(Newbie) Resolution help, please...

Ok, I have managed to figure out how to set up my digital video camera like a VCR for capture direct to tape (My video card has an s-video outlet). This seems to help a bunch in terms of frame rate. However, I'm confused about the relationship between the resolution of my computer monitor, the SL software, and my video camera.

Currently, I have my computer monitor set at 1024x768, and my SL software is also set at 1024x768. I have to run the SL software full screen, so don't have my computer task bar in the shot. As it stands, my frame rate is between 15-25, mostly hovering right around 19. I use my firewire and Windows Movie Maker to capture from the recorder to my harddrive, with the setting "DV-AVI (NTSC)" which has a bit rate of 25 mbps, display size 720x480, and a frame rate of 30 FPS. The video plays very smoothly, but it isn't very sharp, almost like it's slightly out of focus. I see there are some adjustments I can make to the sharpness in the video card settings, but I'm wondering if I have the basic set up correct.

Just to anticipate any questions about the camera or my capture methods from camera to harddrive, when I have worked with video from this camera before (stuff I've shot through the lens), it's always been very sharp. IOW, I think whatever is going wrong is happening before it gets to my camera.


Are these settings appropriate? Of should I try something else? Thanks.

Ok, responding to my own post here, after further testing...

It's not just fuzzy, but the colors are completely washed out. I looked at the settings for the tv out on my video card, and it won't allow me to go higher than 8 bit color with 640x 480 resolution. I guess this is just a problem with the video card I have (Radeon 9250, 256mb, PCI)?

In any case, maybe this is all a mute point, because I just tried using Fraps again, and I can get (recording) frame rates of about 15 or so at 640x480, the color looks good, and the video is sharp. Still, it would be nice to be able to send it to the digital video camera if anyone has any ideas.

My advice,... dump the recordings from within game using any form of codex (compression) use uncompressed avi format,.. the more you compress an image between capture and proofing/rendering, the less raw information you have to play with,.. dump the freebie Movie Maker and get yourself a 'better' movie editing programme.
By doing so, you can zoom in shots/scenes, edit lengths and timings, allow the programme to render using 'tweening/interpolation' to create the additional frames to meet the PAL/NSTC standards and resolution formats, apply masks to sharpen, colour balance and add text etc... and save it directly to your cam using firewire direct from your system.
You may want to look into OpenGLInterceptor, which records the data in raw format via the graphics card pipeline.
None of the above are a simple task as it requires many components to make a half decent job, like fast hard discs, minimum 2gb system ram, a good graphics card and CPU/front side bus speeds etc..

Good Luck

I use Fraps at half screen size and edit with Windows Movie Maker. That fits my objective of publising my videos on YouTube. I don't use full screen because YouTube says half-screen is better for their system. I would not recommend spending money on an editor till you know what you want from an editor. WMM is adequate for starting.

I also use AVS, a low-cost ($40) editor, for a few special effects. But I mainly use it for trasncoding between .wmv and .mov. Since I collaborate with other people, I need to be able to work with both Win and Mac files. I tested the trial version of Pinnacle. It is free for limited use. It would not run on my new HP and the advice I got was to lower the resolution of my system. I am glad I did not pay $100 for that program. I have looked at other video editors but have not found one that convinces me it is worth the money. I am going to wait to see what improvements I get with Win Vista.

My guess is that the best place to pur your money is on the computer: 2G mem., best possible Nvidea, CoreDuo processor. (The newer version of Fraps, incidentally, is coded to make use of CoreDuo.)
TM

Thanks for the help.

Unless I'm completely misunderstanding, when I'm using the DV camera, I think I am capturing in uncompressed AVI format, and then, when I transfer to computer via my firewire into WMM, I am also doing so without any compression. Before I do any editing, I'm opening the uncompressed AVI file in Windows Media Player, and the quality is poor. I'm baffled.

Some things have changed since I made my initial post. The most important change is that someone told me to shut off one of my processors, since SL is not optimized for dual processors. Now I'm getting frame rates ranging from 15-85, depending upon where I am and what is in the scene. Seems like I can now easily find places to get about 30-40 FPS. Also, I figured out how to change the TV OUT settings, so they are currently 1024x768, 32 bit color. While the color and clarity is slightly better, it's still washed out in comparison to what I get with Fraps, and it still looks fuzzy. I don't understand why I'm not getting fabulous results going directly to a DV Camera. Everything I've read says that capturing direct to a DV camera is the best way to go, so I can't understand why I'm getting better results with Fraps. I must be doing something wrong.

I realize the obvious question is, "Why not just use Fraps, if it works well? The answer is that I'd like to be able to shoot as much raw footage as I want, without the worry of disk space, and I like the idea of lower demand on my system, which keeps my FPS higher. I think there must be some obvious thing I'm doing wrong. Everything I know about this stuff is what I've read in the last few days, so I could be misunderstanding something fundamental. Any suggestions about what I might be missing would be greatly appreciated.

If i understand your description, you are using WMM to perform capture to file on the second machine. I checked the WMM helo file on file types suported. It says:
The content you capture in Windows Movie Maker is saved in Windows Media Format.

You can check that by checking the file type. If it is .avi, you are getting a raw file. If it is .wmv, it is Windows media format and probably compressed. You can see if that is the case. Find a static scene and take 30 sec. with your set-up and another 30 sec. with Fraps. Compare the sizes.

I don't think you are doing anything wrong except perhaps reading the wrong sources. The set-up you are tryin is practical only if you are going to turn on the camera and let it run. I shoot in scenes of about 30 sec. to 1 min. each. With my setup, I turn the camera on and off with a function key. No way would I give up that control.

Look at the dates of your sources and look at the date of your computer was made. There was a time when you really did need two machines for this job. But if you have a core duo, it is probably much newer than the sources that are telling you you need 2 machines.

I don't understand why Fraps does not meet your need. I use Fraps and have no worries about disk space. I have 200GB extranal drive on a USB2 port. Fraps will send my files to it if I tell it to. I initially put the files on my internal drive, then transfer them to the external drive for subsequent editing.

And about that system load... The current version of Fraps is (supposedly) optimized for dual core. You might want to see how well your system does with Fraps and both processors. Turning off one of you processors does not sound like the best way to maximize system efficiency.

TM

Thanks for the follow-up, Thinkerer.

(Just to clarify, I was talking about one computer and one DV camera, not two computers.)

Yeah, they are .avi files. And, regarding Fraps, the truth is, it works great. I'm just a bit obsessive about getting the best possible with what I have, so I wanted to figure out why the DV camera thing wasn't working right. But I'm going to let it go [grin], and proceed with what does work: Fraps--->WMM.

As far as the dual core thing, I meant that I'm setting just SL to run on one processor. Fraps (and everything else) continues to run on two. Doing this doubled my frame rates in SL.

Now I have no excuse but to quit tinkering and get to shooting video