Hi to everybody and first question

[Big Cat]

New here, so hi to everyone. I'm a layman at this, so I beg your patience, but I'm fanatic about all that is movie, so I hope to learn a lot here.

Anywayz, I'm doing my very first rip using the Doom9 Xvid guide. Had previously only ripped to MPEG (which is a lot easier). I failed miserably. I don't see where one can screw up ripping the DVD, I did a smartripper rip, the used DVD2AVI. D2v file was 437 KB, my ac3 was 288.186 KB. That seems a bit small. Listened to it with Powerdvd and while it was quiet it was the English track and it had the right length. So I'm guessing I was cool up to there. Now i'll start quoting the guide, then saying what I did. Just for clarity. Before I get any crap (I'm a moderator at the bodybuilding.com forums, I know how it works) I did search on this, and I did read the entire Xvid guide several times before I started, so kindly keep your flames to yourself if you are not intent on helping. If it is your opinion that I missed something in my search, a simple link would help me out a great deal.

If you did not choose Force Film in DVD2AVI due to a too low film content you can perform IVTC during encoding. You'll activate IVTC upon saving the avs file (later on in the guide) but first you should already set FPS to 23.976 so that the correct number of frames for the resulting movie will be shown.

I left it at 25.000 fps, because that is the indicated frame rate for a PAL progressive. It said 23.976 here, but if I understand that is for NTSC films.

Proceeded to pick the right codec, set my file size and number of CD's (2 CD's, 1300 MB, I like to have room for trailers and Autorun)

Avi-interleave I set to 1xvbr-mp3 and checked calculate overhead. Set the audio bitrate A to 128 Kbps, had no audio B. Then selected my resolution : Auto crop was fine, checked crop all. Unchecked the follow ITU etc in options. Set it to PAL anamorphic 16:9 (which it is). Looked at the preview, clicked resize and it looked fine, then set the start of the end credits.

Now you have to set the resolution by moving the big slider.
You can see the Aspect Ratio error in one of the fields, and as you can see the results are close to perfect. You also have to keep watching the Bits/Pixel values (Output resolution.It's a bit guesswork as you cannot predict compressibility of your movie but here's some hints:

It's not a good idea to go below 0.20 bits/pixel*frame
If you go above ~0.35 you might not be able to reach your desired filesize
If you go for 1 CD stay close to 0.20
If you go for 2 CDs stay around 0.27
If TV bits/pixel*frame is below ~0.13 you should raise your bitrate (and go for more CDs).
Mode the slider until you're within this range. These values are the general rule for DivX3 encoding. I find it safe to go quite a bit lower using another codec, say 10-20% at least.

Where I set my slider it had aspect error at 0.0, bits/pixel at around 0.30 (audio important), W-Zoom was 100%, H-Zoom 70.

If I tried to get bits/pixel smaller it either took W-Zoom over 100% or it took aspect error way up.

Preview window, clicked save and encode and entered just what was in the guide : neutral Bicubic, no field operation (PAL progressive) and no noise reduction. Selected no trim, selected file name. Pressed the audio 1 tab, enetered EXACTLY what was on the screenshot, as instructed. Kept it at 128 Kbps since that's what I had. Entered it in the queu, and started encoding. Looked to be doing its thing for about 12 minutes, was finished. What does the log read at the end :

ERROR : MP3 file size is 0, transcoding failed.

Same thing when I started over.

ANy help much appreciated.

[Big Cat]

bump to keep this on top

[jggimi]

A better title might have helped. Note:9) Use a title that describes the content of your post....You're correct, Force FILM is for NTSC use only.

My guess is you have a syntax error in your audio conversion command set. I can't tell, since I haven't seen the log, but it's easy to make a mistake.

The Azid portion in the guide is-L -3db -s surround -c normaland the LAME portion in the guide is--alt-preset 128 Note the two hyphens in the LAME command.

[Big Cat]

My apologies for the less than aptly titled post.

The two commands for LAME and AZID are exactly as you described since I copied them right from the screen shot in the Xvid Guide, I will post the log here shortly.

