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davidg4781

macrumors 68030
Original poster
Oct 28, 2006
2,797
396
Alice, TX
Ok, so I'm converting home movies from VHS to DVD. I recorded them from the VCR using EyeTV 250 plus, all the while assuming I'm using the best quality. Here's my problem....

In EyeTV, it plays pretty good. I exported it as a .dv file to edit in iMovie, and when I play the actual file, it looks interlaced (or deinterlaced) very bad (I can see the lines throughout the whole video just about). Also, along the left and right side, there's wavy black lines, like the tape was moving around. In the EyeTV player, it's not there.

When I play it in iMovie '09, the the black wavy lines are there, and you can't see the interlacing (or deinterlacing), but the quality is very poor.

I do have iMovie HD, is that something I should try working with instead? I messed around with it earlier today, and honestly, I think '09 seems to make more sense as far as usability, although it may be because that was the first time I've ever opened iMovie HD.

I'd like to put up pics on here...do I just attach them or do I need to post them to photobucket and put up links?
 

davidg4781

macrumors 68030
Original poster
Oct 28, 2006
2,797
396
Alice, TX
I'm only seeing the interlacing in the export...when it's in iMovie '09, there isn't any, but the quality's bad...maybe that's why. What do I use to transcode? Something like Handbrake?

Would it be best to just rerecord the whole thing and start from scratch?

Here are some pics.....I couldn't take a picture with it playing in iMovie, so I exported it and took the picture in iTunes. Hopefully y'all can see the detail in the pics.
 

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MisterMe

macrumors G4
Jul 17, 2002
10,709
69
USA
...when it's in iMovie '09, there isn't any, but the quality's bad...maybe that's why. What do I use to transcode? Something like Handbrake?

Would it be best to just rerecord the whole thing and start from scratch?

...
The quality of the digital copy cannot be better than the source material. VHS tape recordings have only about 220 lines of resolution. S-VHS may get up to about 330. Depending on the quality of the recording equipment and the media, you can expect every VHS recording to lie somewhere between these two extremes. On a CRT-based TV set, VHS looks OK. On a computer monitor, all of its deficiencies are clear for all to see.

Long story short--your eyeTV conversions are about as good as they can be.
 

davidg4781

macrumors 68030
Original poster
Oct 28, 2006
2,797
396
Alice, TX
The quality of the digital copy cannot be better than the source material. VHS tape recordings have only about 220 lines of resolution. S-VHS may get up to about 330. Depending on the quality of the recording equipment and the media, you can expect every VHS recording to lie somewhere between these two extremes. On a CRT-based TV set, VHS looks OK. On a computer monitor, all of its deficiencies are clear for all to see.

Long story short--your eyeTV conversions are about as good as they can be.

I understand that. I'm not looking for great quality. My concern is the .dv file that iMovie is using is a lot lower quality than the actual VHS tape. My question is, is this something that maybe EyeTV exported or could this be the original one. I'm kind of new at this, but I don't understand how I can take a 538MB .mpg file, export it to 2.3GB .dv file, and end up with interlacing along with degraded quality.

Could I have had a wrong setting from the beginning?
 
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