Calculator for CCE single-pass VBR mode

[FamousPerson]

I wrote this calculator for myself, but thought I'd post it here in case it could help anyone else.

When I re-encode DVDs, I follow Trilight's method, and I only ever use CCE. Also, I only ever do single pass VBR encodes. I have a 53" 16:9 hi-def TV and have never been able to tell the difference.

So, if you do not do single-pass VBR encodes, you can stop reading because this calculator will not help you.

If you do, however, then feel free to use it. All you have to do is tell it how many frames your movie has, and it will tell you what to set CCE's MIN bitrate setting to. Several settings are hard-coded right now, like MAX bitrate, etc, because those are the only settings I use, and as I said, I wrote it for myself.

Anyway, here it is. If you find it useful, let me know.


cceguesser.zip (11.8 K) (http://www.vanhouwelingen.com/marcvh/cceguesser/cceguesser.zip)

(requires VB6 runtimes (http://www.vanhouwelingen.com/marcvh/today/vbrun60sp3.exe))

[lrosado]

why is it you dont recommend it to people that do multiple passes? Isn't it better to do multipass? By the way, impressive tool.

[FamousPerson]

It's not that I don't recommend it for multiple-pass, it's just that tool won't work for that. All it does is tell you what single-pass settings to use in order to use the max space on a DVD-R or DVD+R.

(Multi-pass I'm sure will produce better results, but I'm satisfied with what single pass does, so I don't do multi-pass)

[lrosado]

got it! thanks for the tool, will use it in future projects.

[HomerJ]

FamousPerson,

Well done, I've dowloaded the file, I'll give it a try over the next few days and report back.

It sure looks easy, reminds me of "DVD Calculator"

HomerJ :D

[benf2]

HI,
Could you make a change in the program to not gray out the Q box and max bitrate?

I too only do single VBR, but i use a different Q factor(usually 37)and max bitrate of 9000, and would find your tool handy if that change was made.

Good Start:)

[FamousPerson]

No, I can't. The calculations it makes are based on real sample data I collected. All samples were run at Q 60 and Max 8000.

The only way I could add that would be if I knew the effect that changing Q and MAX had on the end result, and I just don't have any data on it. If you do, please let me know...

[tyee]

FamousPerson
After looking at your calculator, I think your calculations indicate that the average bitrate of the final encode is going to be approximately equal to the CCE minimum value you enter here. From the calculations I do all the time, yours indicates this. Yes??

tyee

[FamousPerson]

Yes, exactly. I know it doesn't make sense, but it always seems to be very close to right.

See this thread...

http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?s=&threadid=34445

[HomerJ]

FamousPerson,

I've tried your calculator, unfortunately, the resultant VOBs were somewhat over size. (used Black Hawk Down)

I tried it 3 times, varying the minimum bitrate, as well as the "cushion" value. Frame rate is 25.

Any clues ?

I'll give it another go in a couple of weeks, after my holidays.

HomerJ :confused:

[FamousPerson]

Hmmm. Could be the high action. I have Black Hawk Down, I'll try it.

I may have to add a "High Action" check box!

[FamousPerson]

HomerJ:

I tried Black Hawk Down (NTSC, region 1). Here's a synopsis, please tell me if this matches what you got:

Total Frames: 207654
Audio File Size (English only): 462 MB
Subtitles (English only): 232 MB

Leaving the cushion at 100MB, the calculator recommended a minimum bitrate of 3664. It predicted the m2v size would be 3.7831 GB.

When I used this setting of 3664, the m2v actual size was 3.8016, about 19 MB over the predicted value.

Is this what you got too?


FamousPerson

[FamousPerson]

HomerJ:

Oh, I just realized you're using PAL. That may be where my calculations are off (we Americans sometimes forget that the other 90% of the world doesn't necessarily do things our way :) ).

If you send me all the details of your experience, maybe you can help me make this thing PAL-friendly.

[HomerJ]

FamousPerson,

Thanks for looking into it for me, unfortunately I no longer have access to Black Hawk, (well, not an original anyway :) )

Also, I'm just off on my holiday for a couple of weeks, so won't be around much.

