Video versus DVD query

[coachmann]

Having been briefly involved commercially in railway video production in the 1990s, something puzzles me. Prior to digital I filmed on Hi-8 video @ 400 lines and produced a master on a S-VHS editting machine. Ordinarry VHS tape birckwalls at around 250 lines and so thats what the customer got from my master tape. I have been told there is no such loss of quality when transferring to DVD.

 

As it is awkward to have a video player wired up to my TV these days I decided to buy a couple of DVD's instead of video cassettes from railway video producer I usually by from, but was dissapointed to find the picture quality was hardly better than on tape.

 

If a video producer has mastered on ¾in U-matic, I presume this is of very high quality (600 lines?). I expect the quality to drop to 250 lines if copied onto normal video tape for retail, but surely if copied onto a DVD disc then there should be no loss of quality (?) and the customer should get far better picture quality than on a video.

 

I wonder if anyone in the know could comment as to why we are not seeing much better quaity on DVDs than tapes.

[Metr0Land]

Where to start? Afraid this is one of those 'how long's a piece of string?' answers. Without knowing what original equipment the material was filmed on, and how it was manipulated there are so many possible answers.

 

Professional just means they're getting paid for it - look at all the 'professionally weathered' model railway items on a well known auction site. Having the same equipment as Coachman doesn't mean you'll get as good a coach at the end of it, and it's the same with video. 'Lossless' only applied to certain methods - HD certainly isn't lossless - and you're assuming 3/4in U-matic? Don't assume anything!!!!! Then there's the quality of mass production dvd's where the end copy may not to be the same standard as the master.

 

You're right to assume that material on Hi8/S-VHS should deliver 400 lines and that should be easily achievable on DVD. Mini-DV should give around 500 lines and that should be achieveable on dvd also. When Mini-DV was the main thing, and editing on home pc's became possible this was touted as being lossless and this was generally true.

 

However, along came HD and the term lossless was quietly dropped, though people assume that because we once had lossless editing, everything would just get better and better.It's a bit like assuming spray painting will be better than brush. Some brush painters can do better than some sprayers - it's about the equipment and who's handling it!

 

I don't mean to malign the many on here who may be having to balance budgets to get a decent camera, but many of the HD cameras you see people using these days are quite puny, and often the lens isn't top-drawer. For true HD, the camera would need to write something like 95MB PER SECOND to disc/tape which is just impossible unless you can afford professional broadcast quailty kit. There's a very clever standard called AVCHD (a codec) which actually compresses things to write at approx 5Mb per sec which is actually very good and de-compresses well (on good equipment) but it is not lossless. This puts it well within the capabilties of camcorders and pc's and I certainly wouldn't knock it, it's a great compromise - but it is a compromise.

 

Most editing these days (even from originals on tape) is done on pc. Which editing prog has been used for the editing? You can vary from say 50 quid to 500 and beyond. Some of the cheaper progs are excellent value for money, some less so, but all the cheaper ones will have some kind of compromise. You can see where this is leading. A little but of compromise at each stage can end up with an ultimate poor end product. Just like if you skimped a teeny bit at each stage building your coaches.

 

The there's writing the master copy which these days will tend to be on a dvd (though truly professional ones will use a glass master?) What speed/quality has the master been written at? Most progs auto-tune this for you. Ideally you want to override this and create your dvd's at 7K bits per sec (though you need to be careful you don't distort sound). Was the master done like this? If multiple copies were run from the master, were they 'printed' at the same quality?

 

 

Then there's the issue of trying to squeeze too much onto the disc. In order to get perceived value for money, some producers are putting more and more material (ie minutes) onto a dvd. You only have a certain amount of free megabytes on the disc. More minutes (beyond a certain level) means squeezing the quality. Without knowing which product you have in mind it's very difficult to give specific feedback but I suspect it's this last one which may be driving the lower quality.

 

If you have a home dvd recorder these days you typically get say 4 settings: 1 hour, 2 hours, 4 hours, 8 hours. The disc has a finite capacity so the only way you can squeeze more on is to lower the quality.

[Metr0Land]

I knew there was something I'd overlooked. With full HD equipment needs to process 95MB/sec, the way the AVCHD gets round this is:

 

PAL broadcast system uses 25 frames per sec. For consumer HD camcoders to be able to cope, the AVCHD algorithm only processes full data from 3 of the 25 frames. In the other 22 frames they just reference the changes between frames. It is very clever (and certainly does my head in trying to understand the finer details!) Upon decompressing more clever technology tries to recreate the full data (depending on your editing software).

