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Amiga computer related discussion => General chat about Amiga topics => Topic started by: Tomas on January 18, 2007, 04:03:19 PM

Title: Capturing amiga rgb into mpeg2
Post by: Tomas on January 18, 2007, 04:03:19 PM

Does anyone know of any dvd record or a capture card that supports RGB over scart or similar? I want to transfer my Amiga demos into high quality video. Composite will just not cut it quality wise. Thanks in advance.

Title: Re: Capturing amiga rgb into mpeg2
Post by: Zac67 on January 18, 2007, 06:15:58 PM

RGB capture cards are AFAIK only available for industrial purposes (=very pricey).
A very easy way to get near RGB quality through SVideo:
- get a decent Supervideo genlock (my Hama 292 was 8€, it's OK but not great)
- get a PVR card with hardware compression, use only highest bitrate (my Hauppage PVR PCI was ~15€)
  or a DV bridge and capture through Firewire (marginally better quality)
  or use the VideoIn of your graphics card (quality varies widely depending on hardware/driver/CPU speed)
- convert to MPEG-2/lower bitrate with a decent software compression, I like TMPGEnc a lot.

I wouldn't recommend converting directly to DVD rate MPEG-2: consumer hardware generates numerous artifacts, esp. when dealing with high contrast/hard edges video like the one you're likely to capture here.

Title: Re: Capturing amiga rgb into mpeg2
Post by: Framiga on January 18, 2007, 06:40:18 PM

some latest DVD recorder (Philips with HD) supports RGB recording.

Title: Re: Capturing amiga rgb into mpeg2
Post by: Speelgoedmannetje on January 18, 2007, 06:53:40 PM

Can't you use the video output of WinUAE?

Title: Re: Capturing amiga rgb into mpeg2
Post by: Tomas on January 20, 2007, 11:54:43 PM

Quote

I wouldn't recommend converting directly to DVD rate MPEG-2: consumer hardware generates numerous artifacts, esp. when dealing with high contrast/hard edges video like the one you're likely to capture here.

Even if you record at the highest possible bitrate?

Quote

get a PVR card with hardware compression, use only highest bitrate (my Hauppage PVR PCI was ~15€)

I think using a non lossy software codec would be better option though..
My plan was to record either uncompressed or with a dvd record at highest possible bitrate and then re encode it to mpeg2 using software like tmpgenc on a pc or similar.

Where can one get a supervideo genlock these days anyways?

Title: Re: Capturing amiga rgb into mpeg2
Post by: Tomas on January 20, 2007, 11:56:20 PM

Quote

Can't you use the video output of WinUAE?

I want it to be perfect, so that you get as close experience to the real thing as possible.

Title: Re: Capturing amiga rgb into mpeg2
Post by: Dr_Righteous on January 21, 2007, 05:55:32 AM

Your best option is to use a SuperGen SX genlock, S-Video out to a PC with a decent video capture board (such as a Pinnacle AV/DV).

I've also recently discovered the Neobitz RGB to S-Video adapter works on NTSC Amigas, and has comparable video quality to the SGSX. http://www.neobitz.com/

Title: Re: Capturing amiga rgb into mpeg2
Post by: Zac67 on January 21, 2007, 10:34:41 AM

Quote

Tomas wrote:

I think using a non lossy software codec would be better option though..
My plan was to record either uncompressed or with a dvd record at highest possible bitrate and then re encode it to mpeg2 using software like tmpgenc on a pc or similar.

Hmm... 704x576 x 25 x 24 / 8 = 30 MB/s = 1.8 GB/min
Sounds like fun...
The highest bit rate of our WinTV PVR 350 is 12 Mbps with a very pretty quality, a lot better than any DVD recorder I've seen yet. Can't see much difference to the output of our DV bridge (Rainbow something).

Quote

Where can one get a supervideo genlock these days anyways?

Used? Very nice and very cheap.

Title: Re: Capturing amiga rgb into mpeg2
Post by: X-ray on January 21, 2007, 10:46:24 AM

A Lola 2000 will work too.
I am still kicking myself for not getting the one that went for £5 on ebay a year ago.
I could have kept it as a spare.