Looking at you figures, I do agree with the of frames, although the audio was a bit higher at 494mB (AC3).

I didn't have any subtitles etc. so I set that value at 0.

Hope that helps.

As soon as I get back, I'll post again.

HomerJ :)

[FamousPerson]

I have made a few improvements to the program. Also, I made it slightly more conservative in its calculations for movies that have higher action.


cceguesser.zip (15K) (http://www.vanhouwelingen.com/marcvh/cceguesser/cceguesser.zip)

[whirlpool]

For anyone who is interested, With a Q factor of 30, and VBR 2 passes, Avge Rate 3900, film only, the resultant reauthored film just fits a DVD+R and the quality is excellent.

[FamousPerson]

HomerJ:

I have a new PAL-friendly version out now, in case you'd like to give it another try-

cceguesser.zip (http://www.vanhouwelingen.com/marcvh/cceguesser/cceguesser.zip)

[HomerJ]

FamousPerson,

Many thanks for that, (just returned from 2 fabulous weeks).

I'll give it a go over the next few days and report back.

HomerJ :D

[HomerJ]

FamousPerson,

My apologies for not replying sooner, just to let you know, you're PAL version looks quite good. I've only used it once so far (that shows how busy I've been) and it got my final DVD to just under the 4.38GB size (movie was Training Day).

I'll give a bit more detail when I next use it.

Many Thanks for the great tool.

HomerJ :D

[PIRATE]

And i have got some problems sometimes....

The problem vas when entering all values for some movies in PAL i end up on a negative bitrate resault... for example the movie moulin rouge i got a -1280 bitrate...but when i pushed the NTSC button i got a +2800 bitrate suggestion.

[FamousPerson]

The negative bitrate just means your destination size is too small (at this point, try multipass). Changing to NTSC made it think you now had many less frames to encode, and that it would fit.

[PIRATE]

Because i just used 2300 insted of ntsc:s recommended 2800 and the size was nearly correct...have happend sometimes but i think the frames have something to do with it...i just came across some frame settings that made the calculator go rampage :)

[FamousPerson]

Oh yeah, there was a bug that did something like that in the versions prior to 1.0.3. If you're using an earlier version than 1.0.3, then that explains it.

lastest version... (http://www.vanhouwelingen.com/marcvh/cceguesser/cceguesser.zip)

[PIRATE]

Im Using 1.0.3....i probably found some movies that still is bugging your calc :)

[wfn1]

FP,

is it possible to develop a version for multi-pass vbr mode that would calculate the avg bitrate in the future? i'm using one pass vbr to build the .vaf file and then multipass vbr with 1 pass for the final encode (robshot method). right now i'm using dvtool for my avg bitrate calculations but your utility looks very good and i'd like to use it.

[FamousPerson]

wfn1:

Yes, it's possible, but hardly needed. If you want to calculate avg bitrate for multipass, just take whatever size you want your .m2v to end up (in bytes), divide by the number of seconds your movie is long, then divide by 125 (yes 125, not 128). CCE's output will be within a couple megabytes.

I didn't think to add that because of all the calculators out there that already do that, but maybe I will anyway...

[kolonel]

I have been using this proggy for a while with great success. It truly works, great tool.

Rob

[FamousPerson]

wfn1:

Because it wasn't too hard to do, I went ahead and added it. You can now select "Single Pass VBR" or "Multi-Pass VBR". The Multi-Pass mode, since it involves no "Guessing", is dead-on accurate.

I also made a couple adjustments:

1. Lowered overhead. I made overhead (especially for subtitles) more accurate. This means the output is more precise, but also means you will go over 4.37 if you do not allow a cushion for authoring

2. Changed the default cushion to 120MB. Basic authoring uses about 110 MB. Adding menus, etc, uses more.

You can download it here:

CCEGuesser.zip (http://www.vanhouwelingen.com/marcvh/cceguesser/cceguesser.zip)

[wfn1]

Thank you so much!

[FamousPerson]

I just made a few more enhancements. No new calculations, but added a graphical representation of free space and the program now remembers your most recent settings.


