DVDforger: new version 0.6.1 alpha released

[MR Nice]

Hi, There is no harm done, I think it's better if other people give there ideas or suggestions on how to improve your program. You didn't like the idea I suggested so I don't think you will like any of my other ideas good luck with the program. I am always looking for better way to convert nstc to pal without the jerky picture from 23fps, 29fps to 25fps and also the less lose of quilty in the picture the better. Take care peace

[Adub]

This looks like a pretty nice program. I will have to run some tests, but thank you very much for taking the time to code it. It looks like a nice replacement for DVDPlannerBasic

[Sir Didymus]

...It looks like a nice replacement for DVDPlannerBasic

:confused:

AFAIK DVDforger is an xxx2dvd converter, whose authoring engine is based on DVD Author. DVDPlanner by Zeul was a completely new (and original) authoring package. It's a shame this last project has been abandoned. The purpose and the content of the two programs is completely different.

Cheers,
SD

[nonoitall]

This is definitely my favorite all-in-one DVD authoring app! Now, for the nitpicks! (These aren't complaints, but you're homepage does ask for feedback, so here are my thoughts.) :P

Any chance of seeing some multi-threading for us multi-core CPU users? It wouldn't have to be anything too fancy - maybe just have a list of tasks like you have now and then have how ever many threads as there are CPUs taking the next task off the top of the list. (If detecting the number of CPUs is complicated you could even have the user just manually enter in the desired number of threads.) Arranging the list so that the most time-consuming tasks are at the top would probably yield the best efficiency. Then, once all the 'independent' tasks (video encoding, audio encoding, subtitle rendering, etc.) are done, the authoring could be done.

My second and final request: Would it be possible to add 'label' support in the menu editor? (A non-functional text field, as opposed to functional menu items.) I usually don't need a flashy menu, but even so I still have to separately create a bitmap so that I can have a plain text title in the menu. (For example, displaying the title of a TV series above the selectable episodes.)

Anyway, that's the only two improvements I could really come up with. I know you have a life and will understand completely if you never get around to including these features. In any event, this is a fantastic project and I appreciate your hard work!

EDIT: Oops! Didn't realize wg had already asked for that menu feature. Sorry! I second his request. :)

[alvarez]

Hello,

Any chance of seeing some multi-threading for us multi-core CPU users?

There definitely is a chance, but it's at the absolute bottom of the priority list. So maybe around the end of next year :)

My second and final request: Would it be possible to add 'label' support in the menu editor?

Okay, now I stop counting how many times it was asked, and really start working on it :)

Have a nice day,

[marioval]

Ok now that i am a registered user and have waited the 5 days I can post here instead of videohelp.com

Is there a known issue with the settings in the configuration settings window ? First I noticed that When I set the chapters in the config window I get no chapters. However if I set chapters in the settings for each title individually, I do get chapters. That was already discussed before. Now I notice that If I change the colors for the menu items in the config window, my menu items do not show up at all. On my pc I have to blindly move the mouse around and it will highlight when I find it. On the TV, If I use the up/down arrow I can select the items but they are basically invisible. But, if I set the colors in the settings for each individual titles setting window, my menus show up fine.

[rendez2k]

Any new version in the works - always like something new to play with :)

[alvarez]

Hello,

Any new version in the works - always like something new to play with :)

Well, it's in the works, but I have just recently blown up the whole thing :) I've decided to reengineer lots of parts of the source code because it became really ugly and therefore hard to maintain (result of the trial-and-error development process). So, the next version will be delayed, and it won't have too much new features either, but from the inside (which nobody really cares about except me) it will be much nicer ;)

:alvarez:

[marioval]

It seems that no matter which profile I choose for encoding with HCenc, fast normal or best, it will do a 2 pass encode. How can I just do a 1 pass encode? Thanks

[alvarez]

It seems that no matter which profile I choose for encoding with HCenc, fast normal or best, it will do a 2 pass encode. How can I just do a 1 pass encode? Thanks

DVDforger provides user interface only for the most basic encoder settings. However, in the textbox 'Additional options to be set in HC.ini', you can set any parameter that HCenc accepts in its configuration file. Please see the *CQ parameter in the documentation of HCenc (tools\HC\misc\HC.pdf) to see how you can switch 1-pass encoding on (it's a bit tricky, that's why it's not offered on the dialog).

