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25th August 2002, 16:55
This guide explains the basic steps which are necessary to convert a DV film into a DivX video. Ulead's Media Studio 6.5 is used in the first two steps, but you can easily replace it with your favourite DV cutting software. The video norm PAL is assumed here, for NTSC you will need to do some modifications like changing the resolution to 720x480 instead of 720x576.
1. Capture video
Start Video Editor. Set up your project according to the specs of your film, e.g. PAL (25 fps), Frame-based, 720 x 576, DV Video Encoder -- type 2, PCM, 32,000 kHz; 16 Bit Stereo, etc. The settings may vary depending on your camcorder and the settings you used during the shot. BTW: Most camcorders don't support progressive scan, so you will probably use Interlaced instead of Frame-based. The audio settings may vary as well, because many camcorders support 48KHz @ 16Bit.
Make sure you plugged in the firewire cable into your camcorder, and the mode is set to play. Start Video Capture. You may now seek the video part you want to capture, then click on the REC button. You may select the file you are going to capture to and some other settings. The capture process will start. When all capture is done, hit the Esc button.
2. Cutting
Add the video to the main video track (Va), then do all the work you want like cutting the unwanted parts, adding titles, transitions, effects, etc. This can be a very time consuming step, and it depends on your DV software which options are available.
Create the video (Ulead Media Studio: File / Create / Video File). Leave it as a DV video 720x576 25fps. Use DV type-2 if possible, else save the audio as a separate .WAV file and use type-1.
3. Open in VirtualDub
3.a DV type-2
Start VirtualDub 1.4.10, select File / Open video file, and open your created video.
3.b DV type-1
Make sure you installed AVISynth, then open a text editor, e.g. notepad. Write a small script like:
DirectShowSource("C:\DV\MyFile.AVI")
You can add filters for denoising and resizing, if you prefer to do this in AVISynth (it's faster than using VirtualDub filters, because you don't need to do YUV<->RGB colorspace conversions). Save the file with and AVS extension, like MyFile.AVS.
Open the AVS file in VirtualDub instead of the AVI (File / Open video file). Open the WAV file from step 2 through Audio / WAV audio.
4. Filtering and resizing
You may want to add some denoising filters like spatial and/or temporal smoothers. It depends on your personal taste which filters you prefer. You can also use AVISynth for filtering and resizing like described in 3.b (even if you have type-2 input).
If your source is interlaced (very likely, because only a few camcorders support progressive scan), you need to deinterlace. There are a bunch of deinterlacers available, but make sure you use a real deinterlacer like the VirtualDub filter SmartDeinterlace or the AVISynth filter FieldDeinterlace (from the Decomb package).
For proper resizing please refer to the F.A.Q.
5. Encoding settings
You may encode to whatever format you like, if you have the VfW (Video for Windows) codec to create an AVI. If your target is MPEG-2 (SVCD or DVD), then you have to use tools other than VirtualDub (like TMPGEnc or CCE). I will describe the method for DivX 5.0.2 here.
Under Video / Compression select DivX Pro 5.0.2 Codec, then click on Configure. If you need to achieve a specified filesize, e.g. to fill a CD of 700MB, then you should use 2-pass mode to get the best possible quality (use GordianKnot to calculate the bitrate in this case). Else I recommend to use 1-pass quality based with a quantizer of 4 or lower (you can't go lower than 2). In the MPEG4 tools box check Use Bidirectional Encoding only.
Under General Parameters you should set the Max Keyframe interval to 250. This way you'll get a keyframe at least every 10 seconds. In the Source Interlace box choose All frames are progressive as we deinterlaced using the (better) VirtualDub or AVISynth filters. You don't need Enable Crop or Enable Resize here either, so leave it unticked.
Leave the other settings to the defaults, and confirm the settings with Ok.
To encode to MP3 directly from within VirtualDub, you should have the Lame ACM codec installed. It is included e.g. in the Lame 3.96 encoder package, but searching the Web you may find the ACM codec separateley, too.
Under Audio select Full processing mode. Then select Audio / Compression and Lame MP3. Choose the desired bitrate for your sampling rate, e.g. 32000 Hz, 128 kbps CBR, Stereo.
6. Encode
If you use VirtualDub (not AVISynth) filters, then select Video / Full processing mode, else select Video / Fast recompress.
6.a 1-pass
Now select File / Save as AVI, and type the name of the final DivX AVI. Click on the Save button and wait...
6.b 2-pass
Select Audio / No audio because we don't need audio for the first pass, and we don't want to encode it twice. Select File / Save as AVI, and type the name of the final DivX AVI. Check Add operation to job list and defer processing and click on the Save button.
Select Video / Compression, click on Configure and switch to 2-pass, second pass. Select Audio / Full processing mode. Select File / Save as AVI, and check Add operation to job list and defer processing again and click on the Save button.
