Poor quality image from Digibeta

Philuk wrote on 9/17/2005, 2:06 AM

Hi

I know I might be asking too much, but can anyone help me with this issue. I’ve shot on Digibeta, then pushed the pictures and sound out of the camera, through the composite video out (BNC) and audio out (XLR or cannon). Which is then pushed through a Sony PC120 miniDV camcorder (without recording, just using it as a DV encoder.) via firewire onto my computer.

The issue I have is one of quality, when I burn a DVD and ‘Print to tape’ copy of the final video, there’s quite a bit of quality loss. The colours are a little washed, the picture detail has suffered and there’s some strobing or slight flickering on some of the pans. Another issue aside, how do you introduced the ‘reduce flicker’ function to all the timeline, rather than each individual section?

I’m rendering with the DVD Architect PAL widescreen, web stream setting. (I’ve read John Meyers newsletter re not using the default settings.) The miniDV copy produced is marginally better than a DVD, but considering the original format the quality hasn’t transferred on either

Is my problem one of the set-up, by pushing a composite signal through a DV camera and loosing the quality there? Or have I set up the rendering incorrectly?

Any help would be very much appreciated.

Phil

Comments

farss wrote on 9/17/2005, 2:14 AM

Why, oh why are you sending DB out on a composite connection?
You could have saved a bundle and shot on VHS if you want to do that.
If you're strapped for cash get a Sony J30 to play out the DB via firewire and capture from that.
If you have the budget, get a Decklink card and capture via SDI but you'll need fast disk arrays to handle the data rate but that way you'll retain 99.5% of the original DB quality.
Bob.

Philuk wrote on 9/17/2005, 5:37 AM

Thanks Bob, the reason for the composite is I actually own the camera and thought it was a cheap way of getting DB onto Vegas. As for the J30, last time I looked they where around £9K, and to be honest I'm waiting till Sony pull's it's finger out and release HDXDcam. So I would rather put my cash that way.

Phil

farss wrote on 9/17/2005, 6:27 AM

J30 not cheap but way cheaper than full DB deck. One could consider hiring the J30, no?
I do work for a hire company to be honest, unless you've got a LOT of work for high end gear hiring it does make a lot of sense.
I think the problem with high end cameras is they're not designed to work as VCRs, I remember an old SP camera we had that you couldn't even get a color signal out of, just B&W.
Thing with DB I suspect is the read head stacks are pretty expensive as there's lots of them, I seriously doubt if the camera has the full compliment of heads used in the VCRs so apart from anything else you might be missing out on the error recovery built into DB. Also I doubt if Sony put a major effort into the composite video output on the camera. If the camera has a SDI output you could feed that into a Decklink card or even use an SDI to DV bridge such as the SD Connect.
Bob.