Short films and music videos

[ryanhanks]

I have several dvds consisting of collections of music videos and/or short films. I would like to convert each music video (MV) and short film (SF) into a divx or xvid file. I don't particularly care about the output file sizes but would like to maintain a consistant compression quality. I can't assume that the aspect ratio will be the same for all the MVs/SFs on a DVD and would like to crop black bars where applicable. On the DVDs, I believe that each MV/SF can be found in it's own chain (PGC) and also part of a larger PGC representing a "Play All" option (i.e., a set of MVs/SFs all in one PGC).

I've tried several methods so far and haven't found one that I found satisfactory. I've tried using "Fair Use Wizard" and doitfast4u but neither of those seems well-equipped for what I'm trying to do. I've been hoping to find something where I can select a PGC to re-encode, specify encoding parameters and a filename, and enqueue it as a batch job for processing at some other time. I DON'T want to have to specify an output size, only a compression quality.

I've got a B.S. in comp sci, so I'm not afraid of a little scripting. In fact, writing some kind of script seems like it might be the best way to tackle this. What would be the best way to go about doing this? How have you approached tasks similar to this in the past? Would I be able save myself a lot a trouble by re-evaluating one or more of my requirements?

Any feedback is much appreciated in advance. :)

[neo_anderson]

use dvd decrypter,gordianknot with divx fusion codec!

[jggimi]

I don't think that GK will meet Ryan's needs. GK is designed to do multipass encoding to a set bitrate or set filesize. Ryan wants a constant quality encoding, which is a single pass process that GK does not support directly. (Yes, one can use GK as merely an AviSynth script generator and encode with Vdub/VdubMod, but that may be more than Ryan needs.)

AutoGK, on the other hand, does support constant quality single pass encoding, and it can support a queue of jobs, using either XviD or DivX.

[Cyberia]

I may be posting too late, but if size is not a concern, why not just rip the videos and keep them in the native format.

Usually music videos are 200MB(ish) with AC3 audio, thats not too bad and no recompress is necessary.

[Eric Sands]

I'm doing the same thing... ripping from Promo Only Music Videos (which I subscribe to). I'm experimenting with comparing various codecs including MPEG1, MPEG2, VP7, and recently tried DIVX 5.2.1. I'm trying to get file sizes around 10MB per minute, or 40MB for a 4 minute music video. What's the best resolution/bitrate to be using to accomplish this in DIVX? It's very unclear in the DIVX configuration on what I need to do to accomplish this.

Also, what's the difference between DIVX and XVID?