CCEGuesser.zip (http://www.vanhouwelingen.com/marcvh/cceguesser/cceguesser.zip)

[Jafco]

Thanks for such a useful tool; I've used it several times and had excellent results.

However. (Isn't there always a "however?")

On "Antitrust," it ended up estimating 4640 as the minimum for one-pass, with a resultant m2v of about 3,900,000,000. However, I ended up with almost a gigabyte smaller than that. Maybe it's a dramatically low-action movie?

Thanks again, and that's just FYI. After all, the encode looks great, so what the heck!

[FamousPerson]

Jafco,

That sounds very odd. It is not uncommon for the file to be smaller than predicted, as I've got it set to "worst case" - that is, higher action, but to be that much lower? Even if there was little action, CCE shouldn't drop below the MIN bitrate you set for it, which it clearly sounds like it did.

Well, at least you didn't go over...

How was the quality?

[aa3k]

Just wanted to say its a great program

Thanks

[Reggatta Mondatta]

FamousPerson,

Thank you very much for a very useful tool. I used it for Black Hawk Down and the results were exactly on 4.3 GB. The resulting quality is great.

I do have a question and apologies if it has been answered, but a search did not yield an 'easy' answer. Is there a relatively easy method/tool to use to determine the number of frames in a movie? I have the feeling I have been looking right past the answer, but I clearly <G> cannot see it. TIA.

Best regards,

RM

[FamousPerson]

Yes, CCE will tell you the # frames as soon as you drop an AVI or AVS onto it.

Glad to hear the program works for you.

[benf2]

I know u cant please everybody, but still nice to hope... more options for the "Q" setting... if u dont want to make it variable for us to select...how about adding 40 to the options... All i use is single vbr.... quality usualy 5-17 range and Q around 38-40. I would settle for a 40 only setting... I know a few people that use 40.


just a thought

[Reggatta Mondatta]

Geez! If it was a snake I would be dead :D!
I knew that information was somewhere obvious, but not that obvious. Thanks much.

RM

[aftertaste]

I am new to DVD been encoding SVCD for awhile now and this is all alittle new to me since i have bought a dvd burner. Now to throw away all my vcds and start over :) now forgive me if this question has been answered but as for this calculator all i want to do is encode the movie no menu's no extras. Why is the defualt Destination size set to 4,3772 when 4.7 will fit on a dvd-5. Sorry if i sound like a newbie on this quesion. BTW, Im glad i stumbled upon this tread sense i have been wanting something that makes single pass a one stop shop :)

[FamousPerson]

A DVD-5 cannot hold 4.7 GB. The max it can hold is 4700000000 bytes, which translates to 4.3772 GB.

[ianinmalaga]

Hi there, bit of a newbie here but just have a small question about the CCEGuesser and if I am doing it correctly.. I hope someone can help or confirm.

What is cushion in the guesser app? Is this like a give or take ... If I am doing a multi VBR Pass .. can I reduce this to 25Mb or even 0?

I managed to do the following so I think I am on the right lines..

I ripped everything out of the VOBS using ifoedit and just left the main movie and 1 ac3 (english) soundtrack. I then created a dvd2avi project and extract the audio (ac3)...

I then ran the VFAPI app to create an avi from my d2v project, then I loaded this into CCE. I calculated with the Guesser app that the average bit rate is 4545 for my film. The way I did this was entered the size of the AC3 that dvd2avi extracted and entered the frames of the film and changed the cushion to 25 megs. I entered Min bitrate as 0 and max bitrate as 9800.

I selected 2 pass VBR in CCE and encoded. I should have an m2v file once finished which I beleive I remux back into IFOEDIT and finally I click GET VTS in ifoedit so that it will play in a standalone player

Anyone confirm that I am on the right lines, I hope so.. Its a little confusing but I am sure once I have it correct then future encodes will be easy..

Thanks in advance for any help or info

Regards

Ian

[FamousPerson]

Ian,

You are definitely on the right track.

A couple things, though:

When you re-author (create VOBS), either with IFOEdit or, say, Maestro, a certain amount of overhead (about 110 megs) will be added. This is what the cushion is for. If you are doing multi-pass, set the cushion to 120MB and your final product should fit nicely onto an DVD with about 10 megs to spare.