[Big Cat]

17/01/2003 13:45:29: Job "Ripset" started.

o Transcode AC3 -> MP3: C:\DivX Controls\DVD Rip 2\FastFurious AC3 T01 3_2ch 384Kbps DELAY 0ms.ac3
End of Job 1 (Ripset).
_______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Gordian Knot 0.23.0.17
Encoding Job Data:

Type: EncAudio
Number: 1
Name: Ripset
Platform: WinXP (5.1.2600).2

Audio:
mode: ac3 -> mp3
sourceFile: C:\DivX Controls\DVD Rip 2\FastFurious AC3 T01 3_2ch 384Kbps DELAY 0ms.ac3
wavFile: C:\DivX Controls\DVD Rip 2\FastFurious AC3 T01 3_2ch 384Kbps DELAY 0ms.wav
mp3File: C:\DivX Controls\DVD Rip 2\FastFurious AC3 T01 3_2ch 384Kbps DELAY 0ms.mp3
azid: "-L -3db -s surround -c normal"
lame: "--alt-preset 128"
delay: 0
interval: 2
preload: 500
mux: 1
recalc: 1
deleteWav: 1

none.


13:45:29: Started Transcoding Audio.

13:45:29: Azid: Trying to find maximum gain value for C:\DivX Controls\DVD Rip 2\FastFurious AC3 T01 3_2ch 384Kbps DELAY 0ms.ac3
Commandline: C:\DIVXCO~1\GORDIA~1\azid.exe -L -3db -s surround -c normal -g 30dB -N "C:\DivX Controls\DVD Rip 2\FastFurious AC3 T01 3_2ch 384Kbps DELAY 0ms.ac3"
13:50:46: Azid: Finished. Duration: 5 minutes, 16 seconds.

13:50:46: Azid: Decoding C:\DivX Controls\DVD Rip 2\FastFurious AC3 T01 3_2ch 384Kbps DELAY 0ms.ac3
13:50:46: Azid: Using gain -g 13.2dB
Commandline: C:\DIVXCO~1\GORDIA~1\azid.exe -L -3db -s surround -c normal -g 13.2dB "C:\DivX Controls\DVD Rip 2\FastFurious AC3 T01 3_2ch 384Kbps DELAY 0ms.ac3" "C:\DivX Controls\DVD Rip 2\FastFurious AC3 T01 3_2ch 384Kbps DELAY 0ms.wav"
13:56:40: Finished. Duration: 5 minutes, 53 seconds.

13:56:40: LAME: Encoding C:\DivX Controls\DVD Rip 2\FastFurious AC3 T01 3_2ch 384Kbps DELAY 0ms.wav
Commandline: C:\DIVXCO~1\GORDIA~1\lame.exe --alt-preset 128 "C:\DivX Controls\DVD Rip 2\FastFurious AC3 T01 3_2ch 384Kbps DELAY 0ms.wav" "C:\DivX Controls\DVD Rip 2\FastFurious AC3 T01 3_2ch 384Kbps DELAY 0ms.mp3"
13:56:40: Finished. Duration: 0 seconds.

13:56:40: Deleting Wav-File.
13:56:40: Successful.

13:56:40: Audio Done.
13:56:40: ERROR: MP3-File-Size is zero! Transcoding failed.
13:56:40: MP3 Audio File = C:\DivX Controls\DVD Rip 2\FastFurious AC3 T01 3_2ch 384Kbps DELAY 0ms.mp3
Total Encoding Time: 11 minutes, 10 seconds.
17/01/2003 13:56:40: Job "Ripset" finished.
_______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

[jggimi]

You are using Gknot .023, the current release is Gknot 0.27. Doom9's guide is a little out-of-date.

Your problem is caused by your release of LAME. If you go to the first page in the guide (where all the software links are), you'll see LAME 3.92 listed. Gknot 0.23 came with LAME, but an earlier release that doesn't understand Doom9's recommended "--alt-preset" command.

Later revisions of Gknot included DivX 5, BeSweet for audio transcoding, the ability to use .avi or .avs as input (not just .d2v), and other improvements.

If you decide to jump to 0.27, install both the Rip pack and the System Pack.

[Big Cat]

I did install the lame 3.92 in the GKNOT directory as instructed in the first setup.

