How convert old things to digital?

[George]

Another question... Am using WinXP-pro PC that came with MS Movie Maker 2,
and using a Sony digital camcorder, would greatly appreciate insights from
pro's on...

-I'd like to "convert" my old VHS tapes to digital. Would the
simple/practical way to do this be to plug up the RCA plugs into the Sony
Camcorder, and record a digital tape? Is there any more sophisticated way
to do this that would keep the RESOLUTION as high as possible, like using
the Pinnacle hardware unit that has all the plugs and jacks on it, and
Pinnacle software?

-Is it true that once the old VHS goes to digital... whatever resolution I
get will be preserved from then-on-out since I can copy and so forth
forever, with no loss?

-The digital 8mm Sony also "plays" old analog 8mm tapes... is it right that
can I play them on my Sony and IEEE1394 them over to the PC, and that in
itself "converts" them to digital files. Is there any more sophisticated
way to do this that would keep the RESOLUTION as high as possible, like
using the Pinnacle hardware unit that has all the plugs and jacks on it, and
Pinnacle software?

Thanks,
George

 

[Al Stu]

There are generally two methods of converting old VHS (analog) to digital
using a digital cramcoder.

1) If the cramcoder has digital to analog pass through feature, Connect the
out puts of VCR to analog inputs of cramcoder, and connect digital out put
of cramcoder to PC. Enable the digital pass-through mode (obviously) and
play the VHS tape will capturing on the PC with Movie Maker or other such
software/hardware.

2) As you mentioned just connect the analog out puts of VCR to analog inputs
of digital cramcoder, and record with the digital cramcoder. This is the
method I currently use since PC and VCR are not in close enough proximity
with each other for connecting both to cramcoder at the same time for using
pass-through mode.

As for other methods using dedicated hardware/software I can't speak to
those but suspect it wouldn't produce any better video.

Once in digital form you can copy it as much as you like without loss of
quality, so long as you are not using one of the lossy formats as source or
destination. In Movie Maker the non-lossy format is "DV-AVI (NTSC)".

 

[George]

Thanks Al,

When you say...

Once in digital form you can copy it as much as you like without loss of
quality, so long as you are not using one of the lossy formats as source or
destination. In Movie Maker the non-lossy format is "DV-AVI (NTSC)".

does that mean the Movie Maker software automatically uses this format, or
it's something I need to "set" as an option, or something I need to specify
in "save as"

Thanks,
George

 

[Al Stu]

The 'File' -> 'Save Project...' only saves project information, ie: what
footage is being used, transitions, effects, etc. It does not actually save
the video.

When capturing from cramcoder or "Saving to my computer" (step 3, "Finish
Movie", of the "Movie Tasks") one of the dialog windows should have "Movie
Settings" options where you would select the "Other settings" option and
then select "DV-AVI (NTSC") from the drop-down list.

Generally it has been my experience that this setting defaults to the last
used.

 

[Rehan]

In Movie Maker the non-lossy format is "DV-AVI (NTSC)".

This is not strictly true. DV AVI is a lossy format.

However yes in Movie Maker thats the best option for video and closest you
can get to a lossless format out of the box. To save in real lossless
format, one has to make a custom WMV profile which saves in Full frames
(umcopressed) + PCM audio.

If you are interested I have made a set of Uncompressed profiles that work
with WMM. Download from here:
http://homepage.ntlworld.com/rehanahmad/uncompressed.zip


Also note that the loss involved when saving to DV AVI is mainly academic.
It is not noticeable to human eye and the codec is smart in the sense that
it wont accumulate the loss if saved again and again without any change. But
if you edit the footage in each generation (effects+transitions) then I
would guess the loss would start stacking up in places where stream has
changed due to editing and needs re-encoding.

Another point to note is the annoying bug in windows movie maker which drops
every 27th frame in each clip when saving to DV-AVI. This can be very
noticeable if you have a lot of short clips.

--
Rehan
www.rehanfx.org - get more effects and transitions for movie maker

 

[Al Stu]

"This is not strictly true. DV AVI is a lossy format."

Please provide your source of information.

Thanks,

P.S. Remember compression is not same thing as lossy. And I consider the
27th frame bug to be just that, a bug.

