JVC DVD recorders make the picture dull
 

Have followed your advise to a tee...Finally did a duel layer disk with no macroblocks, about 2 hours and 50 minute video. Using the bit rates you said in the other post. Bit rate was set for 132 min on a normal DVD about 3 hours Duel layer. The DVD only works on 2 of my 4 DVD players. Not sure the reason for this either....Single layer never have a problem...

Just wondering why this happens with Duel Layer Disks....

Current Set Up

JVC SVHS PLAYER HR-S7900U
JVC MV5

The tape that was copied to DVD was an old recording that was a bit dull. However with the filters in the JVC machine after the final copy was issued, the picture is too dull.

The VHS playback is currently better than the DVD.

The overall video, is pretty clean, the quality of the picture is good, a lot of the noise from the source is gone. The problem is it has blurred the over all video.

(if the video has a sharp picture the JVC recorder is awesome, however on old dull videos, it is makes them worse than the VHS tape) (-----------Only in the blur factor

It is like the people in faces at a distance look like they have been eroded.

My mother was the final test on this. I brought here the DVD and played it on her standard TV, I asked her what she thought of the picture she said it was blurry. On a close up, she said it looked good.

(One thing to note, it is amazing how much the old TV's crop the picture)

Also did tests with these Virtual Dub Filters

Temporal Cleaner - To your settings
VHS ---- The worst of the bunch.....
2D Cleaner & DNR
Also Tried to sharper the video with no filters and this turned out horrible

Because these tapes show patches of grass in a lot of the video, when these filters are applied to the video, you see unatural movement in the color patches in the grass. The 2D cleaner & DNR on this test seemed to do the least damage.

Basically trying to not use these filters cause of the results they cause to the video. Yes they may help specific areas however they mess up other parts.

Viewing on the computer is one thing, but getting a final copy on DVD is another problem...

Also tested out the PANASONIC recorder on XP mode. It still had Marcoblock but they were a lot better than the 2 hour mode.

In closing it seems that 2 hour mode is the worst of all modes, it creates Blocks on all the videos, the mode should have never been created cause of the problems it causes in the picture. Yes Marcoblocks are a major issue....

Here are some screen shots

Top = JVC recorder
Bottom = Panasonic recorder

What it looks like on VHS? Can't Screen Copy that one....

Attachment 711

Attachment 712

Attachment 713

MPEG encoding natively softens video, because of how the encoding matrix operates. Regardless of chipset, encoder hardware/software, etc -- there is always a degree of softening with MPEG.

Looking at the latest post you made, what I see is the JVC black level being a little light, but the Panasonic is also crushing some blacks (coring) the video. Every encoder acts a little different, and this is why many/most TV sets and DVD players come with user-alterable "picture modes" (movie, cinema, games, etc). In some cases, you can actually tweak the gamma and black level without the cutesy "mode" names (as I can do on my Sony HDTV). I'm forever tweaking these settings, depending on the TV channel, camera or DVD (retail or homemade).

On a calibrated monitor, there's little difference in the first and last image. Only the middle image has a definite contrast difference, and for the reasons mentioned above.

This can always be counteracted by over-sharpening the input a little bit, and adjusting the contrast/colors in a proc amp.

Your DVD+R DL issue is -- as long as you're using Verbatim DVD+R DL -- an issue of the layer break. How did you burn the DVD? What programs, what options in the programs? For setting the layer break, my own guide is currently not published. However, this one is similar -- http://www.digital-digest.com/~bluta...pgcedit_v2.htm -- and it might help you.

As you're finding out, video restoration is a game of trade-offs. Some errors can be fixed, but will create new errors. Either find more filters to counter the new error, or look at finding a "good enough" stopping point.