Capturing VHS to minidv tape

[Marcus Martell]

Hallo dvinfo friends, i need your help.
I'm tryng to capture the vhs footage with my old Sony FX1 connecting the VHS recorder to my camcorder trough S-video. The problem is that the image that my camcorder capture from the VHS are coming in Black And White.
I even tryed to connect the single yellow cable frome the xit of the VHS recorder to my Sony camcorder and....the image is still in black and white.
Any idea?
Thank you so much for your kind help

[Pete Cofrancesco]

Camcorders are not designed to record from other sources. They sell inexpensive analog to digital capture devices for this purpose.
https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/produ...2855/KBID/3801

[Steve Game]

Originally Posted by Marcus Martell

Hallo dvinfo friends, i need your help.
I'm tryng to capture the vhs footage with my old Sony FX1 connecting the VHS recorder to my camcorder trough S-video. The problem is that the image that my camcorder capture from the VHS are coming in Black And White.
I even tryed to connect the single yellow cable frome the xit of the VHS recorder to my Sony camcorder and....the image is still in black and white.
Any idea?
Thank you so much for your kind help

Is your camera an FX1 or an FX1E? The FX1 is an NTSC/30i camera whereas the FX1E is a PAL/25i version, (normally sold in 50Hz countries). If your footage on VHS is not outputting the correct colour system for the camera, it won't recognise the chroma modulation, either through S-Video or CVBS.
I have used my FX1E to transcode old PAL VHS recordings directly into a firewire DV signal and recorded it direct to DV tape. The majority of camcorders don't encode analogue signals, especially European models because the levy of a higher import tariff on recorders would make them slightly more expensive than those without where they were classed as just cameras that recorded through the lens.

[Paul R Johnson]

You’re just recording composite with component that’s all. Back in those days it’s was common for some equipment to be two circuit component, I.e. separate chrominance and luminance channels. You need to do like for like, so this also includes the colour format. NTSC and PAL mismatches were also producers of black and white footage. The yellow cable/socket normally signifies composite, so if it produces no colour Steve’s comments seem spot on, and the colour missing is a mismatch of systems. You also need to say where you are, because in the UK for tax reasons, Camcorders always had recording restrictions from external sources. They were imported as replay devices, not recorders which were in a different import category. Input sockets were frequently missing, but as worldwide products grew, recording was limited with software. Removing the PAL record facility would be enough to keep the tax down.

Pro cameras suffered too I still have my old JVC 5000 camera, but it’s a 5001, and does not have an external record facility. The E in a model number instead of A can be a good clue. Composite into a component input is black and white, if it locks at all, and the chrominance signal into a composite input does the same thing. We also have additional confusion with S-VHS, where that’s different from VHS and that muddies the water too.

[Vince Pachiano]

Can I ask a silly question?
Why are you trying to put a really old tape format onto an less-old tape format?

Anyways, it's gonna be a 3-step process
1a. Capture the Analog VHS video.audio onto your Computer (preferably in AVI format
1b. If not captured as AVI, convert the capture to an AVI format using tbd
3. Write the AVI file to your miniDV using freeware WinDV

[Pete Cofrancesco]

Originally Posted by Vince Pachiano

Can I ask a silly question?
Why are you trying to put a really old tape format onto an less-old tape format?

It doesn't make sense, that's why I suggested simply getting an analogy to digital converter to capture to a computer. From there you can do whatever you want. Commonly on forums people acquire free old tech or have odd ideas on saving money. In the past digital tape was an inexpensive way to archive video footage but now that hard drives have gotten so cheap there's no point.

[Andrew Smith]

I had it in mind to mention that, when coming back to some DV format content, I had noticed that the video quality is a bit soft in detail compared to more modern codecs. Pretty amazing since at the time the format arrived it was like the gates of Heaven opening when compared to analogue formats of the day.

Recommend capturing direct to something better than DV as a codec, even if it's merely VHS.

Andrew

[Bob Hart]

With a JVC HR DVS1 deck you can dub from VHS to MiniDV within the deck.

