Degraded broadcast tapes restoration possible?
 

I apologize in advance if this is the wrong part of the forum for my questions. Nevertheless, here goes...

My father was an ENG videographer/camera man in the 90s and early 00s. When he died, he left behind a huge catalogue of raw footage/b-roll SVHS and Betamax tapes (he used these somewhat interchangeably, depending on what the station he was working for required). I have taken on the project of digitizing these tapes--it's something I've wanted to do for years, but only now have the time. For simplicity, I'm starting with the VHS tapes. At the same time, I've started work digitizing our home movies from that era. I've had good luck with the home movies. The quality is well within my expectations, none of it looks amazing, but we're talking about 30 year old tapes after all. The color is there, the audio is there--I can deal with the "VHS aesthetic". Likewise, there are many tapes of his segments, recorded on a standard VCR from the actual TV broadcast. These all look fine.

But when it comes to my father's pro tapes (nearly all of which are Maxell ST-126 Broadcast Quality SVHS, if that matters), there is a huge amount of apparent degradation. Now, I have tested these on 3 VCR units, none of which are great (no TBC, only one even has adjustable tracking). As a benchmark, the family videos look good enough while playing through a Toshiba VCR/DVD combo unit, but look awful playing through the consumer level Panasonic and Philips that I've borrowed from various family members. Where it gets challenging is, the reverse is true for the pro tapes--they look awful in the combo unit, and look marginally better in the other units (though not nearly good enough to be worth capturing). The fact that the tapes show differently in each VCR leaves me some hope that the issues aren't inherent to the tapes themselves, but have more to do with the equipment.

For all tapes, my workflow is very simplistic. I've got the VHS connected to my old iMac via a USB to RCA capture dongle, and capturing directly into Quicktime. Before I invest in some expensive setup (which I'm willing to do if it's worthwhile) I was hoping to get the feedback of some experienced professionals. Hopefully I've provided sufficient information as a starting point. Thanks kindly.

Unless badly stored the SVHS recordings are unlikely to have degraded significantly.

SVHS recorded tapes must be played on an SVHS player. Some later VHS decks with SQPB would also play them back but at only VHS picture quality.

(ref: Wiki SVHS entry) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/S-VHS

There is nothing inheritly pro about S-VHS except that it was probably recorded on a studio S-VHS machine, It's a consumer format after all, But as mentioned above you do need a S-VHS deck with S-Video out and preferably built in line TBC to really take advantage of the format improvements over regular VHS. Beta tapes are also better captured using a beta machine with S-Video out like some Super Beta and ED Beta machines, however such machines are rare in good working condition and very expensive.

Nope, right place, planning. Welcome. :)

Your father had an interesting job. The 90s/00s are when I started in video (with some broadcaster, cableco, and news overlap), and things were vastly different back then. What specific sort of job did he have, and what state/region(s) of the country?

Kudos to you for wanting to archive this chapter of not just family history, but potentially other histories. Depending on where he worked (broadcast TV news?), and what even he covered, you never know when others may seek A/B roll of historical events (ie, for documentaries).

Don't do this yet. :warning:

You need to get the right gear in place first, not random gear. Cheap consumer VCRs are in a bad state these days, even when claimed/believed otherwise (by amateurs who pulled from a closets, bought at Goodwill, etc). You don't want a POS to eat your dad's tapes! I'm trying to save you from this awful potential outcome. Even a "good" low-end unit will be crummy quality at best.

To some degree, I think you want these tapes to show what your father saw. Not fuzzy, not a lossy version full of VHS flaws (due solely to the cheap VHS player). Certainly not a version with added digital errors, from bad conversion work, using the garbage converters (from China, from 2010s-2020s). With all those added flaws, you're no longer seeing the world through his eyes.

A 30-year-old tape can look far better than most folks realize. The "muck layer" (or "VHS aesthetic") is completely created by the cheap VCR, lack of TBCs, and low-end capture device. The actual data on the tape is better quality. You simply have to extract it, with the proper tools. Most of the flaws on bad VHS conversions can vastly be improved. No more wiggle, flickering, jumping or random movements, even tracking errors, etc. It's all about the gear. The tape is not the culprit for the low quality.

I would not want to assume any degradation has occurred, until put through proper S-VHS gear with line TBCs. While certain Maxell S-VHS tapes were crap back in the 90s-00s, it was mostly the lower-end S-VHS Maxells.

Most likely. You're currently using random VCRs, and seeing random quality output.

