DVD-R vs Original DVD Video Quality

[majagua]

Some people tell me that when you backup an original movie DVD without re enconding (< 4.37 GB), that you can tell if it's an original movie disc or a DVD-R Disc when you play it in a stand alone. Is this true? Can you note the difference in the video output, even if you did not reenconde?

[DJ Bobo]

If you don't reencode, there is NO difference in video or audio quality.
What they mean is probably the lack of some menus or something like that.

[mpucoder]

If you backup a movie with no re-encoding, and no stripping, to DVD-R the only differences are 1) CSS, macrovision, and region masks are missing, and 2) the lead-in track will identify the media as recordable. That last one is enough to stop some devices from playing the movie.

[Arky]

I'm not really into ripping movies for DVD-R writing, but I did try Gladiator, just out of interest, from a quality standpoint (this is nicely encoded by the studio, and is quite a long film - approx 2.5hrs, from memory). I Re-encoded, using the original Doom9 CCESP guide (based upon RobShot's guide), and ended up with video of about 3.8Gb. I muxed this with re-encoded audio, very quickly, in Maestro, just for a playback test from the new VOBs.

I must say that, although respectable, I was not all that impressed by the playback quality, in comparison to the original, when played back on my TFT monitor (which, at 1280x1024, places significant demands upon scaling). When I refer to playback on my TFT, I am referring to RELATIVE comparisons between original and new VOBs, so the scaling ITSELF is not the culprit, per se, since the scaling is a constant in both instances. It looked great when sent through my GeForce3, to a TV, though. I am just curious as to why it is that many rippers claim to get very decent quality when squeezng TWO films onto a DVD-R!? I was barely satisfied with squeezing just ONE film onto a DVD-R (admittedly a long film, but nowhere near the 4hrs+ which two films would require).

I am left to conclude that those of you out there who are squeezing two films onto a disk, and still claiming high-quality results are:

1) judging quality on a TV screen, using a standalone, rather than playing back on a PC screen.

2) judging quality on the basis of macro-block distortion (or hopefully LACK thereof), rather than also taking into consideration the depleted colour gradients which I have noticed with the end result.

I'm not slating the solution, I'm just left wondering what all the fuss is about, creditable though CCESP is at doing the job in hand.

I am very interested to hear people's comments on the topic.

I hope this post is not inappropriate for the thread - if it is, will one of the mod's please move it as you see fit. I do appreciate that majagua's original post was referring to NON-re-encoded projects, but I felt that the post title nevertheless encompassed the topic I wished to address. Please do as you think best.

Regards to all,


Arky ;o)



NOTE: I am NOT CRITICISING anyone, or the CCE-SP re-encoding solution, so for those of you out there who, having read the above, think I am "having a pop" at the rippers amongst you - WRONG! The above is written in good faith, ok? ;)

[TRILIGHT]

Thanks a LOT, Arky!! You just had to go off and have me check, huh? hehe ;) I agree that, in comparison, the re-encoded video looks like CRAP! I have an Eizo-Nanao 18.1" LCD flat panel monitor and (when fullscreen), the video just looks terrible (and no, it's not the monitor. This is a $2000+ monitor!) Like you, I'm sure many will argue that it's the way the LCD scales things but I know enough about how it does this to know that is not what I'm seeing. The anomalies are clearly compression artifacts inheirent on the video itself and not due to the LCD. Damn you for making me look! ;)

Like you, these DVD's, when played back on a regular TV look every bit as good as the original. I honestly can't tell the difference without pausing it in certain places and sticking my nose to the screen! Certainly during regular playback (and especially from 6-8ft away on the couch!) nothing is really noticeable at all. Of course, after seeing the compression artifacts just now on the monitor, I have to wonder what these DVD's are going to look like, should I ever pipe it out via progressive component output to a 16:9 television! I'm wondering now if the artifacts will become more apparent. (Then again, I've sort of learned to live with the WAY overcompressed signal from DirecTV so maybe I won't be so anal about it in my old age. ;) )

[Arky]

lol - well that just about covered all the necessary ground - I was beginning to wonder if I'd done my re-encoding wrong! (MAYBE..!! lol).

