Video Capture Software For Sony Handycam
Suyay Escarsega
Hi after a lot of googling the topic of recording your vhs to the computer through fire wire i really need help whether its possible to do on my Sony camcorders.
i have a a sony dcr-trv900e
&
HVR-A1E (not tried with this one yet)
I have done this before and it worked with my canon Mv75oi and it worked like a charm but i kept going black and white every few seconds. so i stopped using it, i can't give any clients this type of recording. Then i bought a capture device canopus advc 55 it is quite good but for some reason it changes the colors and they went dull, when i played the same tape through on the dvd recorder the colours were vibrant and same as the vhs same thing with when i tried the dv pass through on the canon mv75oi and that's what i really liked about it.. it left the colour the same unlike the canopus device i had bought a tbc thing to control the colours on the canopus device but it makes the picture look poorly which is disappointing because its not cheap , i found the quality colour wise better on the dv pass through & my dvd recorder so i really want to give it another go. I'm done rambling i will come back to my point above.
After using all these capture devices and not great output on the vhs i really want to convert my home videos to dvd via a dv camcorder pass through has anyone tried it or know if
it works with sony dcr-trv900e
or
HVR-A1E
I'm surprised you are not getting good results with your Canopus converter. I use the previous model the ADVC50, and get excellent results from that. You might need to check the switch positions, to confirm they are set up for PAL or NTSC - whichever is appropriate. (Switch setting on page 13 in the manual HERE )
I get my best results by connecting the SCART out from my VHS player into my DVD recorder ( an old Panasonic DMR E55, which includes a form of timebase corrector) and then from the S-video output from that device into my Canopus ADVC50. Excellent results... and no apparent colour changes....(It is set up for PAL, as required here in the UK)
I connect my canopus converter with scart out of my VHS Player with a rca wire (3 wires) and the other 3 wires in the converter device itself. Then open the editor capture software on the pc and there i would see the result it was dull not vibrate. I wish i knew a way to get the exact same colours like you are getting with your canopus. Anyway i can get excellent results?
Well, if the other switches are all 'off' that sounds right. The switch settings on the earlier ADVC50 model are slightly different, so I can't copy the ADVC55 settings directly. I haven't noticed any particular loss of colour in my captures.
I have mostly used WinDV as my capture software in the past, but I tend to use Scenalyzer more these days, now that it's freeware!
Of course, with VHS as your source you can't expect miracles - especially when compared to today's HD video! I've posted a short clip from an old TV show that I captured with my Canopus device HERE (it's only about 30 seconds long - the file is about 10MB) . Not sure the colours should be any more 'vibrant' ?...They'd probably look a bit saturated if they were, I suspect......
With regard to using my old Panasonic DMR 55E DVD recorder between the VHS player and the capture device, I added it simply because that model (along with one or two others from around that time) included a form of line time base corrector on the input.
So, connecting the Scart to the DVD recorder input, and connecting the Canopus device to the 'S' video out from the DVD recorder can give much more stable results... especially on some of my older tapes. I'm not sure if any other makes of DVD recorder included that feature though?.....
There have been comments elsewhere on the internet about the Canopus DV converters producing video that is slightly darker than the original. Your screen shots suggest that. I've not found that to be a problem generally.
I do find the DV files easy to edit -- and I usually deinterlace, resize and crop the overscan to produce 'cleaner' results from captured VHS tapes. I use the free editor Virtualdub for that task, and that program includes lots of other filters .. including adjustments for brightness, contrast and levels. So it's quite simple to adjust your DV captured files to suit the result you are after .
The usual reason for the colour snags is the accuracy of the input and output levels and the way the devices manage the luminance and chrominance - I had an analogue input device that was always very od in the colour department, and in my case, colour like - which I sorted out in the editor. Quality is also variable - composite video managing about 240 line at best. So firewire was the connection where colour vanished?
I don't think many (if any?) VHS players have a 'digital output'?.....
The OP doesn't mention which VHS machine he is using as the source, and the Scart output he mentions provides either the composite (or S video if you're really lucky) signal for input to the camera 'pass through' or Canopus DV converter.....
