Transfering VHS to Mac to PC

[Guest]

Archived from groups: comp.multimedia,comp.misc,rec.video.desktop,comp.sys.mac.apps,comp.sys.mac.hardware.video (More info?)

I am doing a project which involves extracting clips of video from VHS
tapes and putting them into a digital format that will playback on a
PC.

The problem is, the machine I am using to extract the clips is a Mac
(with Imovie) and there are so many different file formats to choose
from.

So my question is:

what is the best compressed video format to choose so the final
product plays on Windows Media Player?

Ideally I'd like to have windows that are no smaller than 320 x 240.
The quality of the video is not overly important (mostly talking
heads) but the quality of the sound should be good. The files will be
streaming from a dedicated server to approx 50 machines within a LAN
(2 student labs).

Many thanks.

Mike

 

[DaveC]

Archived from groups: comp.multimedia,comp.misc,rec.video.desktop,comp.sys.mac.apps,comp.sys.mac.hardware.video (More info?)

Please post your results. It looks like an interesting challenge.
--
DaveC
me@privacy.net
This is an invalid return address
Please reply in the news group

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: comp.multimedia,comp.misc,rec.video.desktop,comp.sys.mac.apps,comp.sys.mac.hardware.video (More info?)

> I am doing a project which involves extracting clips of video from VHS
> tapes and putting them into a digital format that will playback on a
> PC.
>
> The problem is, the machine I am using to extract the clips is a Mac
> (with Imovie) and there are so many different file formats to choose
> from.
>
> So my question is:
>
> what is the best compressed video format to choose so the final
> product plays on Windows Media Player?
>
> Ideally I'd like to have windows that are no smaller than 320 x 240.
> The quality of the video is not overly important (mostly talking
> heads) but the quality of the sound should be good. The files will be
> streaming from a dedicated server to approx 50 machines within a LAN
> (2 student labs).
>
> Many thanks.
>
> Mike

The most compatible format across platforms is probably MPEG1. It's not the
highest quality format, but it does a pretty good job. MPEG1 doesn't support
"real" streaming, but it will download to WMP and play when the download is
complete.

If you want streaming in WMP, you really need to use WMV/ASF, but I am not
sure if you can create those, or even play them on a Mac. You probbaly can,
but it won't be as widely compatible as MPEG. Quicktime and Real will
stream, but they each have their own dedictaed players and won't work well
with WMP, so once again compatibility goes out the window a little bit.

 

[jimt]

Archived from groups: comp.multimedia,comp.misc,rec.video.desktop,comp.sys.mac.apps,comp.sys.mac.hardware.video (More info?)

depending on your codecs there are AVI formats that flow accross the
platforms real well and stream.
jimt
In article <cacl96$3bo$1@titan.btinternet.com>, Adam H
<dfghjkl@fghjkl.ur> wrote:

> > I am doing a project which involves extracting clips of video from VHS
> > tapes and putting them into a digital format that will playback on a
> > PC.
> >
> > The problem is, the machine I am using to extract the clips is a Mac
> > (with Imovie) and there are so many different file formats to choose
> > from.
> >
> > So my question is:
> >
> > what is the best compressed video format to choose so the final
> > product plays on Windows Media Player?
> >
> > Ideally I'd like to have windows that are no smaller than 320 x 240.
> > The quality of the video is not overly important (mostly talking
> > heads) but the quality of the sound should be good. The files will be
> > streaming from a dedicated server to approx 50 machines within a LAN
> > (2 student labs).
> >
> > Many thanks.
> >
> > Mike
>
> The most compatible format across platforms is probably MPEG1. It's not the
> highest quality format, but it does a pretty good job. MPEG1 doesn't support
> "real" streaming, but it will download to WMP and play when the download is
> complete.
>
> If you want streaming in WMP, you really need to use WMV/ASF, but I am not
> sure if you can create those, or even play them on a Mac. You probbaly can,
> but it won't be as widely compatible as MPEG. Quicktime and Real will
> stream, but they each have their own dedictaed players and won't work well
> with WMP, so once again compatibility goes out the window a little bit.
>
>

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: comp.multimedia,comp.misc,rec.video.desktop,comp.sys.mac.apps,comp.sys.mac.hardware.video (More info?)

> > > what is the best compressed video format to choose so the final
> > > product plays on Windows Media Player?

I use DivX for all my video compressions now.

http://www.divx.com/divx/

It's a very high quality video/audio compressor. Your final AV file
will have an .avi extension. The only problem that I can forsee,
you'll need to install the DivX codec (a one time installation) into
each Windows Media Player.

Please let us know which one you decided to use and how it worked out
for you, ok?

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: comp.multimedia,comp.misc,rec.video.desktop,comp.sys.mac.apps,comp.sys.mac.hardware.video (More info?)

You can use a program like Roxio Toast Titanium for Mac. Burn a video CD in
the ISO 9660 format. Don't worry about what that means The Toast manual will
guide you through it step by step. You'll have a VCD that you can play on a
Mac and a PC.

--
Best regards,
Craig Scheiner
Executive Producer
CPS Associates
Video Production and Publication
www.cpsvideo.net

"grackle" <glib_doodlebug@yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:d20e168d.0406110738.2ebf55e2@posting.google.com...
> I am doing a project which involves extracting clips of video from VHS
> tapes and putting them into a digital format that will playback on a
> PC.
>
> The problem is, the machine I am using to extract the clips is a Mac
> (with Imovie) and there are so many different file formats to choose
> from.
>
> So my question is:
>
> what is the best compressed video format to choose so the final
> product plays on Windows Media Player?
>
> Ideally I'd like to have windows that are no smaller than 320 x 240.
> The quality of the video is not overly important (mostly talking
> heads) but the quality of the sound should be good. The files will be
> streaming from a dedicated server to approx 50 machines within a LAN
> (2 student labs).
>
> Many thanks.
>
> Mike

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: comp.multimedia,comp.misc,rec.video.desktop,comp.sys.mac.apps,comp.sys.mac.hardware.video (More info?)

grackle <glib_doodlebug@yahoo.com> wrote:

> I am doing a project which involves extracting clips of video from VHS
> tapes and putting them into a digital format that will playback on a
> PC.

> what is the best compressed video format to choose so the final
> product plays on Windows Media Player?

I would use the MPEG-1 format. Yes, MPEG-1 is old, and the resulting
files are larger than what you would get with most newer codecs, but
MPEG-1's can be played in almost anything (and WMP by default tags
MPEG-1's as a WMP file), including QuickTime 3 on older 68k-based Macs.

As you wil be serving/streaming them internally, size really isn't an
issue.


Geoffrey

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