ADVC and Workprinter Xp, Natural Fit? Better Captures?

[tmoceri]

Hi All,

I was looking at the ADVC 300 for other work (transfering VHS, 8mm video etc) and then it dawned on me (duh) that this would be a natural fit to "enhance" 8mm film in real time (I can do color correction and other stuff in Vegas).

It really does some amazing stuff with video tape (VHS) but I'm not sure that applies equally with film (is that a stupid question?).

I guess my question is, does the ADVC300 bring Workprinter transfers to a higher level of quality? There are many manual options available on this unit, does anyone have a suggestion on tweaking it for film transfers?

My current setup is a WorkPrinter XP with a Sony TRV900 - Firewire to a PC running CineMate (Dodcap).

My new setup (if I went the 300 route) would be Workprinter XP with Sony TRV900 S-Video output to ADVC300 output to PC via Firewire (and output S-Video to monitor).

Sounds like the perfect setup, someone correctly me if I'm wrong.

-Tom

[christoph]

My new setup (if I went the 300 route) would be Workprinter XP with Sony TRV900 S-Video output to ADVC300 output to PC via Firewire (and output S-Video to monitor).

Sounds like the perfect setup, someone correctly me if I'm wrong.

you get two DV compression on top of each other this way, not the best idea. specially, in times where most NLE do realtime colorcorrection and i dont really see what this box could do what you couldnt in the computer (admittedly i dont know the canopus box)

a better idea would be to use a really good camera analog camera head which can be had cheap and feed that signal into the canopus, or even better a 4:2:2 uncompressed capture card.

++ christoph ++

[tmoceri]

you get two DV compression on top of each other this way, not the best idea.

Actually, I would be going out of the camera S-Video into the 300 and then out of the 300 to the PC via firewire (DV) so there is only one compression.

As far as realtime cc in an NLE. Who would that be? You may get realtime preview but rendering a cc clip takes time. Going through the ADVC300 is realtime because the captured clip is corrected. Granted that you have much more flexibility doing it in an NLE. But my reasons for using the ADVC300 is for it's awesome TBC functions.

-Tom

[MovieStuff]

As far as realtime cc in an NLE. Who would that be? You may get realtime preview but rendering a cc clip takes time.

Matrox RTX100 has real time color correction and you see it happen on a standard NTSC monitor, just like the rest of the world will see it. No rendering. We use it all the time. Awesome.

Roger
http://www.moviestuff.tv

[tmoceri]

Yep, I've seen it and it really is the Cats Pajamas BUT that is proprietary HW based and I use Vegas.

Roger, given the choice between stragiht DV to the PC or going via the ADVC300 using S-Video (from cam) is the latter a slam dunk?

[MovieStuff]

Yep, I've seen it and it really is the Cats Pajamas BUT that is proprietary HW based and I use Vegas.

But you don't have to. I mean, the RTX100 is about a grand, maybe less, and comes with Premire, DVD authoring software, realtime effects and color correction, etc. I don't know how much the color corrector you are looking at costs but, to me, if it is more than $1000, then the Matrox would be a better bet.

Roger, given the choice between stragiht DV to the PC or going via the ADVC300 using S-Video (from cam) is the latter a slam dunk?

Not sure what you mean. Certainly color correcting in analog color space has its advantages, if you are using a really good color corrector. Canopus makes a really nice conversion box, so I would assume the ADVC300 would do a good job. We use the Y/C out from the 3 chip cameras on the Sniper-Pro units and that seems to work really well. The comparisons I tried on DV cameras doing the same thing showed no perceptible difference in resolution between the Y/C out converted to DV or coming straight from the DV out of the same camera. I'm sure there is some kind of difference but I could not see it with my eye. So if you are wanting to do color correction with the ADVC300 to avoid long render times in Vegas, then I think you'd be okay using the Y/C output of your camera, assuming that it is uncompressed and not a reconstituted analog version of the DV stream, like on the Panasonic DVX100. But I still think you'd be happier in the long run with the Matrox RTX100 system, which would let you have the best of both worlds.

Roger
http://www.moviestuff.tv

[tmoceri]

Color correcting aside, I use the ADVC300 to allow me to capture better video as this unit has built-in algothrims to "clean up" video...

http://www.canopus.us/US/products/ADVC3 ... dvc300.asp

For instance, advanced 3D Y/C separation, 3D noise reduction and Line Time Base Correction (LTBC), Digital 3D noise reduction, Digital Auto Gain Control (AGC).

I'm trying to understand if these algothrims would provide benefit in caputuring 8mm film as apposed to video. Actually the ADVC300 does not even handle traditional color correction (scope, histogram etc). It is a really nice TBC.

Thanks,

-Tom

[son-of-bubba]

Tom,

Please excuse my changing the subject a bit.
I've been using the ADVC 100 for about a year on analog-video xfers.
I've been very satisified but maybe I just don't know any better.

Can the ADV 300 "correct" older analog video that has degraded with time ?
Have you used the ADVC 100 and did you see the difference when you moved to the ADVC 300 ?

Thanks in advance.

Pat De Marco

[tmoceri]

Pat,

Please excuse my changing the subject a bit.

No problem. I have never used the 100 but the 300 does some amazing stuff. Not magic mind you, if the content is not there or frames are corrupted then they will still be there but it really shines in taking out noise while minimizing the loss of detail.

The other great thing is that you can tweak the settings either manually through the HW or via the included SW.

I got mine off eBay slightly used for around $350 so I was a deal. I will experiment to see if it works as will with film transfers.

Good Luck!