Also, in CCE, lower your max bitrate to 9000 or even 8000. DVD standards allow for a max of 9800, but this is video+audio together. Just to be safe, lower it. Trust me, you won't see any difference...

[mck3nzi3]

Trust FamousPerson and trust me, exspecially if you re-authoring video and audio with IFOEdit lower your max birate to 8000 if you don't wont any "too frame dropped" error, and exspecially if you want to put in some subtitles track.
Your video quality don't change (on human eye only) :D

[ianinmalaga]

Thanks everyone for your input.. I am now redoing it using your advised settings..

The last time it went from 5.4 gigs to 10.5 !! ermmm wrong way!! not what I was expecting..

1 question. When in CCE I choose 2 pass ES. And enter the average bitrate that the cceguesser gives me. Do you have to run 1 pass first and enter any specific bitrate or just set it to 2 pass and then enter the Averge bitrate and let it run for 2 passes?

Thanks again for any tips..

I am so close but yet so far <grin>

Ian

[FamousPerson]

You should only have to enter the AVG bitrate one time. Since you already ran it once, you probably already have a .vaf file. KEEP IT. It will save you some time when you re run it.

If you do multi-pass, AVG bitrate should be the ONLY setting that affects size of the output. Set it to whatever CCEGuesser tells you. Also, make sure you have the fps set correctly in CCEGuesser.

[ianinmalaga]

ahhh this is where I got confused I think...

In video encoding mode I entered Multipass VBR Elementary stream Mpeg 2 and entered 2 pass in VBR passes and then entered average bit rate from cceguesser.. and waited until the 2 passes finish and thats it...

but thats wrong?

So what I should do is enter single pass vbr elemeary stream Mpeg2 and don't enter any average bit rate and then onece that is finished I then choose multipass and enter VBR passes = 1?? and then enter the average bit rate then and not before..

sorry for acting dumb here, is this correcT??

Ian

[ianinmalaga]

and in Q i leave as 60 and min to 0 and max change to 8000 as you said earlier..

Then when I come back to do a multipass ... set it to 1 VBR times... and enter 0 for min 8000 for max and the average given from cceguesser?

Regards

Ian

[FamousPerson]

You don't need to "come back to do a multi-pass". Just simply do a multi-pass. I don't think there is a Q setting in multipass.

0 and 8000 are good for min and max, and set your # passes to 1 or 2 (1 should actually be fine).

Also set video quality to 5.

[snotuk]

hi,
when i try to back my copy of "from hell".useing cceguesser my .m2v size comes out at 2.66 gig or there abouts.
when the guesser says estimated .m2v size is 3.61 gig.
i would like to hit this figure to fill the max space i can on my dvd-r,but have tryed a few times with no luck.i know this film is very dark
so could this be taking into account.
any help would be great.

film - from hell r1 (ntsc force film checked)
mpv size - ive fogot
audio size - 660mb (dts)
single pass vbr
framesize - 175996
q setting - 60
min - 0
max - 8000

OR BEFORE I FOGET THIS HAS ALL SO HAPPEND ON 2 OTHER FILMS,
THE ABYSS (PAL)
Independence Day (PAL)

[FamousPerson]

The truth is CCEGuesser doesn't do so well with PAL. For some reason, CCE treats PAL much differently in single pass VBR. I would suggest you use your VAF from the single pass and do a one-pass "multipass". Then the size will be exact.

[ianinmalaga]

FamousPerson,

can you confirm if I am doing PAL correctly because I noticed your last msg.

I am using PAL and doing multipass. I was trying to read between the lines on your last msg and you say there is a problem with Single Pass?? So I presume if I do multipass (2 passes) on a PAL .. the size should be pretty much dead on correct

P.s. I managed to do the NTSC film but I had some major problem muxing the m2v file back into ifoedit .. the video became jerky .. So I ditched that and I am now using DVD Maestro without problems so far...