 

It is not lossless as it never captured the full data in the first place - however (depending on how much you try and squeeze onto a disc) it CAN be very good indeed (or naff if you try and squeeze 90 mins onto a disc)

[coachmann]

Thanks very much for this very comprehensive answer. The videos I buy mostly of are from B&R. They are not the best cine to video transfer but the old steam material is the magnet. Sound dubbing is pretty damn good and more thoughtful than most, but I just presumed the PQ would improve if the master was copying onto DVD istead of tape. The best PQ from old cine to video I've ever seen was on DVD's produced by DeAgostini for the 'British Steam Railways' series and I have felt it a shame other producers didn't have the same high quality. Stirling video and Railscene also feature a pretty good cine to video transfer IMO.

 

Replacing my favourite videos with DVD's is a must now. Thanks again for your reply, as at least I have a better understanding of the background and why the transfer onto DVD isnt as good as I had hoped for.

[Metr0Land]

You're welcome. Another thing to note is that when eg model shops play dvd's (or videos as it then was) of old material like B&R etc it can be very nostalgic, but the shop tv is invariably say 14". When you get home and play it through a larger tv, it never seems as good as in the shop!

[Metr0Land]

Sorry I seem to be hogging this thread. Another thought re B&R (I have some of their material). Most of their source material was on 8mm cine. It could well be the case that when it was transferred to VHS they'd squeezed as much quality as possible out of the source material and putting it on dvd can't give you any more quality than was on video, as the original doesn't have it to give.

[Adrian Wintle]

I've seen the same sort of thing with other DVDs of older footage. In some of those cases it is obvious that the only 'master' they had was a copy of the video tape, so they made the DVD copy from the existing video, so it is at best the same quality as the VHS release.

 

Adrian

[coachmann]

I've seen the same sort of thing with other DVDs of older footage. In some of those cases it is obvious that the only 'master' they had was a copy of the video tape, so they made the DVD copy from the existing video, so it is at best the same quality as the VHS release.

 

Adrian

Yes, this was another thought I had if they didnt want their videos to look inferior. But it occurs to me producers would be better off showing their DVD's are an improvement in PQ, as they are less expensive to package and post.

[MJI]

I am late to this but have some information.

 

Umatic was not THAT good, better than domestic but not a lot better, good enough when mastering onto domestic cassette formats.

 

SVHS was 400 line B&W resolution but colour was still ordinary Vhs resolution - ie poor.

 

I have done a few tapes in the past shot on Beta, edited on SuperBeta, then final copies on whatever.

 

My final copies were better than people who used Vhs throughout.

 

Editing on PC, done it with old captures and also Mini DV, now all home formats are lossy, the least lossy being (Mini) DV with 5:1 (I think) compression on colour.

 

MPEG encoding for DVD, not all encoders are created equal, being able to do two pass variable bit rate makes a world of difference, I reckon no more than 90 minutes on a single layer before over compression ruins things, also older tapes need MORE bit rate to handle the noise.

 

Now I have edited

Beta->SuperBeta->Beta/Vhs

Beta->PC as DV->MPEG2->DVD

MiniDV->PC->MPEG2->DVD

HDV->PC->BluRay

 

Tape to tape was painful but was rewarding, using a PC increased final product quality a lot, basically barely worse than original. Some of my material is on a history of the Glos Warwicks Railway, mine is the better of the old footage and is also the right frame sequence.

 

DV is great for PC usage but you still need a good encoder, not as critical as handling older footage. But final quality is good, I hope I am not the only person who uses a tripod and edits their holiday videos.

 

Now to HDV, probably the best of the domestics. A PITA to edit, my last edit was a wreck, but final wuality should be indistinguashable from original as HDV uses MPEG2.

 

But you can only edit to half a second accuracy (2 I frames a second), my package uses a SD copy to edit, anything else inserted (mobile phone footage in this case) messes up the output for the rest of the recording. Then finally the burning software messed up the sound timing by 3 seconds! To rescue this one I need to cut the final copy off at the end of the mobile footage, then edit the rest back on. As to sound no isea at present, I just copied the pre burn copy onto the PS3 HDD instead.

 

But basically with DVD it can be very variable, using a retail Vhs copy and packaged MPEG2 encoder in your cheap edit package is different to using the original footage, PC edited and two pass variable bit rate with a better encoder (I quite like TMPGEnc XP).

[Pacific231G]

I am late to this but have some information.

 

Umatic was not THAT good, better than domestic but not a lot better, good enough when mastering onto domestic cassette formats.

