NTSC to PAL conversion (CCe or ProCoder)

[Jynks]

Hi I thought I had this sussed and have read a lot of ntsc 2 pal threads but none seamed to answer my problems so i thought I'd start a new one ...

Q. How do you convert various video formats to a DVD compliant PAL.

I have been using canopus pro coder and have simply been setting the output to pal, thinking that it would render at the correct rez, correct frame rate, withc it dose... but the problem is that itplays super fast in the finnished version.

Is there a CCE front end for converting stuff to DVD compliant PAL? I mean idealy I would like to take all the files I have and run them through them same encoder so they end up all with the same dimentions, frame rates and the like...

Is there any way to do this... I nned to run it on DivX, XviD, Mov, TechSmith and Mpeg files...... but do not stress about the files I can convert them into almost any format, I just need a way to get them all to end up as nice DVD style PAL movies.


I am making a DVD with all my fav Starwars Stuff on it, deleted scenes, fan films, specials etc etc.

[RB]

No, unfortunately there is no such one-fits-it-all solution. Questions concerning format conversions are better asked in the AVISynth forums.

[Jynks]

Well, dose anyone have any ideas of how I can go about this... mabey point me to some guides?

[dloneranger]

I've done a small prog to automate this type of thing for myself
It generates avs files for you, that you can drop into CCE and just hit encode

program
http://www.steven-bond.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/setup.exe

It's not the latest version, but I can't upload it at the moment as i'm not at home

screenshot (http://www.steven-bond.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/avs.jpg)

[FredThompson]

If you want quality results, look at Dynapel's MotionPerfect which does motion analysis of the frame contents then generates new frames at the appropriate frame rate.

[dloneranger]

slightly newer version on the ftpsite
fixes a bug in mpeg audio conversion being pitch corrected
adds option for overscan borders on/off

[Jynks]

wow I'll check these out and see how they go.. I'll let you know.... at the moment I have been looking at that atlantis application, though the homebrew app that gens cce drop files sopunds great as that encoder has great quality.

[dloneranger]

i hope it's of any use to you

basically there are 2 ways of doing framerate conversions

normal
either drop frames (going from 23.97) or add frames (going from 29.97)
pro: film stays the same length
con: unless you have a really good app to do it the films can seem to stutter or have blurry bits

alternative
change the length of the film
pro: no made up frames, or missing ones
con: the length of the film changes

personally i'm not keen on the first method, it never seems to 'look' as nice as the second
i can live with the film beign a bit longer/shorter
it roughtly adds 10 minutes per hour going from 29.97 to pal
sounds a lot, but that's only 5 extra frames a second, so it's not really noticable

the main drawback with just converting like this is the sound changes pitch (making all the men sound like tom waits and the women like charlton heston)

so, this prog changes the film length, and alters the pitch of the audio to what it should sound like

technically it just creates an AVS script that alters the framerate and uses the new soundstretch option to correct the audio
so all the hard work is done by avisynth (shodan be praised :D )

oh, yeah, one other thing
when the avs file is created, you might see _WS at the end of the filename
this means that the film's widescreen, so remember to set the 16:9 option in CCE
(it's only a rough check, but saves opening the film to check)
eg
My_Film_Directshow_WS.avs would be a widescreen film

it all comes down to what you prefer i guess