I have to be fair about this and say that even commercial original DVDs have a habit of looking substandard on my TFT, so it's not that the re-encoding is completely flawed in itself. As I said, the biggest thing I noticed with the re-encodes was not so much macro-block degradation, but colour gradient fidelity. Hey-ho, you don't get something for nothing, and I'm sure that all those re-encoders out there who choose only to playback their rips on television, using a standalone, will continue to be happy with the subjective results.

I think I will continue to reserve my DVD authoring time for DV footage, rather than rips (it satisfies my creative urges more), but that's just me.

C U back in the DVD forum ("home")!


Arky ;o)


P.S. "Eizo" panel, eh? "VERY NICE 'Arry!" (Lock, Stock, and Two Smoking Barrels).

[mikeathome]

Hi,

when it comes to reencode a >2hour movie to fit on a DVD-R you get a noticeable quality drop on PC playback which most often can be hardly recognised on a middle class TV. You'll see it as well on a good 16:9 Wide Screen TV and most likely on a beamer. You can improve this by 3passVBR encoding but NEVER avoid.

Since most DVD Copy freaks does not own this kind of equipment they never find out...

I always purchase a GOOD DVD, despite the opportunity to copy it. When I copy then most liekly to get a handy CD-R DivX copy for Notebook playback on long overseas flights.

mike

[Antonio S.]

I reencode using TMPGEnc and see no diference between the original and the copy. You can download the template that I use here (http://www.antonio.owns.it) .

Antonio S.
http://www.antonio.owns.it

[Doom9]

arky: I have to agree with you there.. I also have a TFT and watching my transcoded DVD-R projects I can see the difference without effort. But TVs (which are crappy by their very own nature) are a different story.. using a really high end TV you could probably spot the differences doing a 1 on 1 comparison... but I never did that. And most people probably have lower quality standards than you and I ;)

[DJ Bobo]

@ Arky
I don't know how you done the reencoding of Gladiator, but I think resizing to a letterboxed 4:3 format will help much to preserve the image quality.
From my calculations, if you're aiming for 4400MB, you'll get 4100kbps average.
Supposed that you'll keep one 448kbps AC3 stream, you'll get an avg of 3650kbps which is high enough if you encode the movie in 4:3 letterboxed.

If you have the PAL version, crop only the top and the bottom, resize to 720x328 and add 2x 124pixel black bars.
If you have the NTSC version, crop only top & bottom and resize to 720x272 and add 2x 104pixel black bars.

Encode definitely in progressive mode (not interlaced) and set the bitrates to something like this:
min: 2000kbps
Avg: 3650kbps
max: 5500kbps

The quality should be awesome.

[auenf]

everyone has TFT's???

looks like ill have to get the TFT im planning on getting :)

i wonder if running CCESP thru 9 passes will fix up the couple of problems you guys are speaking of?

Enf...

[theReal]

DJ Bobo, why would letterboxed encoding preserve more quality?

I have no experience in mpeg2-DVD (re)encoding, but from Divx encoding I know you should always avoid letterboxed because it degrades the quality.

[DJ Bobo]

Because if he encodes anamorph, the actual resolution of the movie will be higher, so a higher bitrate will be needed (so in case of PAL Gladiator, he would have actually 720x432 instead of 720x328 if he doesn't encode letterboxed)

This has nothing to do with DivX. In DivX, what is ment, is to crop the black bars completely to get slightly better quality.
For DVD you can't crop the black bars, so this is a completely different thing.

[theReal]

Ah, OK, now I know what you mean.

Just like if I had never seen a DVD before, I didn't think of the anamorphic picture... DUH ;)