Dear friends,

Any possibilities I've tried in Panasonic Plug-In version mpeg encoder, but I can never get rid of those dummy little squares... I know that happened to many of us, but never know why it didn't happen to VCDs which are sold at the VCD store.

Will somebody kind enough to explain me about this ? Are the VCD store using a very high-end most expensive capture card ? What makes different if I already can capture 352x288, no drop frames, 44100 Khz audio AVI file (and previewing this AVI look as nice as from the tape) with them ?

Sorry for my stupid question, because I'm hopeless on how to make the blockiness dissapear.

Thanks, Sunar.

-- Sunar Karjadi (rekotomo@denpasar.wasantara.net.id), July 10, 2000

Answers

The pixelization that you are experiencing is caused by your capture size. You are capturing in 352X288. What would help reduce the pixelization is to capture twice that resolution (or the highest resolution supported by your capture card), then resize with your MPEG encoding software. The retail VCDs look very good because they may be using professional encoder cards (Optibase...) and film (telecine to VCD as they would with a DVD) as the source (as opposed to a VCR).

-- Mr.Ian Roswell (cyberlien51@juno.com), July 10, 2000.

I can capture at 352x288 PAL with very little or no blockiness so I don't think the problem is there. You are in fact using Panasonic (plug-in, you say? for what app?) so you should get very acceptable quality. You didn't say what video source material you are attempting to capture. VHS? Capturing VHS without filtering, whether during capture or AVI2MPEG encoding, can produce blockiness, the severity of which is related to just how noisy your original VHS material is. VHS IS inherently noisy. Commercial VCDs would probably have been sourced from a D1 tape which is why they look good. Panasonic has settings for various levels of noise reduction and motion compensation. have you tried tweaking them??

-- EMartinez (epmartinez@yahoo.com), July 11, 2000.

What settings do you use with the panasonic and for what type of imput files. I usually use none to weak noise reduction and video filter of adaptive moderate.

-- klebsiella (klebsiella@visto.com), July 12, 2000.

VHS we can't avoid, can we, so if it is to be the source material, the first thing is, use a top-class VCR. By this I mean at least a middle-of-the-line S-VHS-ET machine (from JVC or Philips, most of which can be had in the US$300 range). If you can afford it get a VCR with a TBC. DO NOT use a $50 mono, two-head, department store special (and think you can get away with it). Use the S-video connection. If you can, (HDD space and capture card abilities permitting), capture full- or half-res. I did say I capture at quarter-res 352x288 but that is because the source was a legit S-VHS-C camcorder-shot tape. When you're ready to encode, use weak to medium noise reduction. Motion compensation depends on the video content. If it's a sports program for example you use full-pixel and interpolation,etc. The help in Panasonic explains these variables. Why don't you get a 30- sec. representative clip and encode it using different settings with Panasonic?? You can see what direction quality is going in this manner.

-- EMartinez (epmartinez@yahoo.com), July 12, 2000.

Many thanks for friends who contributed the answers of my question. Yes, I know the source is really impact for the VCD result. My source is JVC-GRDVF21 Dig-Cam, but I use the s-video, capture it at 352x288 then encode with Panasonice Plug-In in Premiere. I like using the plug-in because I can do so much editing. Yes I've tried 30 sec for every option, then I know every option has each compensation....sharp but a bit blocky or smooth but blurry....well - well -well...:) Or will it be better if I capture at 352x566 ?

Thank you once again for all your informations.

Regards, Sunar.

-- Sunar Karjadi (rekotomo@denpasar.wasantara.net.id), July 14, 2000.