Best quality transfer of VHS Tapes?

[AAR.oner]

Originally Posted by Ziggzzster

Any software recommendations to work with the uncompressed .avi to add fade in/out or titles, etc, without screwing up the file?

if yer on a PC -- Adobe Premiere, Sony Vegas, Avid, etc

for Mac -- Final Cut, Adobe Premiere

[gsh]

Originally Posted by xjsb125

What resolution are you recommending the h264?

Agreed on using a conversion box like the Canopus 55/100/110. Those boxes will allow you to capture your video in an uncompressed .avi file.

No they don't. They capture to DV AVI, which is 25mbit/second, approximately 8:1 compression over true uncompressed AVI.
If you want to capture to uncompressed AVI you will have to use a capture card and have a pc that has a fast enough processor to not drop frames while encoding (not too difficult these days). IMO, as long as the person doing the transfer work knows what they are doing, DV capture is more than good enough for vhs sources.
The most important part of the equation is the playback device - you need to get the best signal possible from the tapes, and that will require a good prosumer vcr (a minefield in itself as not all tapes will play back better on a particular machine so having a number of different prosumer vcrs with different features/filters etc to choose from helps), then ideally a hardware tbc and proc-amp for making the most of the source during capture. Once on your pc software filters can possibly help clean/enhance the image more.
You must be careful not to do more damage than good - often fixing one problem can introduce even more.

[Limulus]

and be some careful with using TBC....they can help in getting a non-trouble transfer to harddisc but often they reduce quality aswell.

[rotwang999]

The best prosumer vhs player is the Panasonic AG-1980 with switchable TBC.
99% of the time it will lock on your tape and actually improves the quality of the image by stabilizing it. I have had other tbc standalone units that are shit and over a grand. You can get used ones on ebay for $500 or less and worth every penny.

[AAR.oner]

i use a Panasonic AG1980 as well...makes for great transfers when paired with the ADVC-300 [w/ TBC]

[Limulus]

also try different svhs vcrs, at points cheaper ones give even better results than the high-end models. this is from many years of experience.

[sabkisscrue]

I would start by getting your friends tapes or even better asking your friend to contact the people he got HIS tapes from and getting their 1st gens or masters. Your tapes arent worth transferring. You want the lowest possible generation tapes to transfer, first of all.
Second of all, you already own a 9800, you need to look for pro quality s-video wires such as the ones I use AR Pro II Series, two of them one to connect from the vcr to the es10 and another from the es10 to the camera. They get the most sharpness and color and clarity out of the picture.
Next, you need to make sure your camera has "analog to digital pass through" and a tbc/dnr feature. Because, unlike what anybody else has mentioned in this thread, you must clean the noise up on these tapes. This is the biggest issue with vhs. Next, you need a Panasonic ES10 DVD Recorder, simply to be used as a pass through and black level corrector, you set both in and output black levels to darker and the line in NR on. This unit helps to fix some jitter you get when turning the 9800's tbc/dnr on. Finally, everybody says to get a Canopus, dont. We're talking VHS here. It has to be cleaned up and it has to go through noise reduction filters.
The JVC DRM100 Dvd Recorder that I use has probably the best encoder for transferring vhs tapes and it also happens to have noise reduction filters that really produce a result that is better than what your vhs looks like.
But again this also depends on getting and transferring the lowest possible generation sources, 1st gens.

[Bix]

Check out the VCR buying guide thread at VideoHelp.

I have a Panasonic AG-1980 and a Go Video SDV-650 (clone of the JVC HR-S9800U). It's better to both a Panasonic SVHS and a JVC SVHS or DVHS (or a Mitsubishi DVHS) to make sure you can play back as many tapes as well as possible. Some tapes are better in the Panasonics, some are better in the JVCs.

[sabkisscrue]

Originally Posted by AAR.oner

i use a Panasonic AG1980 as well...makes for great transfers when paired with the ADVC-300 [w/ TBC]

The ADVC-300 doesnt have a tbc. It has a frame synchronizer.
http://forum.videohelp.com/topic376651.html

[AAR.oner]

yes, it has a frame synchronizer...and uses LTBC [line time base correction]