(By the way, have you received my e-mail about the menu problem?)

[marioval]

yeah that's a little nuts. I'll keep the 2 pass encoding.

[marioval]

Yeah thats a little nuts. I'll keep the 2 pass encoding.

[wg]

I selected the shutdown option, but for some reason it did not work, DVDforger had closed, & it looked as if XP had attempted to close as my desktop icons had lost their colours, but the pc stayed on. The DVD folder was produced & seems ok. This is the first time I have used the shutdown option, any suggestions as to what may have gone wrong! Just tried the disc on my hardware player & the playback is very very jerky, to be honest I had to stop playing it. The original file was Xvid & it was NTSC to NTSC with 125kbps vbr audio, the total file size was 696mb. I have ffdshow & Haali media splitter installed.

Thanks in advance.

[alvarez]

I selected the shutdown option, but for some reason it did not work, DVDforger had closed, & it looked as if XP had attempted to close as my desktop icons had lost their colours, but the pc stayed on.

This happens on my computer as well, but I couldn't figure out the reason yet. (It's quite annoying because I have another utility I wrote which has the same code to shut down the computer, and that one works...)

Just tried the disc on my hardware player & the playback is very very jerky, to be honest I had to stop playing it. The original file was Xvid & it was NTSC to NTSC with 125kbps vbr audio, the total file size was 696mb. I have ffdshow & Haali media splitter installed.

Well, I live in the middle of PAL land, so I can't really test NTSC encodings using a hardware player. Does it occur with all NTSC movies or just this one?

This is just a guess, but a 'good' way to produce jerky video is mistreating interlaced movies, especially when it needs to be resized. Please check that the 'Interlacing' setting (in 'Video file properties') is correct. (The third how-to in the documentation explains how the correct setting can be determined.)

Have a nice day,

[rendez2k]

Has anyone tested HC Enc 0.22? Is there any reason why the encoder couldn't be updated and used with DVDforger 0.61?

[alvarez]

Has anyone tested HC Enc 0.22? Is there any reason why the encoder couldn't be updated and used with DVDforger 0.61?

If you copy HC to the DVDforger directory and rename the .exe file (strip the version number), it should work. (As for a new release of DVDforger, it may turn out to include HC 0.23 ;))

[rendez2k]

Thanks alvarez for the info. I gave it a test and had an issue but I don't think it was HC.... I added 5 avi's, 2 with odd frame sizes compared to the others and these encoded with a black screen only! Any ideas?

[alvarez]

Thanks alvarez for the info. I gave it a test and had an issue but I don't think it was HC.... I added 5 avi's, 2 with odd frame sizes compared to the others and these encoded with a black screen only! Any ideas?

What do you mean by 'odd frame size'?

By the way, if you stop the conversion while HC is encoding the file, you shall find the AviSynth script (setXtitleX.avs) which is fed to HC in the output directory. You should be able to play this file in Media Player, and the video shall have the final frame size and rate (720x480 / 29.976 fps for NTSC or 720x576 / 25 fps for PAL). Please try to play it and:
- If it plays correctly, please try adding the line:
*AVSRELOAD
to the HC options in the configuration dialog of DVDforger.
- If it doesn't play or you see only black frames there as well, please paste the contents of the .avs file here.

Have a nice day,

[rendez2k]

What do you mean by 'odd frame size'?

