I'm getting acquainted with my newly acquired PAL VCR/duplicator and my S&W Kudos Standards Converter. First order of business was to make a test tape; source was an el cheapo EP VHS of the original
Airport. Workflow for the test tape transfer was Mitsu HS-HD2000U >S-Video> S&W Converter NTSC to PAL >CVBS> Sony SVO-965P. I also had an input connected to my AIW X1800 as I made the transfer; the
AirportNTSCclip is a short clip of the original video as captured Mitsu >S-Video> TBC-4000 >S-Video> AIW X1800 (
HuffyUV 720x480).
After making a short initial test I played back the
Airport opening credits through the S&W. I had not yet booted up the AIW; I was using my composite preview monitor off the TBC-4000 Preview output. It looked pretty good and I transferred the full movie to PAL. During the last few minutes of the transfer I started up the AIW system and captured the video referenced above.
After the transfer was complete I changed the
VirtualDub capture settings to 720x576 and attempted making a test capture (
AirportNPALclip). The bottom fifth of the PAL capture had a green pattern I'm unfamiliar with; however, the composite monitor continued to show a very good picture (including the areas covered by the green pattern on the capture). Workflow was SVO-965P >CVBS> S&W Converter PAL to PAL >S-Video> TBC-4000 >S-Video> AIW X1800 (
HuffyUV 720X576). I was using the S&W as an adapter of sorts because I didn't have any other way to connect the BNC video output of the Sony to S-Video or straight composite connections. I'm fairly sure that it wasn't the issue because the composite preview monitor continued to show a good full-frame picture. I tried taking the TBC-4000 out of the loop, running the S&W output directly to the AIW, but that made things a whole lot worse.
Finally, I tried a PAL to NTSC transfer/capture from my test tape (
AirportNPNclip). Workflow here was SVO-965P >CVBS> S&W Converter PAL to NTSC >S-Video> TBC-4000 >S-Video> AIW X1800 (HuffyUV, 720x480). For having been run through a standards converter twice and on and off of a standard VHS PAL Sony, I think it doesn't look too bad.
So it seems that my fall down is in the AIW card when capturing a PAL signal. Does anyone have recommended settings which I can try to correct this issue?
Edit To Add: Just tried the same capture from PAL on my other AIW (8500DV) system and had the same results while capturing. However, the Preview window (when set to overlay, using the Microsoft WDM Image Capture device...this system doesn't have enough horsepower to display a true Preview window) was perfect. Which leads me to think that my issue may be within
VirtualDub as I don't see how I could get a good Overlay picture if the AIW card was messing up.
