A lot of episodes on 1 dvd

[Tischnoetentoet]

Hi all,

I have some episodes recorded from television. All those episodes are avi files of about 300 to 400 mb.

If I use TMPGEnc, it says I have to write at least 75 % of the dvd space with one episode. Well, that makes that for each season, I have to write 15 dvd's... I think that's a little bit too much!

I want to put as much episodes on 1 dvd as possible. How can I achieve this???

Thanks!

[Mug Funky]

75% of a DVD-5 for 1 episode? that sounds to me like bollocks, unless they're 1-hour episodes.

try encoding at a lower bitrate. you can fit about 4.3 gigs on a DVD-5 (though they say 4.7 on them, this is also bollocks). calculate conservatively so you don't waste time re-encoding if you end up a few megs over.

i wish that you could overburn DVDs in these cases.

[edit]

if these are regular 25 minute episodes, you should be able to fit 5 of them, provided they're not interlaced or hard-telecined (3:2 pulldown encoded as 29.97fps interlaced, rather than 23.976 with repeat-field flags)

if you're working in PAL, you'll be able to fit 5 episodes in reasonable quality.

you can also fit more if you encode to 352x480/576. this is allowable in DVD specs, and will halve your bitrate. if you have an old TV you'll probably not even see the difference.

[Tischnoetentoet]

Thanks!

Well, it's a present for my girlfriend, and they got an old television.

The episodes are about an hour (it's charmed)

I'll try the 352x480/576 solution!

Thanks for the reply!

[Sirber]

If you don't need HW-DVD support, you could try to recompress them all with RealVideo. I can get those AVI to 60MB with almost no noticeable quality loss.

[Tischnoetentoet]

but can I put them on dvd also??

and 60 mb, that is a really small file!

[Sirber]

you can burn them like AVIs on DVD or CD.

[Tischnoetentoet]

yes, but then my DVD can't be read by my stand-a-lone DVD-player! And that's what I want.

[adam]

Try 352x480/576. If you need to fit even more then maybe try 352x240/288 (also DVD compliant) but if you are dealing with NTSC footage then you will have to deinterlace. The quality will be VCD-like but I've found that the average girlfriend couldn't care less.

[dan991199]

Originally posted by adam
The quality will be VCD-like but I've found that the average girlfriend couldn't care less.

HAH! so true man :D