Select File / Job control and click on Start.
After the encoding process finishes you should be able to open your DivX AVI in Windows Media Player.
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1. Capture video
Start Video Editor. Set up your project according to the specs of your film, e.g. PAL (25 fps), Frame-based, 720 x 576, DV Video Encoder -- type 2, PCM, 32,000 kHz; 16 Bit Stereo, etc. The settings may vary depending on your camcorder and the settings you used during the shot. BTW: Most camcorders don't support progressive scan, so you will probably use Interlaced instead of Frame-based. The audio settings may vary as well, because many camcorders support 48KHz @ 16Bit.
Make sure you plugged in the firewire cable into your camcorder, and the mode is set to play. Start Video Capture. You may now seek the video part you want to capture, then click on the REC button. You may select the file you are going to capture to and some other settings. The capture process will start. When all capture is done, hit the Esc button.
2. Cutting
Add the video to the main video track (Va), then do all the work you want like cutting the unwanted parts, adding titles, transitions, effects, etc. This can be a very time consuming step, and it depends on your DV software which options are available.
Create the video (Ulead Media Studio: File / Create / Video File). Leave it as a DV video 720x576 25fps. Use DV type-2 if possible, else save the audio as a separate .WAV file and use type-1.
3. Open in VirtualDub
3.a DV type-2
Start VirtualDub 1.4.10, select File / Open video file, and open your created video.
3.b DV type-1
Make sure you installed AVISynth, then open a text editor, e.g. notepad. Write a small script like:
DirectShowSource("C:\DV\MyFile.AVI")
You can add filters for denoising and resizing, if you prefer to do this in AVISynth (it's faster than using VirtualDub filters, because you don't need to do YUV<->RGB colorspace conversions). Save the file with and AVS extension, like MyFile.AVS.
Open the AVS file in VirtualDub instead of the AVI (File / Open video file). Open the WAV file from step 2 through Audio / WAV audio.
4. Filtering and resizing
You may want to add some denoising filters like spatial and/or temporal smoothers. It depends on your personal taste which filters you prefer. You can also use AVISynth for filtering and resizing like described in 3.b (even if you have type-2 input).
If your source is interlaced (very likely, because only a few camcorders support progressive scan), you need to deinterlace. There are a bunch of deinterlacers available, but make sure you use a real deinterlacer like the VirtualDub filter SmartDeinterlace or the AVISynth filter FieldDeinterlace (from the Decomb package).
For proper resizing please refer to the F.A.Q.
5. Encoding settings
You may encode to whatever format you like, if you have the VfW (Video for Windows) codec to create an AVI. If your target is MPEG-2 (SVCD or DVD), then you have to use tools other than VirtualDub (like TMPGEnc or CCE). I will describe the method for DivX 5.0.2 here.
Under Video / Compression select DivX Pro 5.0.2 Codec, then click on Configure. If you need to achieve a specified filesize, e.g. to fill a CD of 700MB, then you should use 2-pass mode to get the best possible quality (use GordianKnot to calculate the bitrate in this case). Else I recommend to use 1-pass quality based with a quantizer of 4 or lower (you can't go lower than 2). In the MPEG4 tools box check Use Bidirectional Encoding only.
Under General Parameters you should set the Max Keyframe interval to 250. This way you'll get a keyframe at least every 10 seconds. In the Source Interlace box choose All frames are progressive as we deinterlaced using the (better) VirtualDub or AVISynth filters. You don't need Enable Crop or Enable Resize here either, so leave it unticked.
Leave the other settings to the defaults, and confirm the settings with Ok.
To encode to MP3 directly from within VirtualDub, you should have the Lame ACM codec installed. It is included e.g. in the Lame 3.96 encoder package, but searching the Web you may find the ACM codec separateley, too.
Under Audio select Full processing mode. Then select Audio / Compression and Lame MP3. Choose the desired bitrate for your sampling rate, e.g. 32000 Hz, 128 kbps CBR, Stereo.
6. Encode
If you use VirtualDub (not AVISynth) filters, then select Video / Full processing mode, else select Video / Fast recompress.
6.a 1-pass
Now select File / Save as AVI, and type the name of the final DivX AVI. Click on the Save button and wait...
6.b 2-pass
Select Audio / No audio because we don't need audio for the first pass, and we don't want to encode it twice. Select File / Save as AVI, and type the name of the final DivX AVI. Check Add operation to job list and defer processing and click on the Save button.
Select Video / Compression, click on Configure and switch to 2-pass, second pass. Select Audio / Full processing mode. Select File / Save as AVI, and check Add operation to job list and defer processing again and click on the Save button.
Select File / Job control and click on Start.
After the encoding process finishes you should be able to open your DivX AVI in Windows Media Player.
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