question about american VCR's

[DutchTickler]

In connexion with my upcoming F/m tickle torture vid (which will be released in July) I have a question about North american VCR's.

As I live in Europe, I have PAL video equipment, so the VHS tapes I will produce will be in PAL format. Now, in europe, most of our PAL VCR's can also playback NTSC tapes on a PAL Tv set.

Do American VCR's have a similar function, in that they can playback PAL signals on NTSC TV equipment? In that case, I wouldn't have to worry about selling my tapes to NTSC-customers.

Greetings,
DT

 

[milagros317]

My own VCR is old (circa 1990) and won't play PAL format.

My cousin just bought a brand new home entertainment system, including a VCR and a DVD player. His new VCR (with HDTV capability) also will not play PAL format tapes.

I don't know if this is representative of all VCR's available in North America.

 

[avethibaltus]

If anyone in the States has a VCR that will play PAL formats then they are definitely in the minority, mostly only service members who were stationed in Europe when they bought their players.

It would be better to put it on DVD IHMO.

 

[BigJim]

In regard to VCR's, America has an outlook like most things in the world. They work for us, fuck the rest of you.

While some American vid producers produce PAL tapes, 99% of US home VCR's do not support PAL playback, simply because the US doesn't have anywhere near the amount of tapes imported from Europe, that Europe imports from the US.

 

[BigJim]

Can I suggest that you release your video on CD-ROM, DT? They work in every country.

 

[milagros317]

Can I suggest that you release your video on CD-ROM, DT? They work in every country.

An excellent suggestion, Big Jim.🙂

 

[DutchTickler]

Yes, I thought about releasing it on CD (it would be a VCD). In fact, I might be forced to do so, now that I know American VCR's can't play PAL.
But what stops me is my (perhaps irrational) belief that people associate video CD's with crappy quality. Which it is. I think VCD's have slightly less resolution than VHS tapes, since VHS has somewhere in the range of 250-300 lines of resolution and VCD only 240.

Of course I could choose to do a SVCD, which has about 400 lines of resolution, but SVCD is not an international standard and thus will not be compatible with nearly as many CD/DVD players as standard VCD.

Problems, problems. Why the hell did they have to invent 2 different television standards anyway??

PS the advantage of VCD's is ofcourse that the quality does not deteriorate with playing. The image will remain nice and smooth, without the artifacts that older or dusty tapes develop.

 

[DutchTickler]

FYI, VCD's come in PAL or NTSC flavors too, only that has nothing to with the electrical signal, but merely with the format of the frames (720x480 @ 29,97 fps). There are software tools to help you achieve this, but it takes a little time and effort to make the conversion clean and smooth.

Of course, it doesn't matter if it's PAL or NTSC format if you play the VCD on your computer, since that device doesn't distinguish between the two, but I'm not sure how an American TV set (and VCD/DVD player) will react to PAL format. A section of the image might simply 'fall' off the screen (since PAL is 576 lines vs. NTSC's 480) but would the equipment choke on the frame rate?

 

[DutchTickler]

If you want me to shut up, just say so 😀