I use Vegas Movie Stuio Platinum 16.0. I have an AV Capture device that captures old VHS home movies onto USB. It works with VideoLAN and captures ok with Vegas... but the clip will not save. When I say "Done" (and it should put the clip in my project), It dies with a stack/register dump.
h.e.l.p.?
Vegas was never designed for USB capture of any kind.
IEEE 1394 FireWire devices only.
The interesting thing is that VLC will record the clip fine, and also Vegas will record the clip fine. It recognizes the USB device for both Video and Audio, plays the clips, but won't save them. It ought to.
As Musicvid said, Vegas does not capture thru USB. You need to use the capture software that came with the device and then you can edit with Vegas.
"Ought to?"
Vegas "may" recognize non-1394 capture devices. It's a pig in a poke.
It does not mean it was designed to!
Vegas is not VLC, so comparisons are unnecessary.
You can always read the software specs if you have further doubts.
BTW, we think USB capture pretty much sucks.
Thanks for the feedback. My options are pretty bad, however. I agree USB is a lousy way to transfer video data. The only reason I mentioned VLC is to rule out the USB device as not working. The strange thing is that it (Vegas) really does a great job of capturing with the USB device. I can watch and listen to the video as it is captured, and it does a much much better job than VLC (interpolating between scan lines and frames & auto-balancing brightness for instance).
Vegas is not able to read my .ogg or .mp4 files from VLC either. That is strange, but as you said, probably not in the specs. My previous experience was with an IEEE 1394 card, and it worked great. I may need to switch to another computer and get a card that can input from the VHS player directly.
More information on this: I attempted to do video capture with the integrated microphone and webcam and Vegas does the same thing. This looks like a bug in the software surrounding the function of saving captured video clips.
I don't think you can call out 20 y/o technology as having a "bug" because it will not support your current devices.
Truth check: Tape/analog capture is on its last gasp. and so is FireWire, making future Vidcap development unlikely. You could find a copy of Scenealyzer, but I can't promise you bunnies and ice cream. My question is, if VLC works, why not use it?
That said, I have a ZR series Canon camcorder (15 bucks at Goodwill) with A /D passthrough that does a great job. But my tool of choice is a set-top combo recorder that makes DVD, with hardware denoising and tbc. (4:1:1->4:2:0 is what it is.)
Just used it last month for some memorial tapes, and it still works!
VLC files aren't able to be read by Vegas for some reason, otherwise I'd be done. I am using a Goodwill VHS player and an old USB converter... But as a software developer myself, if there is a feature in a program (like video capture) then it should work. Otherwise disable the button for it and hide the feature until it works. 😀 I may end up getting a set-top combo and hooking it up to a camcorder as well. Just need to get these things finished!
You are right about the old technology! In my estimation, DVD's are on their way out as well, and Blue-ray has another few years after that. Then it will be something different and probably better than flash drives.
There is a reason your VLC captures won't open in Vegas; don't give up so quickly. Were pretty good at figuring out these things.
Also, upload an actual captured sample to Drive or Dropbox (not YouTube ).
But as a software developer myself, if there is a feature in a program (like video capture) then it should work. Otherwise disable the button for it and hide the feature until it works. 😀
Repeating the same feature request over and over again to your peers will not get you different results. except possibly annoyance.
Would you like help with your VLC captures, or not?
Thanks for the advice. I'll upload a video, been away for a few hours.
Here is a smaller (17 minute) one. It is an mp4.
https://drive.google.com/open?id=1lnYrIQOIaGCp39wO7Co5iEM3723MpE9J
I have not had time to read the link you sent earlier, will do that soon.