By the way, if you stop the conversion while HC is encoding the file, you shall find the AviSynth script (setXtitleX.avs) which is fed to HC in the output directory. You should be able to play this file in Media Player, and the video shall have the final frame size and rate (720x480 / 29.976 fps for NTSC or 720x576 / 25 fps for PAL). Please try to play it and:
- If it plays correctly, please try adding the line:
*AVSRELOAD
to the HC options in the configuration dialog of DVDforger.
- If it doesn't play or you see only black frames there as well, please paste the contents of the .avs file here.

Have a nice day,

Sorry, by odd I mean different to the others. I'll try the suggestions and report back!

[rendez2k]

Adding *AVSRELOAD made the conversion work fine.

[rendez2k]

Back again! Can DVDforger output mp2 audio? My DVDlab project requires all audio to be of the same type and most of it is mp2 as its from my DVD Recorder and I'm trying to avoid having to re-convert the audio between several formats.

[alvarez]

Hello,

Back again! Can DVDforger output mp2 audio?

No, only AC3 is supported at the moment (using Aften). Shall I add it to the bottom of the to-do list? :)

[rendez2k]

Hello,



No, only AC3 is supported at the moment (using Aften). Shall I add it to the bottom of the to-do list? :)

Brilliant and thanks!

[Blue_MiSfit]

Looking forward to trying this awesome looking application as a replacement to ConvertXtoDVD! It seems like using HC 0.22 will give me multi threaded performance!

~MiSfit

[marioval]

I really love the layout and functionality of dvdforger, especially the menu creation portion. I use it with HCEnc as QuEnc does not give me chapters which I understand is a known issue. Actually I would not use QUenc either way but thats niether here nor there..... I only use dvdforger for small projects because I find that it takes much much longer than FAVC which I also use with HCEnc. A project that takes FAVC 1 hour to convert typically takes about 3 or more hours with DVDForger. is this because FAVC is using a newer version of hcenc with multicore? I will not pretend to know too much about video encoding but I notice with FAVC there are 2 instances of hcenc running and with dvdforger there is only one. What can I do to speed up dvdforger or when can we expect any updates soon? Also can dvdforger add overscan border?

[marioval]

Hello, anyone out there?

[alvarez]

Hello,

Hello, anyone out there?

Well, I'm still alive... more or less :)

A project that takes FAVC 1 hour to convert typically takes about 3 or more hours with DVDForger. is this because FAVC is using a newer version of hcenc with multicore?

This may well be the case, it you have a multicore CPU. You can use the new HC with DVDforger as well if you do the following:
- Copy the new version of HC to the directory 'tools\HC' and rename the file 'HCenc_022.exe' to 'HCenc.exe'.
- In the configuraton dialog of DVDforger, add the line '*AVSRELOAD' to HC options.

can we expect any updates soon?

I'm thinking about releasing an update with the new HC and a quick-and-dirty fix to chapters if I manage to find the time for it, but I'm kind of overloaded with work until summer so a major update isn't to be expected in the next few months.

Also can dvdforger add overscan border?

Yes, it can. There's an option for it in the video track properties.

Have a nice day,

[marioval]

Thanks for the reply alvarez. better late than never right. Ok, just so i'm clear, by replacing hcenc.exe with a newer version and adding the line *AVSRELOAD, what am I actually acomplishing? because after I did that and ran another job, it seemed to take as long as it did before. I DO have a dual core machine.

*Edit. Nevermind, it is actually a bit faster. Although both of my processors are working there is still only one instance of HCenc running doing 1 task at a time so it still takes pretty long. For now I will still use FAVC for my longer projects and DVDForger for my shorter projects. I'm looking forward to a new version of DVDForger though.

[alvarez]

Hello,

Here's a new version, but please don't expect too much: it only includes two bugfixes and the updated version of HC, Aften, mplex and MediaInfo.

