DivX or DVD±R for home movies?

[valnar]

If you have a stack of 8mm, Hi-8 or VHS tapes of home movies, and were to convert them to digital, what is your preferred format?

I'm torn between DVD-R's and DiVX files (on DVD-R media as well). While I don't forsee any problems with the future proof of either format, DVD certainly is a standard. However, DivX can be copied/moved around easier and without the DVD/ISO structure to worry about 20 or 30 years from now. Plus with DivX/Mpeg4 players coming out now....

Which is your preference?

-Robert

[ppera2]

VHS I usually convert to VCD - it's that what is most adequate for such poor quality source. Obsolete, but still most standard - plays on everything.

[Atamido]

If you are going to make VCDs, but you have a DVD-R writer, you might as well make DVDs.

If you are planning on having these play on stand alone DVD players, then you probably want to use DVDs as good MPEG-4 is coming slowly to stand alones. That means if you want to play it at a family members home, then you would probably be out of luck with MPEG-4.

However, I prefer less discs, and don't use stand alones much, so I would use MPEG-4.

[Tuning]

I preffer using MPEG4 as the suitable for home movies.With in couple of years whole world will be using MPEG-4 compatible DVD players.And I see one more advantage,you can transfer MPEG-4 over the internet to your friends,can DVD do?.As bandwitdh ascending with latest technologies,MPEG4 will be most preffered format.
And in single DVD you can burn several hours of video in MPEG-4.

-Tuning

[int 21h]

Interlaced Mpeg-2 at half d1 resolution.

[Neo Neko]

MPEG4 on DVD±R! Booya!®©

[Skip Around]

Hmmmmmmm, With MPEG-4 I can put 6-10 movies on one DVD-R. These are formated *my* way with all the "junk" content removed. I like that.

[valnar]

There is no junk content. They're home movies, not DVD rips. Also, VCD or SVCD was never an option. I wouldn't consider that since i have a DVD burner.

I'm just trying to find magic answer in a crystal ball that doesn't exist. What would be best for preserving & future-proofing video for 10-20 years from now?

-Robert

[Skip Around]

Sorry Robert, I did not read closely enough. In that case I would use DIVX 5.02 with full resolution, bit rate set to 10,000 and key frames set to 1. This is the format I use for captures (thanks to the member that first suggested this). It is easy to edit or convert, to whatever format you like, with little or no loss. Would give 2-3 hours of video + audio per DVD-R disk.

Skip

[stax76]

What would be best for preserving & future-proofing video for 10-20 years from now?

if longevity is a concern for you then MPEG4 is certainly a good option, every time a new storage technology enters the mainstream you could copy your content to the new medium so then you have backups and as we all know it's always good to have them

[jonny]

After getting a dvdburner i go for mpeg2.
It's too nice to insert the disc in a box (in my case the ps2) and start looking.
When mpeg4 standalones will be widely avaible, i'll change my mind :)

[Hectic]

dvds. i mean come on guys, we're not talking about ripping a dvd and sending it over the internet. make dvds so you can have seperate tracks (vacation, birthday). give your family some credit. make high bitrate dvds, save your tapes. you don't want these to look blocky. not even a question MPEG 2! you guys are too in love with divx here. i think your family deserves better quality than friggin divx...even if they are vhs rips. why would you want to add blockiness over the already crappy vhs quality. don't add digital inperfections to tape inperfections.

[jonny]

It's not a question of quality here.
mpeg2 standalones are widely diffused and there are more features like menus ecc..
There is more comfort using a dvdstandalone player instead of pc for playing.
Soon this will change imho.

[ppera2]

Time required for conversion is also important factor. But this is not intended to be some discussion about what is better, but simple poll.
It looks, however that people likes more to discuss than to vote - number of posts is higher than number of votes :)

[Atamido]

I did not vote because I was split. It depends on which you think is more convenient. As I said, if I wanted less disks, then I would pick MPEG-4. If I wanted to be able to play it back on any stand-alone, then I would pick MPEG-2.

[valnar]

It doesn't matter for me. There is a chance that DVD's will be obsolete like VHS in 20 years, but then there is the chance that the "ol fashioned DivX codec" may be obsolete then too as we all try to play our MPEG files on Linux because Redmond blew up...

I still have the original 8mm tapes, but they won't last forever. I don't want to convert them over and over as they're starting to show their age.

If I choose DVD-R, then the media must stay the same. If the DVD-R media deteriates, I have to move it to another identical one. If I choose MPEG4/DivX, then I can change media as time moves on to preserve it. Someday they may actually have a media format which will last 100 years (like CDR boasts, but doesn't).

So here is my dilemma:

Choose something where the media must stay as is, but the format is currently a standard for years to come (DVD)

Or choose something where the media can be whatever is popular of the day, but the format is the flavor of the year (DivX).

I am adept with both and make DVD's and DivX's all the time. Education or ability isn't a question.

Right now I'm leaning towards DVD, only because its easier to "pass" around to relatives. (Although, all my relatives have PC's too.) But the longevity of DVD-R media has not been tested. With DivX, I can move my movies to Blu-ray or whatever else comes along. I just don't know if there will be a DivX codec for Windows 2020 or Linux version 16 umpteen years from now....

Argghh!!! :scared: :angry:

-Robert

[Tuning]

whatever else comes along. I just don't know if there will be a DivX codec for Windows 2020 or Linux version 16 umpteen years from now....

DivX/XviD or any other MPEG-4 Codecs will be there untill,the newest MPEG-7/MPEG-11 comes up.But the research is still going on and I think MPEG-7 will take atleast 8-9(may be) years to be popular as MPEG-4 now.
And I don't know will there be a codec or compression standard in these MPEG standards.(It is a assumption..for the time being).