 

SVHS was 400 line B&W resolution but colour was still ordinary Vhs resolution - ie poor.

 

I have done a few tapes in the past shot on Beta, edited on SuperBeta, then final copies on whatever.

 

My final copies were better than people who used Vhs throughout.

 

Editing on PC, done it with old captures and also Mini DV, now all home formats are lossy, the least lossy being (Mini) DV with 5:1 (I think) compression on colour.

 

MPEG encoding for DVD, not all encoders are created equal, being able to do two pass variable bit rate makes a world of difference, I reckon no more than 90 minutes on a single layer before over compression ruins things, also older tapes need MORE bit rate to handle the noise.

 

Now I have edited

Beta->SuperBeta->Beta/Vhs

Beta->PC as DV->MPEG2->DVD

MiniDV->PC->MPEG2->DVD

HDV->PC->BluRay

 

Tape to tape was painful but was rewarding, using a PC increased final product quality a lot, basically barely worse than original. Some of my material is on a history of the Glos Warwicks Railway, mine is the better of the old footage and is also the right frame sequence.

 

DV is great for PC usage but you still need a good encoder, not as critical as handling older footage. But final quality is good, I hope I am not the only person who uses a tripod and edits their holiday videos.

 

 

When it was introduced DV was supposed to be a new consumer format to replace Hi-8 & VHS etc. but rather to Sony's horror, when they produced their first DV camera, the VX-1000, broadcast producers (including me) grabbed them to make programmes.  

 

One real positive compared with the then current analogue formats is that if you have an editor on your PC that works with the "native" DV files - in other words the same data stream that was recorded onto the tape-  then in theory even with a fairly cheap editor you should get no loss of quality at all through the process so long as you stay within DV. When hard disk space was more expensive than it is now we actually did quite a lot of initial work by editing back and forth between recorders only putting it on a computer when the rushes had been well boiled down.

 

We tested this for a BBC project when DV was very new and transferred footage back and forth between recorders via a firewire datalink about fifteen times with no visible difference (there may have been a few corrected digital dropouts but we couldn't see them)  When we did the same thing via the S-video link the quality deteriorated fairly quickly as the pictures were being decoded from DV to PAL and encoded back to DV on each pass.  The lesson from this with any digital editing system was to get the material into the format the editor (normally a PC these days) will use as soon as possible - preferably in the camera- and keep it there through the entire post-production process only transcoding it to make the final output.

 

The oddest thing I found was that when transferring VHS material that some clients had supplied as archive to DV, it actually looked better after it had been transferred than when played from the original tape. In terms of information that's obviously impossible but I think the DV encoder was losing some of the noise in the picture and generally tidying up the signal.

 

DV and HDV work by compressing each frame individually so each frame (25 per second in PAL) is a discrete entity and you can edit to the frame (you sometimes need a higher accuracy than that for very fine audio editing but most picture editors don't seem to know that) Most compression systems work across multiple frames so when they are edited it's far harder to keep the same quality as the editing process may involve decompression and recompression.

Colour is fairly crude in all three analogue broadcast systems (but not as bad as VHS !!) they all work by producing a good luminance signal (B&W) and then splashing on the colour.  Beta was technically a better system than VHS and was adapted for professional broadcast use as Beta SP but even that looks fairly rough compared with digital formats.  In the early 1990s I did use Hi-8 for some self shot items for a BBC programme and, admittedly in good summer daylight and mostly with a tripod, got results that my editor found comparable with the then standard Beta SP used for day to day filming.

 

I recently saw a demonstration of NHK's SHV system which has sixteen times the picture quality of HD and on a large screen is fairly mind blowing. The buzz in the industry is that higher definition 2D will knock 3D television out of the running.

[MJI]

I forgot to say with HDV it uses MPEG2 but the same resolution and codec is part of BluRay specifications, so doesn't need recoding, however my current package can get confuse when recoding large bits of non HDV footage.

[coachmann]

I'm afraid it has all gone beyond the limits of my knowledge and understanding but it made for interesting reading for all that. When I buy a new PC I will require to purchase a good video transfer package.

 

I aim to download digital movie from a digital camera to the PC and edit it. I also aim to eventually edit my old Video-8 and Hi-8 stuff once it has been transferred to DVD's. Which pretty decent programme should I be buying please?

[Metr0Land]

I recently saw a demonstration of NHK's SHV system which has sixteen times the picture quality of HD and on a large screen is fairly mind blowing. The buzz in the industry is that higher definition 2D will knock 3D television out of the running.