@marioval:
FAVC has much more tricks to make the encoding faster (it splits the video into several parts and launches multiple instances of HC in CQ mode to gain speed). Currently I don't really intend to put such features into DVDforger, because a) both result in some quality loss b) I'm too lazy to do it :)

Have a nice day,

[marioval]

Hello,

Here's a new version, but please don't expect too much: it only includes two bugfixes and the updated version of HC, Aften, mplex and MediaInfo.

@marioval:
FAVC has much more tricks to make the encoding faster (it splits the video into several parts and launches multiple instances of HC in CQ mode to gain speed). Currently I don't really intend to put such features into DVDforger, because a) both result in some quality loss b) I'm too lazy to do it :)

Have a nice day,

Hey Alvarez thanks for the updated version.

Can we expect any performance increase at all? have you done any type of benchmark tests to figure a percentage of speed increase? 5% 10%???

[rendez2k]

Thanks alvarez - bug fixes are better than nothing!

[alvarez]

Can we expect any performance increase at all? have you done any type of benchmark tests to figure a percentage of speed increase? 5% 10%???

I haven't done any benchmarks myself. Please look in the HC forum for comparisons between version 0.21 and 0.22; the same can be expected in DVDforger, because I haven't changed anything else which could be relevant.

Have a nice day,

[Koohlar]

Hi,

Can any one advise if the new version of DVDforger is able to convert h264, AC3 (VFR) MKV files to DVD without audio sync issues? Would be great if it could. Only software I have found to do that job is Total Video2DVD but video quality is not as good as I'd hoped.

Thanks.

[mcv]

hi,
getting the error "mplex.exe has encountered a problem and needs to close" window when running DVDforger 0.6.2alpha.

Been using this software on my other machine no problems, pretty much identical software installed, works no problem, but no joy on this machine.

Step 1 of 5: Encoding audio track 1 of title 1 in group 1... done.
Step 2 of 5: Encoding video of title 1 in group 1... done.
Step 3 of 5: Multiplexing audio and video of title 1 in group 1... Error!

And here is the log it gives me....

Found PCM audio: 2 channels, 48000 Hz, 16 bits, 5858.052354 seconds.
Writing WAV file...
WAV file written successfully.
SIMD usage: MMX
Threads: 1



==================================================
==================================================

-----------------------------------------
| HCenc - MPEG2 encoder - rel. 0.22.1.0 |
-----------------------------------------

MPEG profile@level: MP@ML
input: c:\documents and settings\mark\my documents\dvd_downloads\fav_output\bekindrewind\set1title1video.avs
output: C:\Documents and Settings\Mark\My Documents\DVD_Downloads\FAV_Output\BeKindRewind\set1title1video.m2v

--------------------
| encoder settings |
--------------------

profile: FAST
frames: 0 - 146482
framerate: 25.000
aspect ratio: 16:9
bitrate Kb/s: 5967
max. bitrate Kb/s: 9600
pulldown: no
closed gops: no
VBV check: yes
scene change det.: yes
interlaced: no, BFF
goplen,B-pic: AUTO
dc_precision: 9
scan method: zigzag
bias: 0
chapter frames: 0
time code: 0 0 0 0
CPU: MMX
priority: idle
SMP active: no
matrix: MPEG
luminance gain: no

------------------
| source stats |
------------------

nr. of frames in source: 146483
width*height: 720x576
fps: 25.000
nr. of frames to encode: 146483
frames to encode: 0 - 146482

---------------------
| encoding - pass 1 |
---------------------

pass 1 encoding time: 3:45:51 (13550.95 s)
fps: 10.8

--------------------------------
| encoding - intermediate pass |
--------------------------------

bitrate set to: 5967 kb/s
est. outfile length: 4267891 kB
intermediate encoding time: 1.25 s

---------------------
| encoding - pass 2 |
---------------------

*** INFO, adjusting average bitrate: -0.03 %
*** INFO, adjusting average bitrate: -0.06 %
*** INFO, adjusting average bitrate: -0.08 %
*** INFO, adjusting average bitrate: -0.11 %
pass 2 encoding time: 3:55:42 (14141.59 s)
fps: 10.4

