newbie question conc. capture guide

[Keckis]

Hi!

This is probably a silly question, but im on the 7. Postprocessing the video step,
7.1 Processing the video using VirtualDub,t what's the next step after setting up all the filters and cutting out commercials?

Am i not supposed to save the file to a new avi that has been processed with the filters? Cause everytime i setup the filters and choose "save as avi", I get a huge file that eats up my whole HDD.

Shouldn't it be <= to the old avi in size? and another question, should i use video compression when editing the avi? i've already used huffy when capping.

hope im not to hard to understand =)

//Keckis:confused:

[GrofLuigi]

Hi,

Yes, you're doing it right, just set the desired compression (codec and parameters). And don't forget to keep track of what you're doing with the audio.

The size will get smaller if you use direct stream copy (but then you can't use most of the filters). If you don't set it, VirtualDub defaults to uncompressed every time.

There are some guidelines in chapter 8 - Encoding and Authoring, but yes, as far as I can see, nowhere it is mentioned explicitly that you need to do Save As AVi. :)

If you have enough disk space, you can save the result of the filtering as another intermediate file (huffy) - if the final enconding will be, for example, in several passes and you use extensive filters, so they would be applied in each pass. Sometimes it's better the other way around - set directly your parameters (for example, xvid) and fire away. You'll need to decide for yourself.

Also, the other guides in the section Virtual Dub Procedures might come handy.

GL

[Keckis]

Ok, thanks! It's nice to hear that i was doing something right atleast :) Gonna try that later!

[Keckis]

So, since I'm converting vhs tape to dvd / xvid, i guess (in the vhs->dvd case) that i then have to convert the "raw" vhs (huffy used) into an avi, add my many filters (denoise and such), 'save as' an intermediate avi with huffy, and then convert it to dvd following chapter 8?

Is this correct? :)

I want to use some filters, since they enhance the picture!

[GrofLuigi]

So, since I'm converting vhs tape to dvd / xvid, i guess (in the vhs->dvd case) that i then have to convert the "raw" vhs (huffy used) into an avi, add my many filters (denoise and such), 'save as' an intermediate avi with huffy, and then convert it to dvd following chapter 8?

Is this correct? :)

I want to use some filters, since they enhance the picture!

Yes. Since you're filtering with VirtualDub. If you were using Avisynth AND if your MPEG encoder accepts it (avisynth), you could skip the intermediate avi, but there is no harm in doing it this way - with intermediate file.

Since we're referencing The Capture Guide, your next step would be 8.2. :)

GL

[Keckis]

Hey back again =)

Now i've been testing with a few different settings, but im still finding some stuff that's not explained in the guide.

Im using TMPGEnc for authoring a dvd. I've done an intermediate file without any sound and a wave file (demuxed them i guess it's callad? :)

Here comes the questions:

Now, I use this (http://www.doom9.org/index.html?/mpg/tmpg-dvdencoding.htm) guide (which the guide refers to) and it's starts of with talking about "Before you can start digging into TMPG you have to create a DGIndex project of your movie."

1. How do I do that? Which program to use? Well, I've skipped that step when i experimented :)

2. It also says that i should choose the stream type "ES (only video)". Don't i have to choose ES (Video + audio) or System (video+audio) since i have separate audio and video? I know using system gives me a .mpeg file which has both audio and video in it and the ES will give me a m2v and mp2 file.

3.In the size section, i should use the same resolution that i had in virtualdub right? I cropped my clip a bit, and should then have the same res right? for me; 720x560?

4. Aspect ration; source was a VHS tape so guessing 4:3 right?

5. when using 2 pass mode i set the avg. bitrate using Bearson's Bitrate Calculator, and set the min to 0. BUT then comes this part: "maximum bitrate to 9800 kbit minus the bitrate of all your audio streams". How do i get the bitrate of the audio streams? do you check the demuxed audio with some program?

6. and also, if im thinking about having some menu with chapters on the dvd, how much will they take in size? im guessing i have to lower the max bitrate or the avg. bitrate?

Hope im not to unclear in what i mean :) Thx for any help at all!:thanks:

[GrofLuigi]

Hi again :) Good you're making progress. :)

That guide (and Tmpg) is a bit old, but I guess there's no harm since it just works. :p (but I might be rusty on it)

I'll start by the numbers directly:

1. You'd use DGIndex (http://neuron2.net/dgmpgdec/DGIndexManual.html) if you have DVD source, which you don't, so just ignore that part for now (like you did).

2. I guess, that guide is written with assumption that you have encoded your audio separately. Most of the time, you'd want to process audio separately - maybe touch it up with some audio editor like Audacity for instance (normalize, remove offset, CAREFULLY try to reduce noise), but this is optional, and more important - compress it (IMO for VHS there is no point keeping it uncompressed). The most sensible formats for DVD would be AC3 or MP2. If you encode audio with TMPG, you need to choose the option that still gives you separate video and audio streams (files). I guess, from that picture, it's ES (Video + audio), but I'm not 100% sure. This is so you can feed the DVD authoring program elementary streams - audio only and video only. Most of them accept other streams (system A+V, which would be a 'normal' mpeg file), but it's better to keep it clean.

3. Find out what valid DVD resolutions are (here's one link (http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?p=223973#post223973)) and use only them. It seems you're in PAL land, so you need 720x576, so you should have added black borders in Virtual Dub after cropping. I guess more work awaits you... :(

For VHS, I often used 352x576 resolution in order to squeeze more material in one DVD (the bitrate can go lower, and visually it doesn't make much difference because VHS is not hurt by lower resolution). Don't worry if it looks squished in Virtual Dub, encode with 4:3 ratio and it'll look right at the end.

4. Which brings us to 4:3 which is correct (ignoring some advanced calculations which you can look into later if you're interested; I think they're in the capture guide too, regarding the 'capture window' or timing of your capture card). Just make sure you don't crop too much (more than, let's say, 50 pixels).

5. Wav (uncompressed) audio at 48 kHZ (which is what DVD accepts and what you should have captured at) is around 1500 kb/s. If you encoded it to something else, you should know what bitrate you encoded it to. :) Or use MediaInfo or GSpot.

Also, for maximum compatibility set the minimum bitrate to 300 or 500 (there were some reports that some old DVD players choked on minimum bitrate of 0).

6. No, you calculate bitrate for the menus separately (their own audio+video+subtitle streams).

GL