 

Not surprising.  Isn't 3D just two lots of SD but the eye brain stitches it together making it SEEM better than it really is?

[Metr0Land]

I'm afraid it has all gone beyond the limits of my knowledge and understanding but it made for interesting reading for all that. When I buy a new PC I will require to purchase a good video transfer package.

 

I aim to download digital movie from a digital camera to the PC and edit it. I also aim to eventually edit my old Video-8 and Hi-8 stuff once it has been transferred to DVD's. Which pretty decent programme should I be buying please?

 

 

Oh dear - another set of answers full of ifs and buts for you coachman!

 

For many years I used Pinnacle Studio in various version numbers which was a good 'fifty quid editing program'.  However, some people couldn't get on with this and much preferred Adobe Premiere (Light?) which I didn't like.  If you can, try out a friend's software if you have someone with such progs on their pc.  They are usually quite intuitive – the main issues for you would then be getting the material into the pc.  DON’T use Windows Movie Maker unless it’s to have a very  early play with it to get the feel of editing.  I can’t really speak for i-Movie on Macs but the little I’ve played with this makes me think you should also avoid this unless it’s for very baby steps into editing.  (Ducks for cover from Mac devotees).

 

Before we get technical it's a good investment to just try a 'fifty quid prog' at first and then if you think it's worth it, buy something better.  I use Sony Vegas but I've been shooting video since 1988 and editing on pc since about 1998 (when it was really leading edge on pc's!!!)

 

You need to understand how the source material is getting onto your pc. 

 

Modern pc's aren't generally sold with Firewire ports (IEEE1394 sockets).  The kids in Dixons will tell you you don't need it.  Hmmm well if you buy a current consumer camcorder you don't.  They record to cards and you copy the data on the card to the pc as a kind of batch job.  If you’re using a new camcorder or copying from DVD you don’t need it but see later.

 

I must admit I’ve never tried to copy material from DVD into my editing progs as there are too many banana skins to slip on, principally your footage may stutter when you’ve captured from DVD and then put it through further editing.  I don’t know if others can answer re copying from DVD?  I’d strongly recommend you try and find someone who has such a prog and have a ‘try before buy’ if you intend to capture from DVD.

 

If you find you need to go back to original footage (if you have it) you’re into another ball game.  Afraid I can’t help with cine – my world starts with VHS (or Sony’s Video 8).  Although Sony can be a PITA at times (though I’ve had some Panasonic camcorders) I’ve stuck with Sony throughout in terms of format.

 

Thus I’ve gone from Video 8 to Hi-8 to Digital 8 to Mini-DV to HDV.  The beauty of this is I have tapes all the way back to 1988 and have a variety of camcorders I use as slaves to transfer the material to pc and can use all my old footage without going through intermediate stages.

 

Now the next problem.  If you want to use a camcorder to get ‘film’ onto your pc you need a Firewire port on your camcorder and your pc (otherwise known as IEEE1394 connections). 

Normal PC leads like USB cannot stream data fast enough.  A Firewire connector lets you encode (assuming your pc and software allow) data at up to 8Mb per sec – continuously if needed.  (Note: there is no such thing as a workable USB-Firewire connection (at least not at an affordable price) there are USB/Firewire leads but they don’t work).  So if you’re transferring in this manner your pc needs to have a Firewire card in it (which will then have the appropriate socket on the outside.

 

Modern pc’s in Dixons etc don’t have Firewire cards.  You need to specify one (if they will fit it into those they supply).  The pc I’m typing this on was specified by me last year for video and photo work (I won’t bore you will all the details but Firewire card ESSENTIAL).

 

If all this is getting a bit of a morass – I can only re-iterate it’s WELL worth seeking out someone who can walk you through this on an actual pc.  Alternatively come back on here.

 

Confused?  You will be!

[MJI]

OK may be worth a self build, firewire cards are not that expensive, any Mini DV camera with video in will do analogue to DV format.

 

I also used Sony cameras exclusively

 

HVC4000P/SLF1 then TRV33 now HC9

 

If you are stuck,I could transfer to a USB HDD for you, just need a USB HDD and a camera to play back if Video 8 Hi8 or SVhs, DV and Beta no problem.

 

Going back to original footage is always best

 

This is old material newly captured but reencoded to fit on youtube, youtube reduced the resolution from SD to 360

 

 

[coachmann]

Martin, good to hear a proper (directional?) mike in use on the above footage. I aim to look around for a Hi-8 camcorder to use as a playback machine, as I too only have Video 8 and Hi-8 original material. I have kept yours and Metr0lands replies for future reference.

