maybe 2-3 per hour. Anything more is generally detrimental for sure.

________

EDIT: Threadjack moved to: http://www.digitalfaq.com/forum/vide...serts-due.html

[uselessunderstanding]

Some say maniac I say meticulous! I will follow your lead and try the tape/ section a few times. I'm going to also run it thru AmaRECTV as well , for the most part I was able to set it up similar to virtual dub, was wondering if there are any settings I should be mindful of I disabled scan line doubler, turned off deinterlace, aspect ratio to not appoint, filter processing off anything else? lordsmurf thank you sir, for the information about the possible causes of drop including SSD very interesting indeed I will experiment further with those different causes.

[lollo2]

Quote:

was wondering if there are any settings I should be mindful of

In addition check "Frame rate" setting and use "999"

A guide here: https://kb.speeddemosarchive.com/Amarectv_configuration

[uselessunderstanding]

Happy Very Belated New Year Friends,
I just wanted to follow up and with two additional questions and let you know my results. I apologize that it took me a while. I felt very overwhelmed at the start but you guys really helped me to understand the settings and process. So I went back and did the all the tapes over I ended up tweaking my setup and testing things for example by ending all not essential tasks on the PC as well as closing out explorer in task manager at one point. That gave me 0 drops on the majority of good condition tapes. On one of the problems tapes I got it down to 5 drops over a longer period of time, for that tape it had been recorded over more than a few times so there were physical blackouts and noise drops during the video and at the start of recording sections, which I took your advice going back and doing sections separately and that helped. I did the same section again but this time in Amarectv with the settings suggested and got 0 drops. I hoping this means that it's actually 0 drops and the counter is accurate but I beyond happy with the results I have been doing sample of sections through QTGMC and things are looking good.

I didn't have problem with the sound but Under advanced on AmaRecTV should "Match the start timing of the audio with a video" always be checked currently I have it unchecked ?

I have three remaining VHS tapes and this project will be done but in a few weeks times I will be switch gears to 8mm/HI-8. I no longer have the camcorder that they were recorded on but I will be borrowing a similar one from an old friend. Should I connect the camcorder to the JVC VHS deck I've been using?

[lollo2]

Quote:

I didn't have problem with the sound but Under advanced on AmaRecTV should "Match the start timing of the audio with a video" always be checked currently I have it unchecked ?

It avoid the "scattering" of audio and video packets in the avi file, but should have no impact on synch (the blocks indexing ensures the relative timing relation).

Quote:

Should I connect the camcorder to the JVC VHS deck I've been using?

The VCR has no passthrough features, so I guess not.

[uselessunderstanding]

Thanks, for that I was able to borrow a Sony CCD-TRV85 and it has a TBC option which I turned on and a DNR which I turned off it's connected directly to the capture card and the tapes that I've reviewed so far play back just right so I'm ready to capture those soon.

A few final follow up questions on the VHS topic. In Amarec on the final problem tape I didn't get any drops but I noticed there was high number on the + counter I think that might be inserted/ Null frames. Should I leave the option checked for Use Null Frames? I haven't tried to use QTGMC on that particular file yet but wanted to ask before I went further in case I needed to recapture.

Final question is more of knowledge thing I came across a wedding tape I forgot about from overseas pre 2000 that I believe to be SECAM-B, It's black and white with the lines until I pause then I can see a frame of it more clearly but without color of course. So would both the VHS deck and capture card need to be in able to handle that format in order to view it correctly? Just a reminder I'm using SR-VS30 with a Diamond device. This tape is not important but I figured I'd ask incase I ever come across something like it again.

[lollo2]

Quote:

but I noticed there was high number on the + counter

Bad sign. These are inserted frames, i.e a duplicate of the previous frame to keep audio and video in synch. The "expected" video frame did not arrive in time, and then the program inserted a duplicate of the previous frame to ensure synchronism.

About the "null frame" option, you have to experiment with that problem tape.

In post processing there are several options to deal with duplicated frames, but it is much better to avoid them when capturing.

Quote:

I came across a wedding tape I forgot about from overseas pre 2000 that I believe to be SECAM-B

With my Hauppauge USB-Live 2 (very very similar to VC500) I am able to acquire from SECAM directly changing its input setting or using an (european) ES-15 transcoding from SECAM to PAL (in this case the card is configured for PAL). Hope it helps

[uselessunderstanding]

As always your help is always appreciated and gets me in a better direction. I'm definitely going to become a premium member in the very near future to support the site as the interactions have been nice.

So I played a little bit with that tape turning off the Null option as we discussed the counter was still the same within the first minute there are +51 this increase during blank sections as well as normally video sections. I also increased the Buff Size got the same result. Out of curiosity I turned off USE CLOCK next to Video Capture Device. The guide you gave me says "The "Use Clock" option is not fully understood at the moment, so it is recommended to leave it checked." but when I did that the + counter was 0 through that section of tape. Do you happen to know if this just turns of the counter or is actually zero?

For the the other tape, very interesting... I can actually borrow a Hauppauge USB-Live 2 and experiment with a similar setup at some point.

[lollo2]

Quote:

I'm definitely going to become a premium member in the very near future to support the site

I am not a premium member either, will probably be in the future to support lordsmurf and the staff...

Quote:

the counter was still the same

If "Null frame" option do nothing, then is probably better to leave it checked. You should not worry about "inserted frames" when there is no video on the tape; it is absolutely normal. You should try to reduce at minimum the inserted frames when real video is captured, eventually capturing twice that segment and hoping that the inserted frames are not at the same place in the 2 captures (sometimes it happens, unfortunately).

Quote:

Do you happen to know if this just turns of the counter or is actually zero?

I suspect that it just disables the counter, rather than avoid inserted frame (like changing the correct setting in VirtualDub). Not recommended.

In post processing you can replace a single inserted frame with a basic interpolation of previous and next frame using the motion vectors from MVtools (http://avisynth.org.ru/mvtools/mvtools2.html):

function interpolate_frame(clip c, int "frame_number")
{
	# interpolate bad frame
sup = c.MSuper()\
bv = MAnalyse(sup, isb=true, delta=2)
fv = MAnalyse(sup, isb=false, delta=2)
interpolated = MFlowInter(c, sup, bv, fv)

	# replace bad frame with interpolated frame
video_repaired = \
	c.trim(0,frame_number-1)++\
	interpolated.trim(frame_number-1,-1)++\
	c.trim(frame_number+1,0)

	# video repaired
return(video_repaired)
}

If you have consecutive inserted frames search for ReplaceFramesMC or ReplaceFramesMC2 functions