Borrowing and edit video clips from DVD

[callstreet]

Someone point me to this forum. It's not authoring as defined by Scenarist. I just want to edit video clips and make some simple special effects. But there's no editing forum.

Here it is: I select a small clip from DVD using old ShrinkDVD. Then demux using VOBEdit. Otherwise VOBEdit wouldn't work properly. The m2v video file plays in POWERDVD and Windows Media Player, but not simple video editors like Ulead 6, ShowBiz and Windows Movie Maker. At least Ulead 6 can import it, play a choppy version, and can remake a mpeg file that plays fine. But the resulting file is very poor than the original.

I remember a long time ago there's advice here about editing in AVI. So I tried DVD2AVI. At least I know that editing mpeg is poor in that the end points are not exact using Ulead 6, and often they looked like torn apart. I couldn't manage to get an avi. But when I opened the DVD2AVI dg version at the back, and DVD2AVI latest version at the front, the different codecs appear when I try to save to avi. Without both program running, I only have the choice of no recompression and full (no compression). When the codecs appear, I tried different ones. Full gave me a huge file for a small clip. The output quality of other codec are poor. Later I search for guides for DVDAVI. Firstly one suggested that he don't use DVDAVI for editing DVD(mpeg) clips. Secondly most people don't obtain an avi file like me. Thirdly there are complicated options/process for conversion.

Can anyone help me whether I really need DVD2AVI? I just need something so Ulead 6 or similar things can read and edit.

Another thing that is NLE: I want to add some clips, say with a dancing cartoon character, and overlay on some other video. Now it looks bad, like a semi-transparent picture in picture.

BTW, I would try virtualdub for that, but I hesitate to do everything on an all command line editor.

[Klinky]

AD & ErMaC wrote a guide @ animemusicvideos.org on obtaining/using DVDs with NLEs. There are a few option/examples explained. One of them should work. There is also a large quantity of background info you should know before you get into heavy editing. This will make it so you don't feel like you're poking around in the dark.

Guide is located @ :

http://www.animemusicvideos.org/guides/avtech/

[callstreet]

Thanks, I think I have already added a few more options to do that now. But the guides about obtaining high quality is good, as most of the software like DVD2AVI is undocumented.

As for adding animations, it will look good if you do it on stable background like uniform colored carpet. Export the carpet as still picture, add whatever you want to add, and then overlay on the video. Looks perfect, but any fluid movements will have to be painfully added still by still.

[Klinky]

Not exactly sure about the effect you're trying to produce? Maybe you should look into mattes. But you could also explain it in a bit more detail or show an example of what you have.


Also VirtualDub is not a command line program...

[callstreet]

Yes, I'm confused about VirtualDub, indeed about a lot of other things. Who can guess that to borrow a clip form DVD you need DVD2AVI AND Asyn (can't spell) ?

Never mind about my effect. But think about adding a picture of an ant to a picture of a carpet, as if the ant has been on the carpet. For stills it's pretty easy. Cut out the ant using some photo packages. You can indeed overlay on any other picture and look good at normal amplifications.

Video is a different matter. Most package allow you to overlay a still or video on a video, but the effect looks like a picture in picture, not the ant crawling on the carpet. But if you try to overlay a stationary ant on a stationary carpet, it's easy, while the other things near the carpet moves.

[Klinky]

Usually you have to convert your video file into a bunch of stills and edit them one by one... :|

[violao]

Originally posted by callstreet
...think about adding a picture of an ant to a picture of a carpet, as if the ant has been on the carpet. For stills it's pretty easy. Cut out the ant using some photo packages. You can indeed overlay on any other picture and look good at normal amplifications...
Don't know if I got this correctly, but if you can make sure that the background of the original ant video is of uniform color then you can use some very simple Avisynth plugins for overlaying, without the need to cut anything. You can produce "fake" AVI from DVD2AVI by using VFAPIconv. This fake AVI can then be loaded into Avisynth for further processing.