First VHS capture done, now what?
 

I'm sure this has been beat to death and I've read a lot on it also, but I'm still a bit lost.

I've got a 720x480 huffYUV avi capture file. Now I need to trim the length, mask out the noisy areas, and encode for delivery. Final destination is going to be an mp4 or mkv on an USB drive on the media server computer for streaming to a DLNA BluRay player.

I think I know what to do for trimming and masking if I can find the guides for it again, but does it need to be in separate steps from vdub? I.E. trim and save to a new avi then crop/resize and mask/pad and save as a new avi?

I think I understand to leave it at 720x480 and interlaced and set an aspect ratio flag when encoding to mp4 or mkv. I'll need to verify the BluRay's media player handles either or both of those though. Otherwise I guess I would need to de-interlace and resize, or add pillar boxes, to net out to something it can play. Which would mean using something like Hybrid, I think? if not that, then what encoder/s is/are preferred for newbies? I've used handbrake before to rip dvds, but I've seen some criticism of it.

Thanks

I do them all in one step using AVSPmod and vdub2 as an output engine, With the exception that I don't mask, I crop and resize to 4K for YT:

If you are encoding for offline viewing you may need an additional step using AVIsynth or Hybrid.

Right, so this is where I get confused. Some recommend not cropping and masking instead and leaving the resolution at 720x480. I understand the 4k upscaling for YT bitrate, correct?

I see there's a guide for AVSPmod and AviSynth. I'll have to pick my way through that.

I'm starting doubt my statement about leaving interlaced for mkv/mp4 file. Seems like it's common to de-interlace to 59.94 fps for the final files. The interlacing borks the compression maybe? idk, that's why I'm asking.

Since I resize anyway I personally prefer cropping than masking because I don't like to see black borders around the frame, It's a personal preference. Yes 4K is for youtube, For offline delivery I de-interlace, crop and resize to HD 1440x1080 since it's the base resolution for any modern display, That way the pixels are assigned and I don't have to worry about viewing a SD file in a HD or 4K TV and seeing it butchered by the display processing chip, artifacts such as line flicker or jitter, frame flicker due to bad upscaling and de-interlacing on the fly.

On the de-interlacing topic, If you do a good interlacing once and for all using tools like QTGMC then you don't have to worry about it later, Somehwere along the lines interlaced files are going to be de-interlaced anyway whether at the file playback level or at the monitor screen level, unless you are specifically viewing the files on a CRT monitor using a 480i/576i capabale player.

Haven't gotten into AVSPmod and AviSynth yet. (Bravely?) dove into AviDemux. I am totally lost on the x264 settings, but I did come across a reddit post asking very similar questions to what I'm having. I snipped a screenshot of the suggested settings.

Attachment 19170

I bumped the rate control up to 20 and saved a few .mkvs. The dgbob and yadif are deinterlaced. I guess to use QTGMC I'll have to install hybrid or figure out AviSynth.

I have a few more questions too.

Do the files sizes seem reasonable? It seems like with these settings it's going to be around 1.5GB for one hour.

This is probably apples to oranges, but I have old Naruto Shippuden episodes that are 720p and are 75MB for 20-25 minutes. Is that due to it being animated vs camcorder vs experience at encoding?

For those who have been doing this awhile, what size should I be targeting/expecting?

As always, thank you for the help.