How to improve VHS video?

[araset]

Hi I am total newbie in VHS restoration. I have number of tennis matches recordered in LP mode. I have tried Neat video demo but I have heard that it’s not so good. Should I post a sample video of AVI file here ?

[aramkolt]

What was your full capture chain such as the VCR, cable type used, and capture card, and were there any passthrough devices like a TBC or proc amp?

A very short capture might also give some ideas about whether certain things you are seeing is due to lack of a line TBC or if your levels are clipping (meaning details lost in bright or dark areas).

Do you know if these tennis matches were live recordings off of TV or a camera directly, or were they copies of another tape? Copies made from other tapes can have compounded issues that may not be reversible.

[araset]

Hi my VCR is JVC HR-S7722, capture card is Pinnacle PCTV Hybrid Pro Stick 330E and no external TBC. Cable is svideo. Tennis matches was recordered directly from TV on misaligned Panasonic nv-sd20.

[Gary34]

Your luma is clipping. You can see that the shadows over his eyes are overly dark, his collar, and the guys hair lack detail.

[araset]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Gary34

Your luma is clipping. You can see that the shadows over his eyes are overly dark, his collar, and the guys hair lack detail.

What can I do about this? Thanks.

[Gary34]

I use the histogram in virtualdub to make sure I’m not clipping then check for clipping in AVSPmod after capture. You have to capture that again and change the settings on your card so that it doesn’t clip.

[timtape]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Gary34

Your luma is clipping. You can see that the shadows over his eyes are overly dark, his collar, and the guys hair lack detail.

Clipping is not about shadows but highlights.

In any case do we know that these dark areas were even captured on the tape?

[Gary34]

That is clipping in both shadows and highlights.

On the tape in analog i would expect it to be a more gradual change instead of no low light detail like that for shadows. It’s climbing the histogram on the left.

[araset]

Like I said I am total newbie. Are there any tutorials? What should I do? Capture once more? If yes what to change?

[Gary34]

Capturing again would be a good idea. This will help. https://www.digitalfaq.com/forum/vid...-settings.html. With the capture card that Sanlyn uses, some of his model of card could capture illegal values. That’s why his has red on the sides of his histogram. Your card will clip and won’t go into the red.

Next time crop then look at the histogram and after you adjust your card stop and rewind the tape then remember to set your cropping to zero before you start your capture. Set your histogram a little bit away from the sides so that it hopefully won’t clip once a scene changes. You don’t want it set too far from the sides because then your video will lack dynamic range.

-- merged --

That guide uses the CCESP patch version of Huffy when really the original Huffy is a better choice. In the guide they sync the audio to the video by resampling. When he resamples his timing isn’t off that much anyways so it isn’t as big of a deal but if you resample with nothing in your workflow to stabilize the signal than you can get distorted audio along with your dropped frames. You’ll see dropped frames on your counter if you get them.

-- merged --

Besides the clipped luma I think your sample looks good. Lack of a frame TBC is the weak point so keep an eye on dropped frames or up and down jitter. I don’t see any in your clip but it’s just a small clip.

After you capture you can make cuts and save the WAV audio in Virtualdub. Open that WAV audio in an audio editor. I use Audacity and it’s good for free but TimTape edited some bad audio I had on a video and he made it better than anything I tried in Audacity. He worked in audio though.

After your audio editor open your video file in Hybrid where you filter and encode.

If you load some audio into audacity or load a video into Hybrid and start playing with filters and effects you will learn quite a bit about what they do.

[araset]

I have tried cropping and captured once more another sample. Could someone check it's correct? Thanks.

[Gary34]

Quote:

I have tried cropping and captured once more another sample. Could someone check it's correct? Thanks.

You used a different capture card with this sample than you did with the first sample and this one looks more noisy but you are clipping in both samples. What is your workflow with both samples?

[araset]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Gary34

You used a different capture card with this sample than you did with the first sample and this one looks more noisy but you are clipping in both samples. What is your workflow with both samples?

I have used the same capture card in both samples. How to prevent clipping? I have tried to avoid red markings in histogram. Workflow is the same like in the first sample jvc he s7722 and pinnacle 330 e.

[Gary34]

Quote:

I have used the same capture card in both samples. How to prevent clipping? I have tried to avoid red markings in histogram. Workflow is the same like in the first sample jvc he s7722 and pinnacle 330 e.

My mistake. I made the assumption that since some cards clip at 16 to 235 and some at 16 to 255 that it was a different card. What changes are you making to your capture card proc amp from the first clip to the second? Did you increase saturation with your card or anything?

-- merged --

The only way I get a checkerboard pattern like that on a color 2 histogram is if I increase my saturation in YUV in post. I always make my changes with my TBCs proc amp though but really under saturation usually isn’t the issue. It’s usually over satiation which I address in post unless there is clipping and there the chroma usually doesn’t clip once my Luna is adjusted.

[timtape]

A word on clipping highlights: In an ideal world there would be no clipping but often there is clipping. But also, often we must clip. Here's an example of this, from a still frame of a video I shot about 15 years ago.

The bright white rectangle above the door is the venue's illuminated EXIT sign. It normally has bright white lettering against a darker green background. While I was shooting this, the exposure meter in my camera was correctly telling me I was clipping this part of the picture. The green part of the sign was overexposed and showing as bright white. The EXIT letters were unreadable as in this frame.

But I didnt care. I knew the eventual viewing audience would not be interested in the exit sign but in the musician who was about to make her entrance through the door below the sign. I wanted her entrance to be correctly exposed. So I exposed for her and not for the sign. I deliberately overexposed (clipped) the sign.

The same can apply with backlit faces, or at a sporting event where one small, advertising sign will require a different exposure to the majority of the scene. This happens even for professionals with professional cameras. A good cameraman or vision mixer will choose to expose for what's important in the shot, which here is the tennis game and the players, not some inconsequential little sign in the background.

When digitising existing recordings a lot of these decisions have already been made for us, for good or bad. But we still have to use our common sense and while using meters we must use them with intelligence and commonsense, not totally enslaved to them. Forget the minor details. Expose for the most important details in the scene.

[araset]

Do according to the upper post my capture is ok? I have tried to be in the middle of histogram.

-- merged --

I am uploading corrected AVI file.

[Gary34]

Quote:

I am uploading corrected AVI file.

That’s better according to graphs as far as clipping. You could still brighten it a bit but maybe that is knit picky. I would open up Selur’s Hybrid and just look around and play with filters when you get a chance.

[araset]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Gary34

That’s better according to graphs as far as clipping. You could still brighten it a bit but maybe that is knit picky. I would open up Selur’s Hybrid and just look around and play with filters when you get a chance.

Is the filter Mcdegrainsharp good option? I have tried and this is improving the image. One filter is enough?

[Gary34]

I prefer Pmod for histograms but there are histograms in Hybrid too that would tell you what I told you with the levels. They are in the Misc part of filtering. The filters that are in Hybrid are a lot of the popular ones that a lot of people like. They are good filters they are for different kinds of noise or different video problems. Mess with the filters a bit and try to see what works for you for your video.

[araset]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Gary34

I prefer Pmod for histograms but there are histograms in Hybrid too that would tell you what I told you with the levels. They are in the Misc part of filtering. The filters that are in Hybrid are a lot of the popular ones that a lot of people like. They are good filters they are for different kinds of noise or different video problems. Mess with the filters a bit and try to see what works for you for your video.

When I am trying to use QTGMC and TemporalDegrain2 filters and interlaced encoding in x264 I got: Crashed with exit status 0. I have tried unistalling hybrid and restoring to defaults. Nothing helped.