It's all about the equipment. Your dad used it, and now you can too.

I do want to make a note here. You keep referring to the VHS and S-VHS tapes as "professional". That word is often misunderstood by others. Professional is what you do, not necessarily what you uses. You can be a professional carpenter, but you use the same basic claw hammer that everybody else does. Only amateurs/newbies fall for marketing that sells "professional hammers".

In the world of VHS and S-VHS, in the content of 80s into 00s shooters, the higher-end "professional" camera is what often determined the quality recorded to the tape. Those wasn't grandma's camcorder, but a quality video cameras with quality mics and lenses.

TBCs are not "professional" tools, but simply the tools required to properly and fully extract the unmolested signal. Hobbyists and non-pros have actually been the main force behind the TBCs that exist for consumer analog formats (VHS, even S-VHS), not some sort of mythical "pro". Most professionals used different higher-end formats, such as BetacamSP, which had different needs (thus different TBCs, the rack-mount/"pizza box" units).

So don't get too lost in "pro" this and "non-pro" that. The pro part was your dad. And as a pro, he knew to use the tools required for his job. That job didn't really differ from hobbyists, as we all had the same "prosumer" gear for VHS and S-VHS.

SQPB almost never works well. To even call the output "VHS quality" is a stretch. Most SQPB playback is more molested than normal VHS tapes.

The problem with this statement, as is always the case, is that I never met at Joe Sixpack consumer that adopted it. It was always the territory of dedicated video hobbyists (which were really not "consumers" from a typical definition), who owned a blend of professional gear, and higher-end consumer gear. (If you ever want to compare VHS-era video hobbyists consumers to something more accurate, look at current LVMH customers. Rarely are they lumped into a general "consumer" category.)

It gets even more confusing when (as we've discussed before on Youtube) the conversation turns to items like the DataVideo TBCs, which is prosumer gear made for both professional use, and hobbyist "consumer" use, to handle consumer formats like VHS and S-VHS. Pros used them, to handle consumer formats, but it wasn't a pro device. Equally, hobbyists used them, for consumer formats, but it also wasn't a consumer device. This is why it's best to merely think of it as a tool for the video conversion task at hand. A dishwasher, refrigerator, lawnmower -- all boring devices that cost a few bucks -- but for videotape conversion. And labels like "pro" are best ignored as marketing and consumer psyche.

Buy it, use it, resell it. It holds value, unlike cars or a fridge.

I consider pro formats bread and butter machines like a D1-D5, DVC-Pro, Betacam, HDcam and the likes that used in studio environement during broadcasting and making the masters. This is my strict definition of pro. Between this and a consumer machine there is a whole lot of levels based on the use, Free lancing, schools, corporations, agencies, medical, law, hobyists, media companies ... you name it. formats used, VHS, S-VHS, Hi8, DV, HDV. My distiction line is the type and quality of the format not the label put on the machine. I hope my position is clear.

Do you have an example of the degradation on the SVHS tapes? Degradation typically results in more dropouts and more noise ( later vcr with auto picture adjustment functionality will often try to compensate by softening the image and possibly increasing noise reduction strength). People unfortunately often attribute other visual issues to degradation that are instead issues with e.g the original recording, whatever is used to digitize the video being not great or other things.

If it's SVHS recordings they will look very bad on a VCR that doesn't support that and as others have noted SQPB/S-vhs playback is very hit and miss so that won't tell you whether it's the tape that's degraded either. Most PAL VCRs I've tested tend to give some degree of black streaking, one exception being the Panasonic NV-F77 I have though that one has very low hours and features amorphous heads like PAnasonic SVHS decks from the time used. (Still way way better than SVHS playback in a vcr that doesn't support it at all of course.)


If it's a combo that could record to dvd rather than just playback those sometimes route the output via the internal digitizing chip used for recording to dvd so if the toshiba is one of those it might be due to that rather than the vcr side of it being better/worse.

" S-VHS-ET and SQPB: Although some VHS units allow SQPB (S-VHS quasi-playback), it is still a VHS-quality signal being broadcast from a VHS player."

Source: https://www.digitalfaq.com/guides/vi...nd-sources.htm

Yep. But SQPB still works very erratic at times, unreliable.

S-VHS-ET, on the other hand, is an excellent feature, when using quality tapes. I recorded hundreds of JVC and TDK tapes in ET mode back in the 90s. It was slightly degraded S-VHS quality on VHS tapes.