Blackmagic had a mini converter which can convert analogue composite/S-Video/component and two sound channels into HD-SDI and record via a Blackmagic Shuttle recorder to a SSD in ProRes.

It is a bit of a longwinded way to do it but it works. The recorder does not tolerate a munted signal from damaged tapes all that well. It just drops out and that's that.

You have to make sure to download the firmware for the converter to your computer to be able to reset the gamma or the image may be a bit "hot". The converter has a USB port for changing settings/updating. You do that via the downloadable application from Blackmagic support.

Separate settings for composite/S-Video/component are via a panel of little DIP switches are on the side of the converter. There is a label which tells you what you get from each switch.

[Mervyn Jack]

Originally Posted by Marcus Martell

Hallo dvinfo friends, i need your help.
I'm tryng to capture the vhs footage with my old Sony FX1 connecting the VHS recorder to my camcorder trough S-video. The problem is that the image that my camcorder capture from the VHS are coming in Black And White.
I even tryed to connect the single yellow cable frome the xit of the VHS recorder to my Sony camcorder and....the image is still in black and white.
Any idea?
Thank you so much for your kind help

Marcus, you may have a faulty cable, there is a luminance wire and a Chromanance wire in the connector.
I do this all the time although I skip recording to DIGITAL 8 or DV and caputer direct to PC. This is how.

I go, S-VIDEO from a VHS deck into the S-Video input of my Sony DCR-TRV355 camcorder (and L/R Audio into the A/V input via TRSS to RCA A/V lead. The camcorder switches the video input to S-Video when the plug is plugged in.
I then have the iEEE1394 (firewire) lead connected from the camcorder to the computer and capture to any of 3 different capture programs I have on the computer.
On the camcorder there is a A/V -> DV out menu selection to set and make sure TBC is on.

There are no dropouts and the signal is very stable as the camcorder acts as a timebase corrector.

I had a lot of trouble with the iEEE1394 connection recently, it turned out I had a faulty cable AND and intermittent connector on the camcorder. Lucky I had a cannon miniDV camcorder that works just the same which aided in the fault finding. Anyway, I ordered some replacement iEEE1394 connector(s) for the camcorder from Aliexpress and did some microsurgery, mechanical and electrical, and replaced it.
Now it is working fine. just be VERY gentle with thos connectors.

[Mark Watson]

Marcus,

I'd try a different VHS playback deck. Also wouldn't hurt to double check your menu settings on the camera. Both the NTSC and PAL versions of the camera are capable of recording off a VHS deck, according to the manuals. Since you've already eliminated the cables, I suspect a faulty VHS deck.

Mark

[Ron Evans]

Still puzzled why you would want to do this. First I have never had a problem with VHS tape but have done with DV. Both have the long term problem of finding a player that works with clean well aligned heads to the original recorder. I have some DV tapes recorded with a Sony PC10 that now do not work well with other players. Clearly the heads on the PC10 were not well aligned when recording. With Covid I too am going back to encode some of my VHS tapes from 1980 All have played fine so far even those that were recorded at LP. I am using a S-VHS JVC player with some TBC on playback into a Sony GV-HD700/1 DV/HDV unit and then through to capture to the PC over 1394cable. So the GV-HD700/1 is not recording to DV just converting the analogue input to DV for output to the PC.

Capture to PC as DV would be a better solution for the future. Just make a couple of copies. If really important take the time and upload to a Cloud service for safe keeping too. Since most of the past on VHS or DV is interlaced I have just made DVD's as well as keep a copy on hard drive.

[Paul R Johnson]

Aas far as I can see, he didn't come back?

[Pete Cofrancesco]

Off topic. I had to re edit an old project I had done in 2014. Doesnt sound that long ago but I apparently filmed back then on mini hdv camera. The heads were worn and occasionally I see these horizontal line artifacts. While I was at it a re-mastered it as an HD MP4 H264 and will delete the dvd mpeg 2 files since if anyone wants a copy they will no longer need a dvd. If I have the time I was thinking of doing this for the rest of my old projects. But its funny how much has changed in the course of 6 years. No more interlaced 1440 video and SD DVDs.