Analog conversion and properties

[cdkindle]

I have a VCR connected to my camcorder which does the analog to digital conversion through firewire to videostudio.

Does it hurt anything to do high video data rate? I've been doing 8000 for all my projects with 100% on the quality/Speed slide, but wondered if the lower rate would be better quality or not.

It seems like the video is a little "foggy" - didn't know if I could get better quality by changing anything.

Thanks for all the great info.

[Ron P.]

While you certainly can capture at a bitrate of 8000kps, you're quality is not any better then if you used a bitrate of about 6000- 6500. By lowering the bitrate you are not going to lose any quality, and you might be able to get more video content onto a disc.

You didn't say what version of VS you are using. Are you using VS8, 9, 10? If you are using VS9 or 10, then your final output audio can be Dolby Digital allowing yet more space...

Perusing the board you will find information pertainting to this...

Ron P.

[cdkindle]

I have VS9.

Does Huffyuv work for me in this situation - smaller capture file size?

[Ron P.]

Yes the Huffy codec is an excellent codec to use for maintaining quality, and minimizing file size.

Ron P.

[GuyL]

From a VHS source you can get away with a 4000 bitrate and resolution of 352 X 480. You may consider 6000 if your video has realy fast motion in it - like car racing.

Having anything greater than the source will not make the video any better in quality and you will be able to put much more video on your DVD in the end.

[Ken Berry]

The other thing you need to consider is the connection between the VCR and your digicam. If the VCR has an S-video out jack, and you have an S-video + RCA audio adaptor which connects to your digicam's AV-in jack, I would use this in preference to the standard yellow/red/white RCA composite plugs. S-video gives much better quality analogue video transfer (though of course you still need the audio plugs since S-video only transmits the video signal).

If you are indeed using the S-video connection, then I think vidoman's recommendation has most relevance, and you could use around 6000 kbps bitrate (though my own personal preference would be to leave the quality slider at the default 70 - 80%). If, however, you are using composite RCA plugs for both video and audio, then the output video quality will not be as high and you can take Guy's suggestion of using a lower bitrate of around 4000 kbps. To express the last thing that Guy said another way, you can't make a silk purse from a sow's ear: that is to say, if the output signal from your VCR is not DVD high quality, which it can never be, then you will not be able to make it any better simply by capturing it at a high bitrate. The only thing that does is take up valuable space. It is better to accept that VCR output will at best only be fair to average DVD quality, and lower your capture settings accordingly.