Your dad must have worked in small market TV what with shooting on S-VHS. It was pretty common (Hi8 too) then edit to BetaSP or later DVCPRO. BetaSP gear was so fantastically expensive that a lot of small stations couldn't afford both cameras and edit decks.

Large market B-roll was also S-VHS, Hi8, and DV.
Even CNN in the 90s, and 9/11.

He worked largely in the Toronto market. Primarily at first for CFTO, which was (and is) the flagship station for CTV (Canada's largest network). Later he did work for most, if not all the other major Canadian broadcasters (Global, CBC, City) and some US ones (CNN, NBC, he even did work for Nat Geo and the History Network, to name a few). Most often he was dispatched to cover local news--anything from traffic accidents and crime to entertainment, politics, events, scheduled interviews and press conferences, basically any kind of current event. Sometimes with a reporter, or just as often he held the mic himself. The tapes in my possession cover an enormous range of subjects.

I hear what you're saying. I'm definitely willing to obtain the right gear for the job, and hopefully re-sell it when I'm done. If you have the time to offer a basic recommendation to this end, I'd appreciate it. A few questions though: 1. As I mentioned, I'm using my older imac for the job. Is capturing through Quicktime a bad idea? If not, is there good software out there for MacOS, or will I have to install Windows? (I'll do it if I have to!) 2. Will the USB->RCA dongle significantly limit quality in your opinon? I've plugged the VCR into an old flat screen TV, and the image looks basically the same as when it's capturing in Quicktime through the dongle.

Understood. My use of the word comes from the tapes themselves. Maxell, Sony, JVC and others all seemed to have a penchant for embossing the word "PROFESSIONAL" in gold letters on these SVHS tapes specifically. I'm sure they cost a lot more for that reason alone.

He worked mostly for the largest market in Canada (CFTO-TORONTO). Market size is population based, right? In the early 90s the Toronto market reached the entire GTA, which was over 4 million. I think that makes it comparable to Boston of the same era.

To be precise, all the ENG equipment was his, and he shot on SVHS and Beta. His back end was swappable. But I'm not sure how the decision was made to use one or the other. The station had a number of editing suites, presumably equipped for either medium. I visited many times as a kid.

You have such a treasure there. My respect leaves some speechless, and I drool in envy at your project. I urge you, from the very the core of my being, to please do the best job possible. It will matter someday, even if you don't see it right now. If you cheap out on these conversions, you will regret it, and others that need/want it will weep.

That's exactly it. Buy it, use it, resell it. Check your PMs. ;)

Mac was very anti-video in the 2000s, and only had DV workflows for filmmakers (most of whom quickly abandoned DV due low quality). Quality capture methods were limited to specific hardware with somewhat fiddly software. It's going to be a headache, and less quality (vastly lesser) is likely.

I'm platform agnostic. Computers are just tools, and the OS powers it. Some hardware, OS, and software is just not the right tool for a task. In this case, Mac for capture. Mac for editing is brilliant, I've used FCP since version 1. For capture, no.

Do this. Your sanity will thank you, and outcome quality will be better.

Vastly inferior. Most of those USB>RCA dongles are literally the worst crap made for video. It's an insult to videotapes.

Imagine eating. You've never had a steak, only cat food. You think cat food is the best thing ever. It's insane, of course, but you just don't know any better yet. You don't know what you don't know.

Quality gear will open your eyes. It really is something that has to be experienced. Simply explanation alone is just not enough. I could show sample clips of concepts (especially TBCs), but to truly understand, you'll need to see your own tapes improve, the muck veil listed, the true quality that exists on those tapes to be unleashed. Proper gear, proper settings.

They also like terms like "broadcast" and "premium" to describe lousy tapes. You had to look beyond the marketing.

Correct, based on population of the designated area. And that's pretty common for ENG camera gear to be swappable, or at least it used to be. The VTR portion was actually "dockable" with a big battery and lens.

The only reason I could think of using one format vs. another is recording time. The Beta tapes that went in cameras lasted only 20-30 minutes I think vs. full-size S-VHS tapes that came in ST-60, ST-120 and longer lengths (but longer length tapes probably weren't used much for ENG, if ever).

Further comment from me matches the enthusiasm of Lordsmurf's. Too often networks and local stations don't realize the vessels of history they actually are.

Costs.

Remember, that was a non-HD CRT era. Not much further back, 70s, the broadcast quality was often overall worse than a VHS tape. The use of VHS and S-VHS went back to the 80s, back when I was learning about video from the local cable company.