Thanks again for your help

Ian

[FamousPerson]

Originally posted by ianinmalaga
I was trying to read between the lines on your last msg and you say there is a problem with Single Pass?? So I presume if I do multipass (2 passes) on a PAL .. the size should be pretty much dead on correct

What I'm saying is that single pass for PAL can be inaccurate. I didn't have much test data on it. If you set it to multi-pass, yes, it will be dead-on.

By the way, setting it to "multi-pass" and changing the number of passes to "1" is not the same as single pass. When I say single pass, I mean "One pass VBR". You can do multi-pass with a setting of 1 pass.

[rveupen]

Hi,

I am really new to DVD authoring and I would really appreciate it if someone could tell me in brief the exact way to rip a DVD.

What i do now is use DVDDecrypter and Demux Video and Audio track. I then use DVD2AVI to create the .D2V file(how long should that take to make..Collateral Damage takes about 3mins) could that be right?? Then i use Vfape104 to create an avi file. The avi I drag and drop in CCE 2.66. Adjust a few things in CCE and encode.

But a few key things are missing i guess.

Does someone have a doco on how to rip a dvd?

I would like to keep using CCE because from what I heard it is the best.

TIA!

[FamousPerson]

rveupen:

What exactly isn't working for you? Looks to me like you're a great job.

guides:

http://www.doom9.org/mpg/dvdr-guides.htm

[rveupen]

Thx for the quick reply...!

Well i am using CCE2.66...and all the guides i find are for mainly 2.50 and 2.64. The layout for 2.66 is totally different. What are the best settings?

During CCE 2.66 encode I always use VBR 2pass....but before CCE starts with the 2pass VBR it first takes about 1:45min to create a VAF file. So actually it is doing a 3pass even though i choose to do a 2 pass???? Is there an explanation for that???

After the encoding I use DVDMaestro to Author it. Import the Video and Audio assets. Make sure I have Pal and 16/9 Letterbox. Import the cahpers.chp file...and then want to import the Subs. But here is wheer it also goes wrong. I use Subrip 1.13. It creats all the BMP files and I choose the Maestro (.SON) file when saving...also make sure its on 25fps. When I look at the original DVD to see when the first sub appears and go back and check the .son file to see when the first sub should appear they are the same. But (and a big BUTT) when i import the .son file in Maestro it only imports a third of the subs. So i did a bit of invistigation and found out that it only imports subs(bmp) that have the hour in it. For example.. the first sub here (ned00001.bmp) Should be at 38 seconds but instead it starts with sub ned00433.bmp which is the first sub that has an hour in it.

SP_NUMBER START END FILE_NAME
Color (0 1 2 3)
Display_Area (000 000 719 573)
0001 00:00:38:08 00:00:43:02 ned00001.bmp

Display_Area (000 000 719 573)
0432 00:58:18:15 00:58:22:07 ned00432.bmp
Display_Area (000 000 719 573)
0433 01:00:58:17 01:01:01:15 ned00433.bmp

So i thought if i add an hour to the whole file it would import all the subs. And to my amazement it did. But (Again that big BUTT)...the subs are not in the exact right place.

Can you explain that??

TIA!

[FamousPerson]

I can answer your first question. CCE needs the vaf file to do multipass. It is an information file that CCE uses in order to make sure it's output's AVG bitrate is exactly right. If your movie has a very complicated part in the middle, for example, the vaf file would carry that information. My advice: do a multipass with only one pass (which would end up being 2 passes, one for the vaf file) if your movie is under 3 hours. The quality will be amazing, trust me. Also, note that you can re-use the vaf file. If it already exists, CCE will skip that pass.

As for your second problem, I've never seen that before. I've never worked with PAL, though. My guess is it has to do with your settings in SubRip. Just a guess.

[FamousPerson]

I have suspected there was a region-based bug in CCEGuesser but could not find it until now (finally!). It was a stupid bug that occured for anyone who uses a comma as a decimal symbol (actually, the bug was really more Microsoft's than mine ;) )

Anyway, here is a fixed version (1.0.6) (http://www.vanhouwelingen.com/marcvh/cceguesser/cceguesser.zip)

[sebus]

It might be me doing sth wrong, but I used version 1.0.5 for calcullations (PAL DV avi). CCE 2.66.xx.07 patched.
Gave me the estimation of min bitrate 4120, used 4100 & was ... over 400b too much for a single DVD5

Any ideas?

