authoring menus and using TMPG

[gvm]

Until now, I've been using Pinnacle's Studio V9 to edit video clips, author DVD menus and encode into MPEG2. I am now interested in using TMPG to do the MPEG encoding on the understanding the codec is superior to that used by Studio.

To do this,I assume the edited video I must output from Studio and input to TMPG must be an AVI file. But given DVD menus are encoded in MPEG, how do I input the menus created in Studio into TMPG?

Can someone correct my misconceptions and point me in the right direction please?

[Dimmer]

Originally posted by gvm
To do this,I assume the edited video I must output from Studio and input to TMPG must be an AVI file. But given DVD menus are encoded in MPEG, how do I input the menus created in Studio into TMPG? 1. TMPGEnc accepts MPEG files as an input.

2. If the menus are already in MPEG form, leave them as is since you won't improve their quality by any further encoding. If you have original BMP, JPEG or AVI files for the menus, you can re-encode them with TMPGEnc if you wish.

[gvm]

OK Dimmer, I can get Studio to create DVD content on the hard drive; hopefully the menu will be in a movie file of its own. I'll go look for it and give TMPGEnc a go...

[gvm]

Well, I've found a file which appears to be the menu and nothing else but it is a VOB file (VTS_01_0.VOB) which doesn't appear to be acceptable as an input to TMPGenc. I've looked around but there doesn't appear to be any mpeg files which are the menu.

So I still don't understand how to bring a menu created by Studio (an mpeg file) and an AVI file created by Studio (the movie minus the menu) together for encoding by TMPGenc. Can someone show me the way please?

[Dimmer]

1. Again, there is no point in encoding an MPEG file.
2. Nonetheless, you can open VOB file in TMPGEnc.
3. Probably, what you really need is to play you DVD using software player like PowerDVD and take a screenshot of the menu.

What exactly are you trying to achieve? TMPGEnc won't create a DVD for you if this is what you hope for.

[gvm]

Thanks for your reply Dimmer. What am I trying to achieve?

Until now, I've been using Pinnacle's Studio V9 to edit video clips, author DVD menus, do MPEG rendering and file compilation and save the image to the hard drive. I then use Nero to burn the DVD.

I am now trying to avoid using Studio's MPEG encoder because I understand it to be inferior to the likes of TMPGenc. Therefore, I am trying to understand the file formats etc that should be created by Studio so that TMPGenc can do the encoding.

Are you saying that TMPGenc will do MPEG encoding but not compile the files for DVD? If this is the case, is there a way I can use Studio in conjunction with TMPGenc?

I hope this is making sense, thanks again for your interest,
Greg

[Dimmer]

Perhaps you're confusing two different programs. TMPGEnc or TMPGEnc Plus is a program for MPEG encoding. That's what you use to convert AVI to MPEG-2.

Another program is TMPGEnc DVD Author. It creates DVD structure (IFO/VOB) out of existing MPEG files. It's pretty good for simple DVD authoring, but it doesn't perform any encoding. It has a set of built-in menu templates, or you can create a custom menu using your own BMP, JPG or MPG files.

You'll need both programs to create a DVD.

[gvm]

I have now successfully created mpeg2 files with TMPGenc and compared visual quality with the mpeg coding performed by Pinnacle Studio V9.

I can't see any difference!

Pinnacle implemented a VBR codec with version 9; maybe that has successfully addressed its perceived quality issue?

Is there a piece of test AVI, or something similar, which enables more advanced comparison of the quality of different codecs? Maybe the particular video content I used to compare the two codecs did not allow the difference to be obvious to my old and tired eyes!

Once again, I welcome members' comments,
regards
Greg