 

[Rehan]

Please provide your source of information.
[...]

P.S. Remember compression is not same thing as lossy.

This is a technical fact since DV encoding uses Discrete Cosine Transform
algorithm (similar to JPEG) to compress data which is lossy in nature: you
cannot get back exactly what you encoded. However DV format uses modest
compression rates in order to preserve quality.

http://www.emedialive.com/Articles/PrintArticle.aspx?ArticleID=8687
http://www.animemusicvideos.org/guides/avtech/video4.htm
http://www.videouniversity.com/dvformat.htm
....


However as I said before this is a rather academic discussion... Practically
DV AVi format is the best choice for capturing video from a camcorder in
Movie maker environment and making any intermediate files. I wouldnt be too
concerned about any non-perceptible loss of quality associated with dv
format. Because if I had I wouldnt be using a home camcorder to make my
video and use WMM to edit it, in the first place.

--
Rehan
www.rehanfx.org - get more effects and transitions for movie maker

 

[Al Stu]

The initial DV encoding is performed by the camera to the tape though, so
the lossy occurs in the camera before even getting to MM. Not a whole lot
we can do about that though with a consumer grade camcorder.



Results of a quick test though indicate once in MM generational copies can
be made without further loss (with the exception of any MM bugs, e.g. 27th
frame drop). This was the point of the posters question and the provided
answer.

Please provide your source of information. [...]
P.S. Remember compression is not same thing as lossy.

This is a technical fact since DV encoding uses Discrete Cosine Transform
algorithm (similar to JPEG) to compress data which is lossy in nature: you
cannot get back exactly what you encoded. However DV format uses modest
compression rates in order to preserve quality.

http://www.emedialive.com/Articles/PrintArticle.aspx?ArticleID=8687
http://www.animemusicvideos.org/guides/avtech/video4.htm
http://www.videouniversity.com/dvformat.htm
...


However as I said before this is a rather academic discussion... Practically
DV AVi format is the best choice for capturing video from a camcorder in
Movie maker environment and making any intermediate files. I wouldnt be too
concerned about any non-perceptible loss of quality associated with dv
format. Because if I had I wouldnt be using a home camcorder to make my
video and use WMM to edit it, in the first place.

--
Rehan
www.rehanfx.org - get more effects and transitions for movie maker

"This is not strictly true. DV AVI is a lossy format."

Please provide your source of information.

Thanks,

P.S. Remember compression is not same thing as lossy. And I consider the
27th frame bug to be just that, a bug.


change.
But out
put that
in

 

[Rehan]

The initial DV encoding is performed by the camera to the tape though, so

the lossy occurs in the camera before even getting to MM. Not a whole lot
we can do about that though with a consumer grade camcorder.

I agree with you. Thats why I only objected to a general statement of yours
that "DV format is non-lossy". Did not mean to refute the rest of your
advice or argument.

Results of a quick test though indicate once in MM generational copies can
be made without further loss (with the exception of any MM bugs, e.g. 27th
frame drop).

Well... here you should qualify your statement with the condition that no
editing is performed that affect pixels. Otherwise as soon as the stream
needs to be re-encoded the generational loss would kick in in the vicinity
of movie portion where editing has been performed.

An experiment to do :

Capture as DV AVI
Edit in MM to change a portion of movie: Apply Brightness Increase +
brightness decrease effects
Save as DV AVI
note any change in filesize
Repeat it N times.


Unfortunately doing this experiment is not straightforward at the moment as
it requires the 27th frame bug to be either fixed or eliminated some other
way.

--
Rehan
www.rehanfx.org - get more effects and transitions for movie maker

The initial DV encoding is performed by the camera to the tape though, so
the lossy occurs in the camera before even getting to MM. Not a whole lot
we can do about that though with a consumer grade camcorder.



Results of a quick test though indicate once in MM generational copies can
be made without further loss (with the exception of any MM bugs, e.g. 27th
frame drop). This was the point of the posters question and the provided
answer.

Please provide your source of information. [...]
P.S. Remember compression is not same thing as lossy.