Thanks

sebus

[FamousPerson]

does 1.0.6 (see 2 above) give you different numbers?

[sebus]

My fault. As I said, done wrong the size of audio.
Your v 1.05 & v 1.06 were right.

To ~ 20 Mb

Seb

[oddyseus]

Famous person your calc is very good. I was on a similar problem for some time and managed to solve it using excel for the calcs. U may find it at this thread http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?s=&threadid=38730.

I am writing this to pass on a fact that I discovered during my research. The extra space u need for muxing up audio+video and subs is 3% on all counts.

U may use the data in the xls file to improve your program. Pls let me know if u need any info on them. Perhaps u could combine them to a fully intergrated programm that could suggest the quality factor as well.

[FamousPerson]

oddyseus:

Yes, total overhead is usually about 3%. Here's why:

Subtitles take up only 2.5% of their size as bitmaps (I determined this by compiling a project both with and without subtitles).

Video and audio take 100% of their size.

Navigation overhead is consistently about 110 MB.

Since 110 MB is 2.45% of 4.3772 GB (the size of a DVD-R), and subtitles typically take 10-20MB, the total overhead does work out to about 3%.

[foxmolder]

FamousPerson, as I must say it to you.
Until now I have used version 1.0.1 of your software with PAL format and it has worked very well.
Instead with the new versions, the calculations had many trouble with PAL format, because it is kept under the average with CCE Min but perhaps also too much in comparison to the version 1.0.1
However always thanks for your job.

[<Aussie>Twodogs]

First off thanks for a very useful program Famousperson.
I have been using it now for two weeks and i have encoded about 6 movies in that time using your program.
One funny thing i have noticed if i use the recomended min and max bitrates from your program with a 4:3 movie it's spot on , if i use it for a 16:9 it always " at least 3 times " makes the m2v file a lot smaller than it could off eg : re-encoded terminator 2 pumped all the relevant info into cce guesser and it gave me the recomended bitrates.
After re-authoring it all in maestro it totaled just under 4 gig , as this was a movie only re-encode the overhead was only 1 audio track so the outcome was suprising.
But all in all i think the programs great and will continue to use it " i just add a bit to the min encoding when doing a 16:9 movie ".
Thanks again for the program.
Btw i'm using version 1.06

[FamousPerson]

Yes, it depends too on the amount of complexity in the movie. I set it rather conservatively because some do go over.

[DVD1968]

Has anyone implemented the corrections to Robshot method from Bach and used FamousPerson's calculator with any accuracy?

Here is the link to the article from Bach I'm referring to

http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?s=&threadid=28939

Also, there is an alternative method to determining Q factor based on a small sample of the movie (http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?s=&threadid=41033&perpage=20&highlight=robshot&pagenumber=1). This seems a bit tedious.

FamousPerson - Can you incorporate an optimum Q-factor determination for OPVBR in your calculator using the Bach method? Also, I see you are using a quality setting of 5 which is low according to Bach.

Has anyone seen considerable differences in quality with a setting of 5 compared to something between 15-25?

[FamousPerson]

DVD1968:

Funny you should ask. As you can see in the thread you reference above (the 2nd one), I'm working on just that.

If anyone likes, feel free to download and test the new CCEGuesser that does the Bach method. You can find instructions, etc in this post:

http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?s=&postid=236925#post236353

As far as Quality=5, that's what I've always used. From what I understand, the lower the better.

[rveupen]

Wonder if anyone else has this problem...?

I use DVD Decrypter to DEMUX the Audio and Video of Spiderman.
Seen as though the .m2v file is small enough I dont have to use CCE to make it smaller. I then use Subrip to get the subtitles i need.

I import the .ac3 and .m2v file in DVDMaestro. Add the chapters and also the subtitles. Make sure it is Pal and 16:9. Compile the dvd and burned it. Works great.

