AVI to MPEG2 with AC3 audio

[Lula]

Hi,

I capture from Mini-DV using Pinnacle Studio Version 7 software and DV capture card. That produces an AVI file ( 720 x 480 ).
I then use TMPGEnc to encode to MPEG2.
After that, I start the DVD authoring phase with DVD Workshop.

I know that some older standalone DVD players do NOT support mpeg2 audio. My Pioneer 353 handles it OK.
BUT, as I will duplicate this DVD and hand it to many people, I would like to have the most possible compatibility.
I understand that AC3 audio would be the way to go.

So, how to produce my MPEG2 with AC3 audio, from the captured AVI ?

Thank's in advance.

[ulfschack]

I hear that BeSweet now supports avi as audio source, and I know that it handles AC3 encoding, so probably you just have to get Besweet and and do it in one sweep.

Another way: Sometimes the wav isn't 48Khz or it's not really a compatible one (strange headers etc), so you could use "save wav" in VirtualDub, run it through BeSweet and do a Wav2Wav (with SSR just to correct the sample frequenzy. Then drop the new wav in Sonic Foundry's "softEncode" and create your AC3 from there. Actually that's how I do it. SoftEncode isn't free tho.

cheers

[Lula]

Thank's for replying.

I read that Soft Encode produces better ac3 than Besweet.

On question : how to mux my video (.m2v) and audio (ac3) streams ?
I tried that with TMPGEnc but there seems to be a sync problem.
Also , I don't want to do it inside my authoring software ( DVD Workshop 1.3 accepts elementary streams, but introduces some bugs on the rest of the authoring process). Any suggestions ?

[ulfschack]

sorry, (almost) no suggestions for the muxing, since I use DVDMaestro, which requires separate streams. You could try IfoEdit, which can remux even if you've coded the video stream yourself (don't know if that goes for audio as well tho). I think the chanses are pretty good.

cheers

[24hourloop]

You author with IFOEDIT (use the Author DVD option). Works great. Is free.

Check the guides.