How can I work with mpg captures...???

[angelleye]

I used to have an ATI capture which allowed to capture with YUV. I would always use the HuffYUV codec for my captures and then use VDubMOD to encode the video to Divx/MP3. I was able to get excellent quality Divx video by capturing from HD channels at the 720x480 that my capture card would let me and then resizing the video to a 16:9 aspect ratio with the resize filter in VDubMOD.

Now, though, I have a new setup and the capture card that I have doesn't give me YUV as an option in my capture software. In fact the only thing I've been able to capture with using this card is BeyondTV. It's all setup as a Media Center PC now connected to my cable box and everything so that's cool, but I'm having a really hard time figuring out how to work with the mpeg-2 files that it captures with.

Initiall I tried opening the mpg's in VDubMOD like anything else. Well, it had to go through a "parsing the interleaved stream" process or something like that and then the audio/video was completely out of sync when it was opened up.

I tried another version of VDub called VirtualDubMPEG-2. Figured ok that's what I need. Well, it works better...but it's acting weird. I open up the mpg and it goes through the same initial process but the audio/video is in sync. So I go on like normal with the following procedure:

-Add Deinterlace Filter
-Add Resize Filter set to 704x384 and Lanczos3
-Add cropping option to the resize filter to remove black edges.
-Perform a 2-pass Divx encode at at a bitrate of 4854 with Home Profile selected

The output window it shows me in VirtualDubMPEG-2 looks exactly like it should. a 16:9 video at 704x384 just like specified. However, upon opening the .avi file that is created it's only 320x240. The file size is still very large as if it used the high bit-rate, but I wouldn't do that if I was gonna do 320x240 so that kinda defeats the purpose. I tried a few more times just to see if I screwed something up but the same thing happens everytime. The de-interlace works. The Divx/MP3 stuff works. It just ignores the resize that I give it.

I've tried opening the original MPG captures in Adobe Premiere Elements. That seems pretty cool. I like the way it handles cutting out frames and stuff like that...especially since it doesn't actually remove them and you can always get them back. The problem there is that from my testing the Deinterlacing in Premiere sucks tremendously and I cannot resize the video to the correct aspect ratio like I need. If I open one of the videos captured off an HD channel it's all squished because it's playing back at 4:3 aspect ratio. When I play those in BeyondTV, of course, it takes care of the aspect ratio for me.

I've been told this is because Adobe Premiere is an Editor, while something like VDub is a video processor. So, is there a processor that works with MPEG's well enough that I can follow the same procedure I do with all my AVI captures?

I've been trying everything I can think of and I simply can't find a working procedure to use with these mpg captures. Any information I can get on this issue would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!

[neuron2]

If it looks OK in the VirtualDub MPEG2 output window, then the problem must lie in your DivX encoding. Try saving to HUFYUV for a short section and see how the resulting AVI looks. Load the resulting AVI back into VirtualDub and look at File/Information.

There is no reason why the VirtualDub MPEG2 process should not work just like your other encodes.

You say you resized to 704x384 and then you cropped, but if that is true the preview would not have been 704x384 as you say. So you are not giving us accurate information.

[angelleye]

I tried saving to HuffYUV from the MPEG and the audio/video ended up completely out of sync.

I'm not sure why you say I'm giving inaccurate information with the resizing and cropping. In VDub, I add the resize filter and then I apply the crop to that filter. I don't add the Null Transform and crop that way...I simply add it to the resize filter.

This gives me cropped video that DOES end up the resolution that set for resize. When I view details in Windows Explorer it shows the resolution that I resized to.

Also, if the resizing wasn't working then I highly doubt I would accidentally be cropping to exactly multiples of 16 like Divx needs. That always gave me problems when I would just use the Null Transform. I couldn't simply crop off the edges because the multiples weren't 16 and then I'd get an error. Adding it to the resize filter instead of using Null Transform crops it and then resizes it to the full resolution that I specify. I've never had a problem with that with my AVI captures.

[angelleye]

Hey, looks like you were correct about the Divx being the problem. For some reason the settings in the Divx configuration was set to Custom Resolution of 320x240 so the Divx codec was taking over even though I had a different size in VDub. So I think that will fix my problems.

Just in case you're curious, though, here's a screen shot of the way the filters works out. http://angelleye.sytes.net/eBay/temp/filters.jpg

As you can see, I first add the deinterlace filter and then a resize filter. You can see that it was cropped from 720x480 to 705x467 and THEN resized to 704x384.

[angelleye]

ah, crap! So that problem with the resolution seems ok now and it works with little sample clips I save straight from the original.

Now,though, I'm trying to cut out commercials and that apparently is what jacks the audio/video sync up so badly. I've cut out about 10 min worth of commercials and the audio/video is now totally screwed.

:(

[neuron2]

Please don't use profanity.

Your first post said you added a resize filter set to 704x384 and then added cropping to that filter. Now you are changing your story. Anyway, it's irrelevant.