[killingspree]

Originally posted by Big Cat
[B]Anywayz, I'm doing my very first rip using the Doom9 Xvid guide. Had previously only ripped to MPEG (which is a lot easier). I failed miserably. I don't see where one can screw up ripping the DVD, I did a smartripper rip, the used DVD2AVI. D2v file was 437 KB, my ac3 was 288.186 KB. That seems a bit small. Listened to it with Powerdvd and while it was quiet it was the English track and it had the right length. So I'm guessing I was cool up to there.

well the size of the ac3 depends of the encoding quality /channel count of your DVD. is not unusually small! oh and about the volume... there will be some gain during the process of converting it to an mp3 file!


Where I set my slider it had aspect error at 0.0, bits/pixel at around 0.30 (audio important), W-Zoom was 100%, H-Zoom 70.

If I tried to get bits/pixel smaller it either took W-Zoom over 100% or it took aspect error way up.

to get smaller bits/pixel you'll might want to lower your resolution: big slider in the gknot resolution register or set it to a higher bitrate. but sinc you are dealing with a 2cd rip anyway the bitrate shouldn't be the problem!


Preview window, clicked save and encode and entered just what was in the guide : neutral Bicubic, no field operation (PAL progressive) and no noise reduction. Selected no trim, selected file name. Pressed the audio 1 tab, enetered EXACTLY what was on the screenshot, as instructed. Kept it at 128 Kbps since that's what I had. Entered it in the queu, and started encoding. Looked to be doing its thing for about 12 minutes, was finished. What does the log read at the end :

ERROR : MP3 file size is 0, transcoding failed.



ok here's your problem!! (:
well if you want to get your movie done fast, just check 'disable audio processing' on the audio tab... then try the video encode...
afterwards download a besweet gui and encode your audio seperately @ 128 kbit (if you don't know how to do that, there's a very comprehensive guide at the top of the newbie section (sticky))
anyway than you'll have to mux it with nandub or virtualdubmod. a process you'll find explained into every detail in the guides too.
this sounds very confusing at first, but isn't too difficult to accomplish with the help of the guides!

oh and about your 12 minutes: transcoding the audio should take way longer... about twice the time if you have a very fast processor 2.0 GHz plus!

if you need anymore help, feel free to ask (:

regards
steVe

PS: and i would recommend very much to update your gordianknot to version .27

[jggimi]

I did install the lame 3.92 in the GKNOT directory as instructed in the first setup. [/B]Azid worked, you should have a .wav file produced from that step. But LAME took 0 seconds, and did not produce a valid .mp3 file.

You could test to see if 3.92 is installed by executing LAME from a command prompt in that directory, with no parameters...

If you upgrade to 0.27, this will be academic, as BeSweet will be used.

[Big Cat]

Originally posted by killingspree
well the size of the ac3 depends of the encoding quality /channel count of your DVD. is not unusually small! oh and about the volume... there will be some gain during the process of converting it to an mp3 file!

Well I can only compare to MPEG encoding and that was a pretty hefty file (about 1.2 GB usually). But I'm new at this, so if it seems normal then you have put my mind at ease. Means I didn't screw up in that step.

to get smaller bits/pixel you'll might want to lower your resolution: big slider in the gknot resolution register or set it to a higher bitrate. but sinc you are dealing with a 2cd rip anyway the bitrate shouldn't be the problem!

I tried, but it seemed to take the zoom values into the red. Anyway, I was thinking the same way, 2CD rip, stress the video, 0.3 wasn't that bad.

ok here's your problem!! (:
well if you want to get your movie done fast, just check 'disable audio processing' on the audio tab... then try the video encode...
afterwards download a besweet gui and encode your audio seperately @ 128 kbit (if you don't know how to do that, there's a very comprehensive guide at the top of the newbie section (sticky))

Well if it is comprehensive then that shouldn't be a prob at all. If it isn't, I can always pose my questions here, right ?

oh and about your 12 minutes: transcoding the audio should take way longer... about twice the time if you have a very fast processor 2.0 GHz plus!

Hmmm, more like 1.2 (well until I get my new 3.1 anyway).

if you need anymore help, feel free to ask (:

Thank you, you've been most helpful, if you ever need some bodybuilding, nutrition or training advice, give me a holler, I would gladly return the favour.

PS: and i would recommend very much to update your gordianknot to version .27

Would the Doom 9 Xvid guide still be applicable then ? Until I figure it out completely, I prefer to have a guide.