scenarist nt .. 2 easy newb questions

[krause54]

- i have some avis in dv-codec ... want to use tmpeg to make mpeg2 to use with scenarist ..
what are the settings? how has a video-file to be?

- is it right that i can not use a mpeg2 video wich contains sound an video? do i have to seperate the video and the audio?

thx a lot
krause

[Arky]

Yes, you do need to create separate streams before you import them into Maestro - it only accepts elementary streams.

However, don't be concerned by this - TMPGEnc has a muxer/demuzxer built in, so even if you do find it easier to create multiplexed streams, TMPGEnc can demux these in a matter of seconds, for use in Maestro.

Regarding the correct settings, this is not easy to sum up quickly, because there are so many parameters, but the first thing you need to decide is what resolution you intend to author in - i.e.:

MPEG-1
• SIF (Standard Interface Format): 352x240 NTSC, 352x288 PAL

MPEG-2
• Full D-1: 720x480 NTSC, 720x576 PAL

• Cropped D-1: 704x480 NTSC, 704x576 PAL (matches analog blanking)

• 1/2 D-1: 352x480 NTSC, 352x576 PAL

• SIF (Standard Interface Format): 352x240 NTSC, 352x288 PAL


You would be well advised to close all your GOPs if you wish to create a multi-angle title, and this may also help if you need accurate chapter placement, although there can be a marginal increase in file size with closed GOPs - nothing to get in a twist about.

PAL must have a maximum GOP length of 15 (which, in the case of Interlaced material will actually become 30, but you will not need to account for this in your encoding settings, since the encoder will automatically compensate) to fit the DVD spec.
NTSC must have a maximum GOP length of 18 (which, in the case of Interlaced material will actually become 36...etc.) to fit the DVD spec.

You should ideally place headers before every GOP.

Audio may be encoded as AC3, WAV, DTS, or MPEG1-Layer2, but in all cases, must be in 48khz for DVD authoring. If you are creating low-bitrate disks, then MPEG1-Layer2 is a good choice, because you can stay within the DVD spec and still get down to 64kbps (joint stereo), although admittedly this is only good enough sound quality for very basic dialogue. A good general kbps for MP1-Layer2 is 192kbps. WAV and DTS take a great deal of space which could arguably (and this is very contentious!!) be better used for the video files!

The COMBINED bitrate of audio and video should not exceed 9.8mbps.

PAL MPEG2 must be encoded at 25fps, NTSC at 29.97fps (rarely, 24fps may exist, I think, but this is not relevant to you anyway!).

Apart from variable quantization, and variable bitrate (superb features!!) of MPEG2, which were massive improvements on MPEG1 (which does not officially support these features), MPEG2 also allows interlaced encoding. You may choose to encode interlaced (also known as "field encoding") MPEG2 files, and many people argue that these offer smoother motion in fast scenes. Alternatively, you may still successfully aurthor with progressively encoded MPEG2- the choice is yours, and TMPGEnc will support both types. Do note, however, that you may not encode smaller frame sizes (e.g. 352x288) with fields - small framesizes must be encoded progressively or they will be rejected by Maestro. Also, although TMPGEnc is capable of VBR encoding of MPEG1, you will be wasting your time if you try this, because VBR MPEG1 is not supported by the DVD spec and will also be rejected.

If you really want to, you can encode to MPEG1, if you are creating a title to be played back on a system which may not have installed MPEG2 codecs (Windows includes MPEG1 codecs as standard). If you choose to author MPEG1, you must not exceed 352x288 (PAL) and 1800kbps. Also bear in mind, regardless of whether you are creating MPEG1 or MPEG2 files, that if you intend to write your title to CDR, rather than DVDR, you must be careful to keep the bitrate low (don't exceed, say, 2300kbps, for example), or you will not be able to play the disk. This is because the CD format does not pack the data as tightly as DVD does. This means that to read the same amount of data from a high-bitrate file on a CD, you need to pass the linear track much faster over the lens than with a tightly-packed DVD track, because the data is more spread out. Hence, there is a limit to how fast you can spin a CDR!!! ..the higher the bitrate, the higher the required spin speed, and you don't want to exceed the capabilities of the playback drive, so had better keep the bitrate down to a reasonable level! :D

It does not really matter what DC precision setting you use - 8,9,and 10 are all perfectly acceptable (although there are technical reasons for the delineation between them, which needn't concern you for general authoring).

All the above advice does not necessarily hold true for all MPEG encoding - but it is specifically relevant for DVD authoring.

The topic of MPEG encoding is a massive one, so I can't possibly hope to cover everything here - it would run into thousands of pages!