[Revolution Mike]

Modern pc’s in Dixons etc don’t have Firewire cards.  You need to specify one (if they will fit it into those they supply).  The pc I’m typing this on was specified by me last year for video and photo work (I won’t bore you will all the details but Firewire card ESSENTIAL).

 

Isn't Firewire pretty much dead now (or at least on its way out)? USB 3.0 and Thunderbolt would seem to have overtaken it and even Apple have been dropping Firewire.

 

Cheers, Mike

[Metr0Land]

Red Death not sure I understand 'where you're coming from'?

 

Coachman has old material on Video 8 and Hi8.  He can't put his tapes in anything that has a USB 3 output socket so it's of no use/relevance to him that a current build pc might have a USB3.0 input socket on it even if it is capable of carrying fatser data than Firewire.

 

BTW am unclear if USB 3.0 allows CONTINUOUS capture of data?  This was always the problem woith USB versus Firewire in that USB will transfer the data in packets as an when it felt like it whereas Firewire allowed continuous encoding.  I haven't got USB3.0 so prepared to accept I'm wrong.

 

Ref Apple dropping Firewire - that's no help to anyone with a camcorder that has Firewire outputs and another reason I stayed with PC last year when I upgraded.  Would have loved to move to Mac but it'll be another several years before Apple gets a chance to get any money from me!

[MJI]

Martin, good to hear a proper (directional?) mike in use on the above footage. I aim to look around for a Hi-8 camcorder to use as a playback machine, as I too only have Video 8 and Hi-8 original material. I have kept yours and Metr0lands replies for future reference.

Well done for noticing it

 

Yes it was and I need a mic for my HC9 as handling noise is annoying.

 

The addon mic I used was quite good, but slow tape speed were useless for audio, I did a few concert recordings, it was only OK, but unique footage

[MJI]

Isn't Firewire pretty much dead now (or at least on its way out)? USB 3.0 and Thunderbolt would seem to have overtaken it and even Apple have been dropping Firewire.

 

Cheers, Mike

No, firewire is a guaranteed speed, also no tape based - ie real time camera system uses USB.

 

D8 the digital version of Video 8 - would be ideal for Larry for playing back his V8 stuff to PC.

 

DV THE standard, digital standard definition tape format.

 

HDV the 1440x1080i version of DV.

 

These are all firewire based, I bought a card when I rebuilt the PC.

[MJI]

Just thought my first 14" TV has cost me the best part of 10k over a LONG time.

 

Wanted a VCR, my dad got a Sanyo, found same format made by the TV manufacturer.

 

Wanted a bigger TV - no question

 

Wanted digital TV and a flat CRT - what else but

 

Video camera - why not

 

DVD

 

Home cinema receiver oh look it got good reveiws

 

Games console - see the pattern?

 

HDTV - hmm

[MJI]

Red Death not sure I understand 'where you're coming from'?

 

Coachman has old material on Video 8 and Hi8.  He can't put his tapes in anything that has a USB 3 output socket so it's of no use/relevance to him that a current build pc might have a USB3.0 input socket on it even if it is capable of carrying fatser data than Firewire.

 

BTW am unclear if USB 3.0 allows CONTINUOUS capture of data?  This was always the problem woith USB versus Firewire in that USB will transfer the data in packets as an when it felt like it whereas Firewire allowed continuous encoding.  I haven't got USB3.0 so prepared to accept I'm wrong.

 

Ref Apple dropping Firewire - that's no help to anyone with a camcorder that has Firewire outputs and another reason I stayed with PC last year when I upgraded.  Would have loved to move to Mac but it'll be another several years before Apple gets a chance to get any money from me!

Home rebuilt XP PC was a no brainer for me.

 

I still use some DOS tools, I have a quad core chip and some lovely 1TB Samsung drives.

[Metr0Land]

MJI am unclear, are you saying you have or have not an external mic for your HC9?   Reason for asking is I have an A1E as my main camera and got Sony ECM-MSD1 mic for it (just over £55 at Amazon) and this is excellent ( was recommended by another train filmer).

 

I have an HC7 as a handycam and use it as a slave indoors but there's no way I can see of attcaching the ECM-MSD1 mic to it.  I was wondering how you attach an external mic to your HC9 which is similar?

[MJI]

I had an external microphone on my HVC4000P (camera for SLF1UB) but the HC9 microphone is not very good.

 

I have had 3 video cameras over 27 years

[MJI]

Oh there is a shoe for a microphone and a microphone input.