I transferred about an hour of VHS video to my PC, using the VC500 video capture USB dongle. I selected the avi option (as opposed to the default DVD option). The file is large, 447 GB. After editing in Vegas Pro 12, rendered using Main Concept MPEG-2 > DVD Architect NTSC video stream. Burned a DVD, it played back fine, EXCEPT that any motion has a very jagged, staircase effect. I rendered using variable bit rate, 2-pass, Maximum 9,500,000, Average 6,000,000, Minimum 192,000. What did I do wrong? The "staircase" appearance is not acceptable. Should I have used DVD Architect NTSC 24p video stream?

Thanks!!!

sounds like field order. did you check it?

In the past I would play the tape in using a VCR going thru a pass thru, either a DV deck or later after the deck died, I used a camera. FW into the computer and captured using either Vegas capture utility or Scenalyzer. Keeping in mind the VHS is 240 lines to begin with I would really not expect to much more than what you have but as Leslie said, check the field order and keep your fingers crossed.

Don,

The "240-line" resolution that you have listed for VHS is the effective horizontal resolution, in lines per picture height. All SD video - analog or digital - has an actual vertical resolution of 480 lines. For VHS, at 250 lines per picture height of effective horizontal resolution, translates into an effective total resolution of 330x480 with a pixel aspect ratio of 1.9394. Thus, with the best standard VHS recordings, one has less than half the picture information of a good digital SD video to begin with.

and that's why VHS transfers so well Right? ;-) Sorry but VHS is crap, always has been and will always be. No amount of futzing with it in any NLE will make it better than what it is. I was just saying that with the lower resolution that VHS has having bad looking "jaggies" in motion/movement doesn't surprise or shock me and frankly there is probably little one can do to make it look any better.

Any analog video is interlaced by default and must be captured to maintain quality in full D1 resolution (720x576), SuperCIF (704x576) or SVCD (480x576) or corresponding resolutions for NTSC. Some hardvare also allows capture in 352x576 resolution. (I'm from PAL-land).
Prefered resolution for editing is full D1. After editing resolution can be changed to desired.

and that's why VHS transfers so well Right? ;-) Sorry but VHS is crap, always has been and will always be. No amount of futzing with it in any NLE will make it better than what it is. I was just saying that with the lower resolution that VHS has having bad looking "jaggies" in motion/movement doesn't surprise or shock me and frankly there is probably little one can do to make it look any better.

You misinterpreted my last post. I actually implied that the image quality from even the best VHS tape looks the way it is - crappy. This is because there is less than half the total effective picture information in standard VHS compared to a good SD DVD image to begin with. And if VHS SP looks crappy, VHS LP and EP/SLP looks even worse (largely due to the higher video noise in such lower-speed recordings).

Hey Randall, Naw, I knew what you meant and I was just being a bit sarcastic about VHS in general. Nothing personal was meant.