Capture from Hi8 camera

xberk wrote on 5/8/2019, 12:29 PM

I'm capturing a bunch of tapes from a Hi8 Sony TVR315 using VP14. This seems to work fine using the DV output on the camera to Firewire port on Windows 7 PC but this produces large AVI files using Vegas Capture Build 1004. Just wondering if anyone has a suggested workflow to Capture directly to MP4 files? Or is conversion to MP4 using handbrake or something else best.

Comments

Eagle Six wrote on 5/8/2019, 12:44 PM

I've never heard of that, but wouldn't surprise me. Most likely a program that would produce an mp4 would stream the capture DV to a temp file (which would be the firewire to Vegas capture part), do the conversion (which would be the Vegas Pro 14 render part) and then delete the temp file to cleanup when done.

I myself would probably prefer to make the mp4 within Vegas Pro rather than what might be a limitation in render format from a program like you describe. On the other hand maybe such a program exist and is pretty much easy to run, convenient and does a good job. It will be interesting if any other members have such experience.

JackW wrote on 5/8/2019, 12:45 PM

I do what you do to capture. I've been putting the captured video on the Vegas Pro (v13) timeline, cleaning it up as needed, then rendering it out to MP4. Or, if in a hurry, just taking the captured AVI file and converting it to MP4 in Handbrake. Wish there was a way to capture directly in MP4 format.

3POINT wrote on 5/8/2019, 2:05 PM

Capturing is copying digital data from a digital tape device. Converting this data to mp4 is already a next render generation and lossy.

john_dennis wrote on 5/8/2019, 3:57 PM

My SD video captured to DV-AVI is ~30.4 Mbps including PCM audio. When I deinterlace that video to 480-59.94p and convert it to AVC All I-frame at CRF 18 with 320 kbps AAC audio, the bit rate is ~8.3 Mbps.

Considering I'm leaving the house to shoot all afternoon at 100 Mbps, I wouldn't fool with it just to take a generation loss.

If there was a capture device that captured to AVC, I would want it to at least be All I Frame.

xberk wrote on 5/8/2019, 4:50 PM

Thanks guys. These are my neighbors home movies. I guess I'll plug along with VP14's capture, then convert to MP4 for archiving so he won't have to deal with huge files or risk that the AVI files will no longer be supported in future media players.

Musicvid wrote on 5/8/2019, 8:21 PM

Suggestion: they will work best if you run your a/d avi captures through NeatVideo before making mp4s.

I use a DVD set-top recorder for this stuff, because the built in hardware noise reduction works just great, too.

xberk wrote on 5/9/2019, 12:21 AM

>>run your a/d avi captures through NeatVideo before making mp4s.

Yep. Good idea. Some of the low light level stuff looks like noisy video on steroids.

3POINT wrote on 5/9/2019, 12:51 AM

You guys live in a NTSC country, you probably don't see a difference between interlaced and deinterlaced DV recordings due to the higher framerate and the less resolution. I'm living in a PAL country where deinterlaced DV looks choppy on a TV with fast movements, therefore I never deinterlace.