Bill
Mediainfo on the above linked file:
General
Complete name : \\LINKSYS02083\menger\VHSTapes\5m-EndOf1997.mp4
Format : MPEG-4
Format profile : Base Media
Codec ID : isom (mp41/avc1)
File size : 21.7 MiB
Duration : 17 min 53 s
Overall bit rate : 169 kb/s
Encoded date : UTC 2019-09-16 12:16:42
Tagged date : UTC 2019-09-16 12:16:42
Writing application : vlc 3.0.8 stream output
Video
ID : 1
Format : AVC
Format/Info : Advanced Video Codec
Format profile : High@L1.1
Format settings : CABAC / 4 Ref Frames
Format settings, CABAC : Yes
Format settings, Reference frames : 4 frames
Codec ID : avc1
Codec ID/Info : Advanced Video Coding
Duration : 17 min 53 s
Source duration : 17 min 53 s
Bit rate : 32.3 kb/s
Width : 160 pixels
Height : 120 pixels
Display aspect ratio : 4:3
Frame rate mode : Variable
Frame rate : 30.303 FPS
Minimum frame rate : 1.689 FPS
Maximum frame rate : 1000 000.000 FPS
Original frame rate : 30.000 FPS
Color space : YUV
Chroma subsampling : 4:2:0
Bit depth : 8 bits
Scan type : Progressive
Bits/(Pixel*Frame) : 0.055
Stream size : 4.13 MiB (19%)
Source stream size : 4.13 MiB (19%)
Writing library : x264 core 155
Encoding settings : cabac=1 / ref=3 / deblock=1:0:0 / analyse=0x3:0x13 / me=hex / subme=7 / psy=1 / psy_rd=1.00:0.00 / mixed_ref=1 / me_range=16 / chroma_me=1 / trellis=1 / 8x8dct=1 / cqm=0 / deadzone=21,11 / fast_pskip=1 / chroma_qp_offset=-2 / threads=4 / lookahead_threads=1 / sliced_threads=0 / nr=0 / decimate=1 / interlaced=0 / bluray_compat=0 / constrained_intra=0 / bframes=3 / b_pyramid=2 / b_adapt=1 / b_bias=0 / direct=1 / weightb=1 / open_gop=0 / weightp=2 / keyint=250 / keyint_min=25 / scenecut=40 / intra_refresh=0 / rc_lookahead=40 / rc=crf / mbtree=1 / crf=23.0 / qcomp=0.60 / qpmin=10 / qpmax=51 / qpstep=4 / ip_ratio=1.40 / aq=1:1.00
Language : English
Encoded date : UTC 2019-09-16 12:16:42
Tagged date : UTC 2019-09-16 12:16:42
mdhd_Duration : 1073177
Codec configuration box : avcC
Audio
ID : 2
Format : MPEG Audio
Format version : Version 1
Format profile : Layer 2
Codec ID : mp4a-6B
Duration : 17 min 33 s
Bit rate mode : Constant
Bit rate : 131 kb/s
Maximum bit rate : 3 336 Mb/s
Channel(s) : 2 channels
Sampling rate : 44.1 kHz
Compression mode : Lossy
Stream size : 16.4 MiB (76%)
Language : English
Encoded date : UTC 2019-09-16 12:16:42
Tagged date : UTC 2019-09-16 12:16:42
mdhd_Duration : 1053801
More information on this: I attempted to do video capture with the integrated microphone and webcam and Vegas does the same thing. This looks like a bug in the software surrounding the function of saving captured video clips.
It's working for me with my inbuilt webcam in VMS Plat 16 Build 142 but not as expected.
Selecting HDV doesn't result in the camera being detected.
Selecting DV works. But I also get the same error message after capturing. However in my case the files have been saved and I found them in my User Documents. They are avi 4:3 640x480 pixel 30 fps interlaced. Not a great deal of use in our 1080 or 4K age.
The mp4 file won't open in my VMSP but I'm not surprised. Look at the extreme variation in the framerate!!
Thanks for the pointer. I'll see if I can fix the framerate when creating the files.
I converted the file with Handbrake to 30 fps fixed. The converted mp4 opens okay in VMS but the audio goes silent around 4 mins 27 secs and the image goes black around 4 mins 39 secs. The total length is 17 mins 53 secs.
Edit: The original file also goes silent and blank around the same places when played using MPC-HC or VLC.
Your video us variable frame rate, which is murder on nonlinear editors.
Record constant frame rate or convert in Handbrake or ffmpeg.
All this fuss over 160p? That's a postage stamp.
Thanks to all. Of course this little sample video was not the actual target. I have about 30 hours of higher quality content I’m trying to preserve.
This is a great community, I really appreciate the help.