How to convert a few mini-DVDs to mpeg2?

[manusse]

Hi,

Sorry if this question has already been asked but I tried search and didn't find an answer.
My problem is I have some home footage from a camcorder. They've been shot on mini-DVDs. I want to know how to convert them to mpeg2 (I tried VOB2MPG but it didn't work) so that I can then join a few of them together.

I don't want to lose quality so don't want to decompress then recompress. I also want to do it with free software.

Thanks for your help.
Cheers
Manusse

[setarip_old]

Hi!They've been shot on mini-DVDs. ...so that I can then join a few of them together.If you simply want to join them together and create one "full size" DVD, this can be readily accomplished using the freeware DVD Flick...

[manusse]

Hi,

Thanks for your answer. Can your confirm that DVD Flick doesn't decompress/recompress them? In this case this could be a good solution.
Otherwise, I'd like to convert them to mpg files. Is there some easy way to do that (freeware, no recompression).

Thanks in advance
Manusse

[rica]

Manusse,
what is the source format of your records?

[setarip_old]

@manusse

If, as you seem to indicate, they are already in compliant DVD format, there should be no reason for Flick to decompress/recompress them...

[manusse]

Hi all,

@rica: They are PAL DVDs. If I remember well they were shot using a SONY camcorder (by myself). So the format is MPEG2 but with a DVD structure (VIDEO_TS and VOB, BUP and IFO files).

@setarip_old:
If, as you seem to indicate, they are already in compliant DVD format, there should be no reason for Flick to decompress/recompress them...
OK, I'll try that too.

I've found a method for converting them to mpg: I demux them (pgcdemux) and then remux them to mpeg (imagompeg-muxer). However I couldn't join them.

Thanks for your help

Manusse

[rica]

@rica: They are PAL DVDs. If I remember well they were shot using a SONY camcorder (by myself). So the format is MPEG2 but with a DVD structure (VIDEO_TS and VOB, BUP and IFO files).


manusse,

You can use eac3to to extract mpeg2 video and ac3:

(this is a commercial DVD but the structure is the same: )

Getting info:

C:\>eac3to E:\VIDEO_TS\VTS_01_1.VOB

VOB, 1 video track, 4 audio tracks, 4 subtitle tracks, 0:20:20
1: MPEG2, 576i50 (16:9)
2: AC3, 5.1 channels, 448kbps, 48khz, dialnorm: -27dB
3: DTS, 5.1 channels, 24 bits, 768kbps, 48khz
4: AC3, 5.1 channels, 448kbps, 48khz, dialnorm: -27dB
5: DTS, 5.1 channels, 24 bits, 768kbps, 48khz
6: Subtitle
7: Subtitle
8: Subtitle
9: Subtitle

Extracting video:

C:\>eac3to E:\VIDEO_TS\VTS_01_1.VOB 1:C:\video.m2v

VOB, 1 video track, 4 audio tracks, 4 subtitle tracks, 0:20:20
1: MPEG2, 576i50 (16:9)
2: AC3, 5.1 channels, 448kbps, 48khz, dialnorm: -27dB
3: DTS, 5.1 channels, 24 bits, 768kbps, 48khz
4: AC3, 5.1 channels, 448kbps, 48khz, dialnorm: -27dB
5: DTS, 5.1 channels, 24 bits, 768kbps, 48khz
6: Subtitle
7: Subtitle
8: Subtitle
9: Subtitle
[v01] Extracting video track number 1...
[v01] Creating file "C:\video.m2v"...
Video track 1 contains 30525 frames.
eac3to processing took 2 minutes, 13 seconds.
Done.

If you want to join the vobs:

eac3to v2.66
command line: eac3to\eac3to E:\VIDEO_TS\VTS_01_1.vob+E:\VIDEO_TS\VTS_01_2.vob 2: video_joined.m2v
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
VOB, 1 video track, 4 audio tracks, 4 subtitle tracks, 0:39:41
1: Joined VOB file
2: MPEG2, 576i50 (16:9)
3: AC3, 5.1 channels, 448kbps, 48khz, dialnorm: -27dB
4: DTS, 5.1 channels, 24 bits, 768kbps, 48khz
5: AC3, 5.1 channels, 448kbps, 48khz, dialnorm: -27dB
6: DTS, 5.1 channels, 24 bits, 768kbps, 48khz
7: Subtitle
8: Subtitle
9: Subtitle
10: Subtitle
[v02] Extracting video track number 2...
[v02] Creating file "video_joined.m2v"...
Video track 2 contains 59558 frames.
eac3to processing took 13 minutes, 25 seconds.
Done.

And you can remux video and audio to a ts container with TSMuxer.

EDIT: If you want an mpeg2 program stream you can use this simple graph to convert ts to ps:

http://img217.imageshack.us/img217/6397/haaligs2.th.jpg (http://img217.imageshack.us/my.php?image=haaligs2.jpg)http://img217.imageshack.us/images/thpix.gif (http://g.imageshack.us/thpix.php)
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