Best capture format

I am pretty new at this and would appreciate some help / advice. I am using the following: a Haupauge PVR-150 tuner card and/or a Samsung R120 DVD player recorder. I am basically using the Haupauge tuner and its software to capture the video. I am using Pinnacle Studio 9.4.3 software to edit and record the edited file in DVD format.

My objective is to record my old vhs tapes and camcorder hi-8 tapes (analog) to DVD and retain the best video quality possible.

I have captured some hi-8 tapes with the Haupauge as mpg files, edited them, and recorded them to DVD as VOB files with the Pinnacle studio software. So the final product is a DVD with audio_ts and video_ts folders, and VOB video files.

Questions: 1) Should I capture as AVI files rather than mpg prior to editing, rendering, and copying as a DVD video? Would capturing as AVI retain more quality?

2) How do I put more than one set of DVD videos of a DVD disk? In other words I want to fill up a disk and maybe one video only takes 25% of the disk space. I would like to be able to add videos, but I get the sense if I add more video its going to write over what I already have on the disk.

Thanks in advance for any advice or suggestions you can provide. Denny

 

if you use a codec with avi then the file size will be smaller and greater quality, whereas MPEG the file will be larger with a lesser quality but will already be ready to put on dvd and its more widely accepted cause avi uses codecs...

 

The Haupauge 150 will capture in AVI. So are you saying that's probably what I want to do? I can then edit the AVI clip before recording it as a VOB file on DVD. See I know just enough to be dangerous. Thanks, Denny

 

no probs...
again this is only a suggestion...

PS: welcome to the forums, i am phantom69 and i hope you see you around the forums...

 

In using Pinnacle Studio 9 I've always taken my downloaded avi file and converted over to MPEG II in MainConcept MPEG Encoder first, then I import into Studio and add my chapters and menus and/or adjust the audio as needed. I've done a lot of DVR's to DVD mainly stuff like TV shows. I've been able to get normally 4 jimmy neutrons on one disc with menu's without any loss of quality or integrity.

 

Thanks Phantom for your thoughts.

RP - Why do you convert to MPEG II prior to editing in Pinnacle? Why not bring it in as an AVI file, then output it as an MPEG file... or my Pinnacle records it out as a VOB file. I only ask this so I can understand a little more through these discussions.

I have just started but I have captured some hi-8 tapes with the Haupauge 150 as mpg files, edited them with Pinnacle, and then wrote them to DVD as VOB files. I think VOB is about the same as MPG files? The quality of the DVD's seems very good. It is really fun to take this variety of clips and make them into something with chapters and transitions.

 

I re-encode to MPEG II prior because I like to make sure I see what I have prior to anything I do. I don't want to waste my time finding out later the video sucks. If for some reason the video is chattery or fuzzy, I just say screw it and not waste my time editing the video all together. Overall, just picky I guess.

 

Prove it.

The PVR-150 has a hardware mpeg-2 encoding chip onboard.
Capture at the highest bitrate you can, so your edited file still fits on a disk (roughly 5500kbps VBR for 2 hours).
Use an editor that doesn't re-encode the whole file, only the cutpoints (womble, videoredo, etc.).

 

I have an older model Pinnacle PCTV card vers2.4. I can capture in avi or MPEG 1 and 2. I just prefer to capture in avi. that's all.

 

Rebootjim -

You are right. The Haupauge 150 does not show an AVI capture mode. It was the Pinnacle 9 that shows that you can capture in AVI.

One problem for me is that I can't seem to capture using my Pinnacle 9 software. My capture screen is blank like it does not recognize the signals coming through my PVR-150. But the 150 captures fine. Any thoughts as to why I'm not getting a signal to Pinnacle for capturing?

Thanks for help. Denny

 

I have no idea about Pinnacle. If it can't initialize the card, because it's trying to capture in avi, then you can't do it.
Nerovision has the same problem.
I suggest you use some capture/pvr software that works with mpeg-2 directly from the card, then set it up to use the settings for bitrate that you want.
There are some good mpeg-2 editors around, even free, if you don't mind doing a bit of work.
Demux in PVAStrumento, and edit in Cuttermaran.
Other options all cost money.
What kind of editing do you want to do? Simple cuts, or are you adding fades etc.?

 

I'm not sure I'm ready for the things your talking about, yet. I am just doing simple cuts, deletes, transitions, and adding menus and chapters. Pinnacle makes all of these pretty easy - once you understand how to do them. The quality of the hi-8 I captured as a mpg file and wrote to DVD was very good. I'm just not sure my old vhs tapes played on a VCR to the haupauge tuner will be as good. We'll see. Denny

 

The captures will be as good as the VCR can make them.
If you use a lousy, misaligned VCR, you'll get lousy mpegs.
I'm about half way through digitizing 250+ VHS tapes. The first 100 or so I did with my Canopus ADVC-110 and Mainconcept. I've switched to using my Hauppauge cards, and the quality is virtually identical, at far less than half the time.
I demux in PVAStrumento, edit with Cuttermaran, and author with DVDLab Pro (here's where I do all my chapters).
There's nothing terribly complicated about any of these, and they're probably easier to learn and use than Pinnacle, without any of the software re-encoding my videos.