Newbie Needs Help

jkastrinos wrote on 6/6/2003, 8:24 PM

Hi, looking for help. I have installed Vegas 4.0c and I am totally green. I have to produce a music video for my band in a short time period. I have VHS of the band and CD Audio. Hardware: GeForce4 Ti 4600, XP Pro, P4 2.4 gig, about 60gig of disk space. I know the first stab will be crap but I have to do it anyway. But I am STUCK!

Using the Video Capture program, I have tried several different options to capture from my VHS player. Everything looks great in the Video Preview window but when I save the capture, a large white horizontal band covers the main portion of the video. If I view the video outside of Vegas with Windows Media player, the band is still there. I have tried to search the forums and can't find anything on this problem.

Can someone provide some guidance. Thanks in advance.
Jkastrinos

Comments

vicmilt wrote on 6/6/2003, 9:03 PM

It sounds like you have a sync problem - what are you using to interface between the VHS output, and the DV input?

farss wrote on 6/6/2003, 9:15 PM

Or it may be macrovision but thats unlikely if it seems OK in the preview window, I assume its a tape you made yourself?

Your not going to get good quality coming off VHS at the best of times by the way.

Thats just the way VHS is I'm afraid.

sdmoore wrote on 6/6/2003, 9:17 PM

What codec are you using to capture? I'm wondering whether you're using a 'demo' codec which may have restricted write capability. Try using a different codec.

Scott

jkastrinos wrote on 6/6/2003, 10:58 PM

Thanks for the quick replies:

"It sounds like you have a sync problem - what are you using to interface between the VHS output, and the DV input?" I have my VHS player connected directly to the GeForce4 card. It came with a S-Video/Composite combo plug. I am using the Composite jacks.

"Or it may be macrovision but thats unlikely if it seems OK in the preview window, I assume its a tape you made yourself?" It was recorded by Full Sail Studios in Florida and dumped to VHS.

"What codec are you using to capture? I'm wondering whether you're using a 'demo' codec which may have restricted write capability. Try using a different codec." The nVida WDM Video Capture device (listed in the Device Manager of XP) provides a list of codecs. There are only 2 that display correctly in the preview window: NTCS_M and NTCS_M_J. I tried both and get the same results. I just updated the Video card drivers with 5/14/203 release from nVidia and still get the same results. I have looked for any other obvious setting or option and can't find anything.

Does anyone have any other suggestions?
TIA

vicmilt wrote on 6/7/2003, 11:02 AM

Don't have any experience with the GeoForce card -
depending on how much you are going to import VHS, you might:
1. Copy VHS to DV tape (if your camera supports this) and then import DV
2. Buy or borrow outboard converter, like the Canopus (can't remember exact model number but it had a 100 in it).

sdmoore wrote on 6/7/2003, 7:39 PM

Hmm, I think farss is right when he suggests it might be macrovision. I've just had a look on the net and found others with the same problem - i.e. a white bar/box on captured footage. Maybe the capture driver doesn't add it when previewing but only when saving it to disk.

Scott

sdmoore wrote on 6/7/2003, 7:53 PM

Had another look on the net and many people are using nVidia's WDM capture driver v1.08 since this appears to ignore macrovision. You can get it here http://download.nvidia.com/Windows/WDM/NVIDIA_WDM_1.08.exe

jkastrinos wrote on 6/7/2003, 8:23 PM

THANKS SCOTT!!!

No, really, thanks. I kept working with it and I was only able to get a clip without the white band if I recorded at PAL 25fps. I thought everything was great until I viewed the playback of the AVI clips. The video was faster than live and the audio was twice as slow as live. In frustration, I came back to the net and saw your thread. I loaded the driver and now everything works correctly (correctly as my green-ness can tell).

Where did you find the forum messages about the white band? I am usually pretty good about finding newsgroup threads (from the programming day job) but couldn't find anything.

Thanks again and I am sure I will end up posting more things that have me baffled.

John

sdmoore wrote on 6/7/2003, 9:51 PM

Hurrah! Glad you've got it working. I did a search on Google and deja and found "http://forums.afterdawn.com/thread_view.cfm/27720" and "http://groups.google.com/groups?selm=3e064691.952498960%40news.mindspring.com&oe=UTF-8&output=gplain" among others

I think I remember seeing something that the very latest nVidia drivers may not work correctly with the 1.08 WDM Capture driver so I'd recommend keeping a copy of your current drivers before updating them in case you need to go back to them.

Cheers,

Scott