This is a technical fact since DV encoding uses Discrete Cosine Transform
algorithm (similar to JPEG) to compress data which is lossy in nature:
you
cannot get back exactly what you encoded. However DV format uses modest
compression rates in order to preserve quality.

http://www.emedialive.com/Articles/PrintArticle.aspx?ArticleID=8687
http://www.animemusicvideos.org/guides/avtech/video4.htm
http://www.videouniversity.com/dvformat.htm
...


However as I said before this is a rather academic discussion... Practically
DV AVi format is the best choice for capturing video from a camcorder in
Movie maker environment and making any intermediate files. I wouldnt be too
concerned about any non-perceptible loss of quality associated with dv
format. Because if I had I wouldnt be using a home camcorder to make my
video and use WMM to edit it, in the first place.

--
Rehan
www.rehanfx.org - get more effects and transitions for movie maker

"This is not strictly true. DV AVI is a lossy format."

Please provide your source of information.

Thanks,

P.S. Remember compression is not same thing as lossy. And I consider the
27th frame bug to be just that, a bug.


In Movie Maker the non-lossy format is "DV-AVI (NTSC)".

This is not strictly true. DV AVI is a lossy format.

However yes in Movie Maker thats the best option for video and closest
you
can get to a lossless format out of the box. To save in real lossless
format, one has to make a custom WMV profile which saves in Full
frames
(umcopressed) + PCM audio.

If you are interested I have made a set of Uncompressed profiles that
work
with WMM. Download from here:
http://homepage.ntlworld.com/rehanahmad/uncompressed.zip


Also note that the loss involved when saving to DV AVI is mainly
academic.
It is not noticeable to human eye and the codec is smart in the sense
that
it wont accumulate the loss if saved again and again without any change.
But
if you edit the footage in each generation (effects+transitions) then
I
would guess the loss would start stacking up in places where stream
has
changed due to editing and needs re-encoding.

Another point to note is the annoying bug in windows movie maker which
drops
every 27th frame in each clip when saving to DV-AVI. This can be very
noticeable if you have a lot of short clips.

--
Rehan
www.rehanfx.org - get more effects and transitions for movie maker





There are generally two methods of converting old VHS (analog) to
digital
using a digital cramcoder.

1) If the cramcoder has digital to analog pass through feature, Connect
the
out puts of VCR to analog inputs of cramcoder, and connect digital out
put
of cramcoder to PC. Enable the digital pass-through mode
(obviously)
and
play the VHS tape will capturing on the PC with Movie Maker or other
such
software/hardware.

2) As you mentioned just connect the analog out puts of VCR to
analog
inputs
of digital cramcoder, and record with the digital cramcoder. This
is
the
method I currently use since PC and VCR are not in close enough
proximity
with each other for connecting both to cramcoder at the same time
for
using
pass-through mode.

As for other methods using dedicated hardware/software I can't speak to
those but suspect it wouldn't produce any better video.

Once in digital form you can copy it as much as you like without
loss
of
quality, so long as you are not using one of the lossy formats as
source
or
destination. In Movie Maker the non-lossy format is "DV-AVI
(NTSC)".



Another question... Am using WinXP-pro PC that came with MS Movie
Maker
2,
and using a Sony digital camcorder, would greatly appreciate insights
from
pro's on...

-I'd like to "convert" my old VHS tapes to digital. Would the
simple/practical way to do this be to plug up the RCA plugs into
the
Sony
Camcorder, and record a digital tape? Is there any more sophisticated
way
to do this that would keep the RESOLUTION as high as possible, like
using
the Pinnacle hardware unit that has all the plugs and jacks on it, and
Pinnacle software?

-Is it true that once the old VHS goes to digital... whatever
resolution
I
get will be preserved from then-on-out since I can copy and so
forth
forever, with no loss?

-The digital 8mm Sony also "plays" old analog 8mm tapes... is it right
that
can I play them on my Sony and IEEE1394 them over to the PC, and that
in
itself "converts" them to digital files. Is there any more
sophisticated
way to do this that would keep the RESOLUTION as high as possible,
like
using the Pinnacle hardware unit that has all the plugs and jacks
on
it,
and
Pinnacle software?

Thanks,
George