VHS Video into a PC? Options please!

[BAW9DV]

Hi,

I have been searching the forum looking for tutorials or advice on how to capture VHS Video such that I can get it onto my PC - and use Ulead Video Studio to edit it - and then burn the results onto DVD.

I understand about using a physical lead to connect the VHS recorder to the PC. However, I was wondering if there was an easier way considering the kit I currently have that allows me to watch the videos that I have.

I have a Panasonic DMR-EX95V DVD Recorder - its a video cassette recorder/player with a built-in 250GB hard disk and a DVD writer, all in one.

I have many home videos, many of them with two to three hours worth of footage on each one and I want to try to get the contents of at least one VHS tape onto my PC so that I could then use Ulead Video Studio 9 to edit it and perhaps tidy it up and then burn it onto a DVD.

What I'd like to know is has anyone used this type of machine to assist this kind of job? Exactly what would I do to get the footage from the video playing in the machine onto another medium (DVD?) so that I could then load it onto my PC to work on?

Any comments on this would be gretly appreciated - as would any advice about not doing it this way ...

Thank you.

Lee

[skier-hughes]

A few of my observations.
VS9 I don't think works with mpeg or vob files.
A dvd recorder generally makes files that aren't quite the same as normal pc dvd burners, which isn't too much of a problem when using on a pc, but can be if you use them on other dvd players. Editing them though means that you convert to a lossy format - mpeg - wrap it in a vob, import to editing app, edit, resize image, as all dvd recorders I've used make odd sized files, so lose quality on sizing and recompression to mpeg again, wrap back up in a vob and burn your dvds, as 3 hours on one dvd will lose lots more quality. At the same time I hope that I don't suffer any out of sync with audio/video. You'd need to upgrade to VS12.

If I was doing this, I'd invest in a canopus advc model, capture direct from the vhs via this unit to my pc with a firewire cable, as a dv.avi file, so lose virtually no quality. Easily edit, save and author a couple of dvds.
http://desktop.thomsongrassvalley.com/p ... ersion.php

I've done some training dvds for NATS

[sjj1805]

You have a few options available to you.

Option 1.
Using your existing equipment and software.
I did a search on the internet to try and get more detail of the particular device you have and can see it is an integrated VHS / DVD and Hard Drive machine. I would think that any videos recorded on the hard drive would be in a proprietary format - rather like the Sky + Digibox I have. Those recordings cannot be simply copied over to a computer and would need to be played into the computer and recorded with something like a TV card.

One possible method would be to record from the VHS tape to the units DVD recorder. It might work out a bit expensive because you are recording to a blank disc which will then be discarded. You can of course try using re-writeable discs though I have never found those to be reliable - after the first recording they tend to deteriorate quite rapidly.

If you record from the VHS to a DVD disc you can them place that DVD disc into your computers DVD drive and use the VideoStudio 9
Import From DVD Function - this will create one or more MPEG2 files on your hard drive dependant upon if you chose to import individual chapters or the entire disc.

VideoStudio 9 is a bit on the old side now and did suffer from some audio/video synchronization issues when editing MPEG files - in particular when joining clips together with transitions. The more recent version VideoStudio X2 is more reliable.

Option 2.
Using some new hardware.
The first option involves using a DVD disc recorded by your existing player. If this runs a bit expensive due to the number of tapes you wish to convert then it might work out cheaper to purchase something that enables your computer to record these videos. One option is to invest in a TV card - this fits into a slot inside your computer and is easy to fit. Effectively it turns your computer into a Television with a hard drive recorder (rather like your Panasonic!). You then simply connect your Panasonic to the TV card either by way of a coaxial cable or RCA plugs.

Once you have the recording on your hard drive you can then use VideoStudio to edit the video and create a new DVD with menus.

[BAW9DV]

Steve and Graham,

Thank you both for explaining options for me. After carefully considering your replies, here is what I have achieved.....

I took a 1994 family VHS E-180 video tape and put it into the Panasonic unit. After some reading of the manual, I then placed a Verbatim DVD-RAM disk (recommended by Panasonic for this purpose) into the DVD writer drive on the unit and managed to copy some 7 minutes of video directly off of the VHS video and onto the DVD-RAM disk.

Next, I placed the DVD-RAM disk with the recorded footage into my Windows XP Pro computer's DVD writer drive and was able to copy the resulting VRO and IFO files onto my hard disk. Windows Media Player was unable to view the video footage after I changed the VRO file to and MPG file, so I managed after some research, to locate a utility called AVS Video Editor which is a 30-day trial programme. With this, I was able to import the VRO video file and create an AVI video file some 7 minutes and 14 seconds long with a filesize of about 50MB. This was viewable using Windows Media Player.

So, success! The resulting clip is amazingly clear considering the VHS video was taken 14 years ago!

I have taken Graham's advice and downloaded the X2 trial version with a view to purchasing the full programme to replace Video Studio 9. I will also purchase AVS at a cost of $39 which is quite cheap - and gives me access to other options as well.

Now that I have the ability to use a DVD-RAM disk via a writer drive on the Panasonic unit to capture VHS video, I will begin the process of converting our home movies to DVD and editing the hours of "boring" footage into hours of good video from days gone by!

Steve, I just want to say how informative this forum is and how well you guys respond - my sincere thanks for all the help you and your expert members have provided.

A few days ago, all this was kind of mind-boggling for me. Now it is beginning to come together!

Thank you.

Kind regards,

lee