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Hi there - only started using this software recently on behalf on my uncle while archiving old video footage.

We can capture the footage just fine and using the software we can play back everything and it works just as it should. But if we choose to either batch convert the video to compress it, or choose to burn a DVD, we end up with sound and a black screen.

It seems that in the process of converting it either into a smaller file format or convert to DVD, we are losing the picture and I am not sure why.

We ripped his camcorder footage off old tapes in order to free up his tapes for re-use and now have footage stored on his laptop taking up a large amount of space, and no way of getting it onto discs for safe keeping.

I'm hoping we are doing something wrong that has been a silly error on our part and this is easily remedied, as we seem to have done what the hard part is, and got the footage onto the PC so that we can manipulate it.

Thanks for any help.

P.s thanks to Steve Jones for sorting out my registration here.

In which case can you give us far more info.

From the beginning,
What file format is your captured footage,
What are your project settings?
Do you go straight from the timeline to your dvd?
What are you settings for producing this dvd?
Is your dvd blank video as seen on a dvd player/tv combo or on your pc? Or both?
If you make a dvd folder on your pc, then do you get video?

What if you save the file as a dv.avi file, can this be seen on your pc when played with something like media player?

It seems that in the process of converting it either into a smaller file format or convert to DVD, we are losing the picture and I am not sure why.

What format did you capture to? Was this from analog tape (i.e. VHS)?

Some formats (and some files) are "difficult" to convert or edit... I don't know why either... There are probably several potential causes...

You might try converting the file to DVD-compatible MPEG-2 with SUPER (FREE!!!). You can look at your Video Studio Project Settings to find the settings (resolution, framerate, bitrate, etc) for a DVD compatible MPEG-2 file.

Welcome to the Forums!

One extra useful piece of information would be to tell us exactly which device you used to capture the analogue material, and exactly how it was connected to your computer (i.e. via Firewire cable, or RCA cables [yellow/red/black or white] or USB).

Knowing something about your computer set-up would also be useful, as well as the version of Video Studio you are using.

Hi there and thanks for the quick responses.

I won't have access to my uncles PC until Sunday again now. But I know from memory that it was set to capture in AVI format, I remember as I was a little surprised that the resultant captured footage (maybe just over an hours worth or so) was over 18gigs in size. I'd imagined AVI capture would have resulted in a smaller file size.

The DVD is blank whether played in the PC or DVD player. I also tried making a DVD with windows movie maker from the original captured footage, but that too resulted in sound but no picture.

The capture device is one of those USB dongles that has composite and s-video inputs. As I say though, that seems to work fine as I can happily review the captured footage in its raw form. I'll double check on what version videomaker it is.

But rather than me add bits and bobs here now, I'll get access to his machine at the weekend and jot down every setting at every stage and get back to you.

Thanks again so far.

ok, for your info there are over 800 different types of avi, ranging from uncompressed at around 65gb per hour, dv.avi the "Std" video avi at 13gb/h and then you can get all manner of well compressed ones like divx/xvid/mpeg/mjpeg.

Which version of windows is it?
Movie maker does not normally make dvds, unless you have a media centre edition of windows (this uses a sonic plug in) or vista which uses dvd maker.

If you have the dvd you can do this before the weekend.....

Take a peak at the dvd file structure in windows explorer, you should have a video_ts folder (maybe an audio_ts folder as well) and inside this folder you should have a few files, some .vob (the video files) .bup (back ups of the video) and .ifo information files.

Use a programme like avicodec to look at one of your vob files, and tell us what it tells you about your file.
http://www.myvideoproblems.com/Tutorials/avicodec.html

Hi
First of all what version of VS are you using.

I would suspect your USB capture device as being the weakest link here.
USB is not really for good video capture.
But You say :-
We can capture the footage just fine and using the software we can play back everything and it works just as it should. But if we choose to either batch convert the video to compress it, or choose to burn a DVD, we end up with sound and a black screen.
(maybe your capture settings need looking at)

Right click one of the captured files and select properties what are they.??

I'll double check everything at the weekend and let you guys know.

He is using Vista by the way which has a DVD creator as part of the movie maker software. I tried adding a menu to the DVD using that software and although it displayed the menu and showed there to be several chapters that it had auto created, they wouldn't play. It created a rolling backdrop of short scenes from the footage, but wouldn't play the whole thing - but that did mean that somehow it managed to convert those short segments just fine. But I'm veering off-topic with that.

I'm familiar with Video_TS folders etc from when I have used Nero in the past so I'll check that as well.

It will be late Sunday evening U.K time when I can post again with details. He is on holiday so I can't even get access to the DVD at the minute. Thanks.

Hi there - just wanted to follow up with my progress on this.

I noticed that my uncles laptop had a dvd movie maker program labeled as a Toshiba DVD maker, but on opening the program it is actually Ulead but with a Toshiba custom front end.

I loaded up the captured footage and it made a DVD that played perfectly. Or at least as perfectly as the captured footage.

I do have a couple more questions though. The captured footage we have appears to be a little jerky. It is almost like when you playback NTSC footage on PAL and you get that extra frame put in to compensate for the FPS (or is it PAL on NTSC, I forget) - what is the best setting to get highest quality capture from the camcorder? I captured it in avi format, but maybe I shouldn't have?

Also sadly as lost sound on some of the footage we captured. I had been capturing from one tape in his camera but was running low on HDD space so paused the camera footage, switched HDD's and carried on capturing. But that somehow gave us captured footage without sound, despite using the same settings.

Anyway, the main thing is we now know we can capture and convert footage, it is just a case of getting the best quality capturing possible. Thanks for the help so far.

Hi
Generally a jerky video is usually associated with the field order.
We use Upper or Lower fields depending on the source video.

Regarding standard video:-
For digital capture ---- Lower Field is the norm.
Analogue capture uses Upper Field.
Getting these the wrong way round and you may experience jerky video.

I am a little confused as to where your footage originated.
In your first post you mentioned ripping from old tape to camcorder.
Do you mean you captured the footage from the camcorder to the pc?
Or are VHS recorder tapes involved.?

What type of camcorder was it and how did you connect to the pc.
Finally what are the properties of the original captured video clips,
What capture settings did you use?

OK
If it is a field order problem, re-capture using the correct settings is the answer.
I suspect you don¡¦t have the tapes any more.??????

We still need answers to all the questions above to get any further.

Ok, I will clarify what we have been doing and using so far. It is a Sony camcorder using tapes, that we are capturing footage from.

We have used the composite outputs to a USB capture device and selected AVI as the capture format. I didn't notice if the program allowed variations on the quality of the AVI setting but I'll check.

We are using Windows Vista on a Toshiba laptop that has a toshiba branded version of Ulead.

I do recall seeing the upper and lower field setting and wasn't sure what it was so left it as default. But I'll be sure to check next time I am there (I only visit once a fortnight on Sundays). Pretty sure it was set to lower field though, and as we are capturing an analogue signal, it seems that could be the final piece of the puzzle as to why it is jerky.

I'm guessing I didn't check the settings when continuing the capture process and that is why some of it has no sound. Luckily my uncle didn't take much footage on his recent holiday and so most of what we wanted to capture is still on the tape.

Apologies for not having any more info as yet, but when I managed to make a DVD yesterday I had hoped that we were almost there apart from the jerkiness.

I'll try the different field setting next time I am there and I reckon we should be set to go to be honest. But just in case I'll note down anything else of importance. thanks

I suspect that the program you are using is not VideoStudio but is in fact MovieFactory

Knowing what sort of avi it is would also help, you can use avicodec to do this
http://www.myvideoproblems.com/Tutorials/avicodec.html