The dcr-trv900e was a small consumer DV camera, wasn't it? had composite and y/c output on the usual phonos and 4 pin, plus the i-link output which was 4 pin firewire? I could be wrong, but it certainly wasn't VHS, and the other one is a more modern HD camera. I just couldn't see why he was using analogue at all?
I think you may have the wrong end of the stick here......This is about digitising VHS tapes - either by using AV in on a suitably enabled DV camcorder, or by using a Canopus analogue to digital converter.
It's not about capturing camcorder tapes.....
I discovered quite by accident that the Panasonic recorder uses a form of TBC on the input ( it's either a frame synchroniser or a simple line time base correcter -- not been able to discover exactly which).
Both of those cameras in the E version had their video inputs disabled, didn't they. I have a vague recollection of the Sony being able to be tricked into this mode by a combination of the cassette mechanism being left open, and holding down a control when turning it on, but it's a long time ago. Could have been the record button?
I just want to say how my connection are my VCR is a SHARP VC-MH815
i have a swithable scart that i use to connect the vcr and advc with it set on output.. i'm using normal 3 rca wires that look like this
"Both of those cameras in the E version had their video inputs disabled, didn't they. I have a vague recollection of the Sony being able to be tricked into this mode by a combination of the cassette mechanism being left open, and holding down a control when turning it on, but it's a long time ago. Could have been the record button?"
The disabling of the Firewire input was to do with the tax paid on VCR's at that time. Another example of EU legislation which was intended to protect the EU VCR manufacturers. Also if the Cam was left on with no tape in then it was programmed to shut down after about 5 Mins. Leaving the cassette door open over solved this problem so that you could, for example, use the cam connected to another recording device.
I sometimes capture analogue to DVD Ram and convert to Mp4 with Handbrake and stream through the network or from the USB connection on my Humax HD box of LG Blu Ray, still a quicker conversion than firewire, although Sony Movie Studio Platinum 12.0 produces far superior results for higher quality footage.
When I recorded analogue output to DV tape with the Sony camcorders, the remote had to be modified with some extra buttons and pressing them both simultaneously so the Record button could be enabled,
I haven't captured that way for years.
Unfortunately, it would seem there are a number of possible causes for your dark video. THIS THREAD from VideoHelp has some quite expert input from different folk, and although it's describing an NTSC situation, much of the advice comes from a UK (PAL) contributor.
It's quite long thread, and some of the more informative posts are towards the end. Especially those regarding AGC and sync pulse timings. Once you've read it, I think you'll probably think that correction in the editor might be a simpler option!
I sometimes capture analogue to DVD Ram and convert to Mp4 with Any Video Converter and stream through the network or from the USB connection on my Humax HD box of LG Blu Ray, still a quicker conversion than firewire, although Sony Movie Studio Platinum 12.0 produces far superior results for higher quality footage.
In the end I decided not to do the 'disc thing' all over again, and tend to use my WD Media player for most things these days.. It does mean eventually making ISOs of all my DVDs I suppose... but if it takes as long to ditch DVDs as it has to convert all the VHS tapes, it could all take a while yet!....
I don't 'do' many VHS tapes these days, but my Canopus converter still sits in a bay of my PC, and is easy to connect via S-video to the old DVD recorder, with the VCR connected via Scart to the input of the same DVD recorder. So it's not as fiddly as 'setting up' a camcorder with pass through.......
Time wise, it's all real time of course... same as DVD capture .... but as I'm not using discs anymore, I find it easier to edit the DV and save as mp4. File sizes tend to be less than half the size of Mpeg2 DVD files, for about the same quality.
I'm not sure that Blu-ray will now ever achieve the mainstream status of DVD ... even Sony themselves have stopped making Blu ray drives .....so I suspect that future video capture and storage will be in a whole range of different formats....
Thanks for the link, correcting a video after it's done isn't such a problem but just seems too long and i have many tapes with dance performances different colour from each performance, i don't know if i can spend a lot of time correcting each one. Back to my device advc 55 doesn't give correct colour is it because it has a fault in the device? its been 10yr since i bought it and since the beginning its been this way i didn't really notice untill i bought a dvd recorder and saw the colour comparison, If i purchase the Canopus: ADVC-110 Converter would that fix my issue, i know its pricey but if i works and i get the correct colour like you do instead of doing post production i don't mind playing for it but if i performs the same way as the 55 then i've got a big problem.
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