I could go on forever, and bore you, but I'll spare you! If you have any more questions, please repost here. "MB1" is an expert on the MPEG matrices, but you will do fine in the meantime with the standard TMPGEnc default matrices:

**********************************************************************
This link regards Cinemacraft, but the point is that it includes discussion of matrices, for your information, by MB1

http://www.rilanparty.com:8080/vbb/showthread.php?threadid=12161&perpage=20&pagenumber=2

...AND this thread, on Flexion, includes discussion of TMPGEnc matrices:

http://www.flexion.org/cgi-bin/UltraBoard/UltraBoard.cgi?action=Read&BID=8&TID=1352&P=1&SID=45772#ID10

**********************************************************************




I don't want to confuse the issue for you, but JUST FOR THE SAKE OF COMPLETENESS, there has been a recent development in circumventing the DVDspec, for >authoring< (although not necessarily playback compatibility!!!!!), in terms of input frame sizes. I recommend you sitck to the official frame-sizes for the DVd spec - this info is, as I sai, provided for completeness, not really recommended unless you already have non-standard files ripped from an SVCD which you wish to author into a functional DVD without re-encoding...

http://www.rilanparty.com:8080/vbb/showthread.php?threadid=13948&perpage=20&pagenumber=1

http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?threadid=12676

kickme.to/dvdpatcher


Here's a couple of EXCELLENT general resources, too:

www.geocities.com/aussie01au/

www.silverlist.com


I hope you will find at least some of this post useful :|


Arky ;o)



http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?threadid=12199&highlight=velocity

[krause54]

wow, thx a lot for your explanation! here to! (http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?s=&threadid=15032)

in the thread (link above) is everithing i want :)

i have miniDV-Cam PAL tapes - capture them via premiere 6.0 - encode
tp mpeg2 via tmpeg or cce and then? .. a jes split audio and video
for use with scenarist ...

all videomaterial is PAL 720x576 in ms dv codec.avi

i calculatet to put about 85to90min on a 4.7gb dvd+rw using
cbr 6500bit/s video and 192 bit/s audio 48khz

the dvd+rw media works fine with my dvd-stand alone

the background of the menu is a movie i made with premiere it
includes the text for the buttons .. so a transparent button to
overlay the text in the video is enough for me :)

i will try to get into scenarist again this evening (gwt)

if you have some mor hints for me .. that would be superb!

thx a lot!

best krause

[Arky]

If you are using Premiere to capture your DV footage, then I recommend that you use MainConcept's excellent DV204 codec. This has slightly higher quality than the standard M$ codec. Some people seem to need to use a patch to get Premiere to use the DV204 as the default capture codec, but strangely, whenever I install Premiere 6 and the MC DV204 codec, Premiere AUTOMATICALLY defaults to the DV204 codec, which suits me just fine!

This codec is not the be-all and end-all of DV capture, so don't panic if you don't have it - it's just a small tip, since you asked for tips!


Arky ;o)

[orionware]

Arky...

thanks a ton.. I was messing with Scenarist and could not get my mpeg to import. Took me an hour but I finally found this post!

Gave it a try and sure enough the demuxed files work fine..

Now I just have to read the manual to figure out how to use Scenarist to put something together.


Thanks again...

And thanks Doom9 for the site.

[Arky]

Glad you found the post useful. Don't forget to check out Doom9's own guide for Scenarist authoring - it's not exhaustive, but it does collate the basics, which are so difficult to grasp from the Scenarist manual. You can find Doom9's guide here:

http://www.doom9.org/mpg/dvdr-guides.htm


Arky ;o)

[tonyzhankaiyu]

Originally posted by Arky
If you are using Premiere to capture your DV footage, then I recommend that you use MainConcept's excellent DV204 codec. This has slightly higher quality than the standard M$ codec.
Arky ;o)

Arky,
I thinks capture is merely a "copy" process, MC DV codec doesn't improve image quality of the source file. Supposed we have MC DV codec installed. Definitely this codec make better quality when Premiere export DV AVI file than MS DV codec. Another important point is: When Premiere export to plug-in MPEG Encoder or frame-serve to external MPEG Encoder, the timeline will be decompressed to VFW AVI by MC DV codec rather than MS DV Codec. The we have better image quality. Am I right?

[Arky]

Well, I upgraded from Premiere a while back, but when I used to use it to capture DV, Premiere did specifically tell me in the capture statistics that it had used the DV204 codec for the file. That is not to say that you do not have a valid point. To be honest, I am happy to admit that I may have been wrong, but I never had any problems, and I remain to be convinced that all firewire captures are identical, regardless of intended codec. This is a reason why many people used to recommend downloading MainConcept's MainActor demo purely for capturing with their codec, since MainConcept allowed full functionality in this respect, only watermarking the encoder during final output rendering.

As I recall, from my past usage of the codec with Premiere for capturing, it captured my DV footage as a type-2, not a type-1 AVI file. This is not such a big deal now, but about 2-3 years ago, this was a big issue because AVI-synth was necessary to get around the problem that CCE-SP and other encoders (I think Heuris suffered here, too) were unable to open M$ DV Type-1 AVI files. DirectShow support has now been integrated into almost all encoders, but it was this precise issue which led me to use TMPGEnc at the time, which I had not been familiar with up until I found nothing else would encode my Firewire captures. Of course, NLEs such as Premiere and MSPro were able to open them, but I wanted to directly feed them into a standalone MPEG2 encoder.

Well, I don't have the definitive answer, but I was always happy with the quality of my rendered footage, when using the codec throughout (in as much as this is possible). Nowadays, I use the Fast codec, which is the default in Pinnacle Edition.

If you do find a definitive answer, I'd still be interested to hear about it, whether I'm wrong or not. None of us ever stops learning - to believe so is only to delude oneself! :)


Arky ;o)

[lucindrea]

BTW .. their are some pdfs in the scenartest folder that goes into detail of what types of mdeia it will accept ( if they not their dont ask for them here ) .. i also belive their is a link to these in the start menu somewhere , also the system should have adobes pdf reader incuded in the install of scenartist