But I wanted to do the same with Black Hawk Down. Used DVD Decrypter to get my .m2v and .ac3 files. The .m2v file was to big so I used CCE 2.66 and CCE Guesser to create a new and smaller .m2v file. Used Subrip to get my subs and DVD Decryoter already created the Chapters file. Started DVDMaestro up and imported the .ac3 and .m2v file. Added the chapters file and imported the subs file. Only then to find out that I used the original .m2v file that was to big. So I started a new project and did all the same except for the .m2v file. I used the one created with CCE only to find out that when i import my SUbs and chapters that only the half of the subs and chpaters are imported. So i removed the video from the timeline and as asset. Imported the .m2v file DVD Decrypter made (which is too big) and added it to the timeline. Imported my subs and chapters and this time they where all imported?????

So in short:

When i use the .m2v file created by DVD Decrypter (which is too big to create a dvd) I can import all Subs and Chapters.

When I use the .m2v file created by CCE only half of the Subs and Chapters are imported.

Is there some setting in CCE that I am not using or am supposed to use? I am using CCE 2.66.01.04.

Any suggestions are welcome!!

TIA!

[oddyseus]

change the start timecode in CCE that defaults to 1:00:00.00 hours and u r done. Alternatively u can reset the timecode in Maestro to 0:00:00.00 by clicking on the video tab up left from the timeline.

[rveupen]

Thx....that did the trick!!

[discutter]

Hi Great prog just what I was looking for, couple of niggling little question when I load up your pro it says "Single PASS VBR does not work well with PAL" does that mean it isnt accurate with PAL calcs or thats a rubbish thing to use in CCE with PAL?

I just ask as this is the method I have always used am I better of with multipass?

Secondly I havent figured out how to use the prog for something with say 4 main features (Im doing Star Trek TNG) I tried adding the total frame lenght of them all up etc, once Id finished I had 1.3 Gb spare on the disc

G

[FamousPerson]

No, sorry, it's only saying that it's calculations sometimes do not work well with PAL. I put that in there because some people have reported that. (I have no PAL material to test with)

If you have multiple titles, I would do what you did - add up all frames, bur then use multi-pass. That way it's guaranteed to be dead-on accurate.

[aftertaste]

hey famous excellent work i'm pleased to say i've done about 20 movies so far using your tool and everyone has been dead on accurate. Nice and simple straight to the point. I love it.

[FamousPerson]

Thanks!

[aftertaste]

Question famous is there a way to calculate hummm how do i put this. OK say within dvd decrypter to see a movie that is gonna be close to fitting on a dvd-5 after taking out the extra audio streams but its so close that unless you rip it and tear it apart you won't know for sure. Well in decrypter under stream processing it will show all the audio files. Is there a way to tell the video bit rate and do a calculation to figure out what the actual size of the movie would be after ripping out the unused audio streams and menus. My point is if the movie won't fit then i'll do all my demuxing within dvd decrypter and if not then i'll do it in file mode and use ifo edit to strip streams. This saves me time either way. Weather i have to re encode or just strip the streams i can save time by making that decision before i even rip it to the hd for the first time. So many times it has been so close that i have made the wrong decision and had to go and do it over. I'd rather not author a new dvd if its gonna fit in the first place. I know this may sound silly but it really does make sense if you think about it.

[FamousPerson]

aftertaste:

As far as I know, no. But I have seen lists in this forum of DVDs that will fit on DVD5 after stripping. You may want to try to "look it up" if a DVD is close.

But also, there is no need to re-author such disks. Just rip the DVD in file mode (entire disk is easiest if you have room, otherwise just main movie, plus it's IFO and BUP, plus VIDEO_TS.*). Then open VTS_0X_0.IFO with IFOEdit. Then press "VOB Extras" and you can create a full working DVD in a new folder of just the movie and whatever audio and subtitles you want. Details on what settings to use in IFOEdit can be found in Step 4 of this guide:

http://doom9.org/mpg/ifoedit-basic.htm#stripaudio

[HOGGER]

I must say that I had encountered some difficulty’s using cce until I came upon your wonderful program.
With its uses and cce…… along with dvdmaestro
I’ve had nothing but prefect results

Thank you very much