------------------
| encoding stats |
------------------


intra matrix used
8 16 19 22 26 27 29 34
16 16 22 24 27 29 34 37
19 22 26 27 29 34 34 38
22 22 26 27 29 34 37 40
22 26 27 29 32 35 40 48
26 27 29 32 35 40 48 58
26 27 29 34 38 46 56 69
27 29 35 38 46 56 69 83

non-intra matrix used
16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23
17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24
18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25
19 20 21 22 23 24 26 27
20 21 22 23 25 26 27 28
21 22 23 24 26 27 28 30
22 23 24 26 27 28 30 31
23 24 25 27 28 30 31 33

nr. of gops: 10506
nr. of frames: 146483
nr. of I-frames: 10506
nr. of P-frames: 43094
nr. of B-frames: 92883
average bitrate: 5960
minimum bitrate: 156
maximum bitrate: 9598

bytes in bitstream: 4366260897
bits in bitstream: 34930087176

average Quantizer: 2.428

total CPU time: 7:09:37 (25776.63 s)
total elapsed time: 7:41:39 (27699.46 s)

[marioval]

So if using 0.6.2 there is no longer a need to use AVSRELOAD to utilize both cores?

[tallguy85]

hi im new here and not sure if this is where i can post this but it seems only on certain videos i get this error in DVDforger when i try to add them to my dvd project/list (this is just an example) " 'C:\examplevideo.avi' doesn't seem to be a video file. (DirectShowSource: could not open as video or audio.)' " how can i stop this error from happening so i can add the videos i want without problems? any help would be great, thanks!

[rendez2k]

hi im new here and not sure if this is where i can post this but it seems only on certain videos i get this error in DVDforger when i try to add them to my dvd project/list (this is just an example) " 'C:\examplevideo.avi' doesn't seem to be a video file. (DirectShowSource: could not open as video or audio.)' " how can i stop this error from happening so i can add the videos i want without problems? any help would be great, thanks!

Have you got something like ffdshow installed? Can you play the videos normally?

[tallguy85]

Have you got something like ffdshow installed? Can you play the videos normally?

no i dont have ffdshow installed, and i just tried playing the videos and it says that it needs a codec to play them. so do i need to install ffdshow or?...

[rendez2k]

no i dont have ffdshow installed, and i just tried playing the videos and it says that it needs a codec to play them. so do i need to install ffdshow or?...

Yes, you need the correct codecs on you're system. I install k-lite which I know some people hate but its always worked for me (ffdshow is part of that or just try getting ffdshow separately)

[tallguy85]

Yes, you need the correct codecs on you're system. I install k-lite which I know some people hate but its always worked for me (ffdshow is part of that or just try getting ffdshow separately)

thanks so much! i tried adding my videos to DVDforger again and everything seems to be working now! no problems ^_^

[tallguy85]

ok i have a new problem now but sorta similar to my last problem only this time the error says "C:\examplevideo.avi doesn't seem to be a video file. (Script error: there is no function named "DirectShowSource")" i have the newest version of ffdshow installed also.

[rendez2k]

And is avisynth installed?

[tallguy85]

And is avisynth installed?

im...pretty sure, how can i tell if it is or not?

[rendez2k]

Probably best just to re-download and install!

[tallguy85]

k, i will try that and post back....

[tallguy85]

did exactly what you did and everything seems to be working again. thanks!

[szechman]

Hi,

I a setting up a project with the new alpha of dvd forger and when i go to start I get the error
Aften: A/52 audio encoder
Version 0.0.8
(c) 2006-2007 Justin Ruggles, Prakash Punnoor, et al.

usage: aften [options] <input.wav> <output.ac3>
type 'aften -h' for more details.

Error: Too many parameters.


Any ideas?