So about laser disk....

[fireemblem776]

I have a few,but their is no way to dump it on the pc is their?
Is capturing the only way i can use them? This isnt for an amv really, i just want to share what the menus looked like, and extras that were not included in the dvds r1 or r2.

[Kariudo]

waddaya mean a laserdisk player won't fit into a computer?

yeah, I think capturing is your only option here

[Qyot27]

Unless there's some special video fu that's been discovered which allows analog video signals to be transferred digitally without doing a conversion while capturing, then no. Although the audio might be able to be transferred digitally - some later laserdisk releases used PCM, AC3, and even DTS IIRC. Of course, this hinges on there actually being a laserdisk reader that can connect to a PC through something like FireWire or USB and facilitate the digital transfer for you. Chances are, equipment like that is professional studio mastering level, and way out of the price range for the average consumer (kind of like the laser turntable, which goes for something like $20,000 USD, last I checked).

If the laserdisk player has some sort of 'digital video out' option, then maybe it's not so farfetched, but I wouldn't count on it.

[Kionon]

As far as I am aware there are no digital out laser disc players. The solutions I know have been used by professionals include a canopis digital converter that was quite costly. The incoming video was amazingly well preserved, but it was still analog capture.

[DJ_Izumi]

It's actually not possible. The LaserDisk actually contains a digitally stored composite video signal, it's not digital data like MPEG-1 or MPEG-2 or anything else, it is a digitally represented composite video signal, a form of video that has no known storage method. It also means that all Laser Discs are already interlaced and have hard coded composite dot crawl. However the audio data on the disk is truely digital. It would be hypothetically possible, using an antiquated LD-ROM drive to rip the audio but not the video. But I doubt necessary software and drivers for this task even exists anymore.

For LDs you're stuck with analog capture card. Get a good LD player, a good capture card and pretend it's the days of VHS anime agian.

[Vlad G Pohnert]

However, since the video on a Laser Disc is uncompressed , even if you capture it the image quality is quite high... I used the Ghibli LD Box set for Memories Dance and the Quality of the footage is way better then what I can get of DVDs these days...

Something to be said about good old laser discs.. But yes, via analog capture card is pretty much the only way

Vlad

[DJ_Izumi]

But it IS compressed, it's compressed as an analog composite video signal which introduces dotcrawl, bleeding colors, compressed color space and even loss of detail. Heck, compare a composite 480i video signal to a component 480i signal, due to the much higher bandwidth it looks a LOT better than composite.

Sure, it's tonnes better than VHS but VHS is just utter crap cause it's even MORE compressed to save on signal bandwidth.

[fireemblem776]

Thanks for the help, I was finally able to get this stuff on the computer.
I used the pinnacle video transfer, and connected an S cable to it to get the best quality possible. It was odd flipping to side B to get the rest of the extras on each disk haha.

Its amazing the stuff on these LD. I wonder why non of the extras are in the R2 dvds. Their are interviews, henshin story board sequences, pencil drawings, fan art, how the dubbing was made, actual footage of Naoko!! And thats rare -_- All 12 LDs (season 1 ) have something on them not in any dvd releases I at all. Their are alternate openings not even on the ADV release, X_X But the ADV version sucks to begin with, no text less op at all.

And since this isnt a tape, im assuming the quality cant deteriorate like vhs right? Because, season one looks very old, faded, maybe the dvd releases really were remastered. But when I pop in my Laser Disk for season 4. It looks just as colorful as the dvd releases.