May be someone here will have more answer??

-Tuning

[valnar]

I decided.

DVD authoring takes longer for me since I have to give it "form" along with chapter points, menus, etc., so I'm going the DivX route.

To make it the most plain vanilla possible, I'll make the videos DivX 5.05, no advanced features, MP3 CBR audio with highest video quality and AVI file format.

I'd love a better container than AVI, but its the most widespread at the moment.

-Robert

[Tuning]

Originally posted by valnar
I'd love a better container than AVI, but its the most widespread at the moment.

Look here:What are your favourite containers? (http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?s=&threadid=63585)
Astonished!?
Well it is the most preffered format by the members.

Bye

-Tuning

[valnar]

I'm not a big open source fan. I'd prefer an established industry standard format. AVI support is built into Windows, which is a plus.

But thanks for the link. Interesting reading.

-Robert

[int 21h]

Originally posted by Tuning
DivX/XviD or any other MPEG-4 Codecs will be there untill,the newest MPEG-7/MPEG-11 comes up.But the research is still going on and I think MPEG-7 will take atleast 8-9(may be) years to be popular as MPEG-4 now.
And I don't know will there be a codec or compression standard in these MPEG standards.(It is a assumption..for the time being).

May be someone here will have more answer??

-Tuning

Mpeg-7 is a descriptor language, based on XML, using Mpeg-1, Mpeg-2, & Mpeg-4.

[Tuning]

Mpeg-7 is a descriptor language, based on XML, using Mpeg-1, Mpeg-2, & Mpeg-4.

I don't know what is exactly meant by that.Can you explain or give a link.

Thanks

[SeeMoreDigital]

It's Mpeg4 (DivX) for me.

I usually store the files on my Media PC's hard disc, either as 800MB files for backup to CD-R. Or as an 2500kbps stream (Video@2370kbps and Audio@128kbps) for eventual backup to DVD R/RW.

I can't wait for NeroDigital. And being able to store Mpeg4 video and AAC audio in an MP4 container!

Cheers

[int 21h]

Mpeg-7 is a markup language, like HTML, or XML. Its used to describe multimedia content... used to index multimedia files. Its made to index existing MPEG files, it has no specifications for video or audio compression in it.

[KpeX]

Originally posted by SeeMoreDigital
I can't wait for NeroDigital. And being able to store Mpeg4 video and AAC audio in an MP4 container!
You can do that right now. Use xvid/divx for your video and psytel/nero/quicktime for your audio, there's an MP4 guide on the Doom9 homepage.

[Atamido]

Originally posted by Tuning
I don't know what is exactly meant by that. MPEG-7 is like ID3 tags for MP3. You would use it to identify the name of the clip, the author, producer, etc. It also allows you to specify for just a portion of a clip, like information specific to a chapter. And, it even allows you to specify things for a single frame. Like, in this frame, the person's face located in this portion of the frame is Elvis.

Its probably the most comprehensive tagging system ever designed for multimedia. It was looked at when the tagging system was designed for Matroska, but it was to big. Right now Matroska has over a hundred tags, if it had used MPEG-7, then it could have been thousands.

[Neo Neko]

Originally posted by Hectic
dvds. i mean come on guys, we're not talking about ripping a dvd and sending it over the internet. make dvds so you can have seperate tracks (vacation, birthday). give your family some credit. make high bitrate dvds, save your tapes. you don't want these to look blocky. not even a question MPEG 2! you guys are too in love with divx here.

Just because you are not MPEG4 adept does not mean Divx etc are crap. I have seen several instances where MPEG4 blows MPEG2 away. Less blocks and everything. Use MPEG4 at ½ the bitrate of MPEG2 and the output will usually always be equal or better. Currently though my fav mpeg4 codecs are the ffmpeg based ones. :D

Originally posted by valnar
I'm not a big open source fan. I'd prefer an established industry standard format.

Industry standards are nice. But there is no reason not to be an opensource fan. Industry standards tend to have wide spread implementation in commercial devices. But open source has wider implementation everywhere else. And it is even making major inroads into once totally commercial territory. The thing with opensource and opensource formats is that they are generally quite easy to create, use, or convert to another format. You are not locked to the format or restricted in what you can do. Matroska is no exception. With the Matroska Playback Pack your users need only run the single program to install the required files to parse Matroska files, playback AAC and Vorbis audio, and support dynamic rendered subs. And depending on how what you put in your Matroska files you can easily and directly mux them to MP4 files in seconds once MP4 becomes a viable widespread format. Once Movix gets updated with the latest Mplayer that supports Matroska it will be possible for you to create a CD or DVD that can play itself on a computer with only a CD or DVD drive and no hard disk what so ever. Simply put the disc in the tray. Boot the PC and watch your movie. :D

Originally posted by valnar
AVI support is built into Windows, which is a plus.

But thanks for the link. Interesting reading.

-Robert

AVI may be built into windows but even the versions built into windows can be rather inconsistent and even then they do not cover many areas of the specification that Microsoft itself set up to any extent in a proficient manner. IE more than one video audio stream and things could go funky. 3rd party software is often required to get the desired results. And VBR Audio is only partially supported for one or two formats. For what you are doing AVI should suffice. But there are many nice things Matroska and MP4 can offer over AVI. ;) Never fear. Opensource is your friend. Think how many opensource programs left you high and dry with your data locked up in them and then look at how many commercial programs have done the same thing. No matter how you look at it opensource is often the safest bet. The only weakness of opensource software is lack of central sources for professional technical support. But companies like IBM, Mandrake, and Redhat are even doing that in many cases. Oh and the odd fork here or there. Why does code only ever fork but never knife or spoon? :P