Need help with backup decision

[Commander XJL]

I was about to start backing up the Star Trek Next Generation series. I was going to use ShrinkDVD. If I keep the 5.1 audio track the encode will be 53.8%. If I go with the 2 channel audio the encode will be 58.5%. What will the audio difference be with a series disk like this between 5.1 audio and the 2 channel audio? I don't like encoding below 55% but I did a test and it looks pretty good. But if there isn't must noticable difference in the audio I would rather encode higher.

[writersblock29]

You might profit from checking out the DVD Rebuilder threads on this one... Transcoders like DVD Shrink are great for most projects, but of course the more you have to reduce your project, the less your quality is going to be. You're far better off using an encoder for projects that require more than perhaps a 20% reduction.

You'll find that Rebuilder can be used completely with freely-availible programs, and is pretty simple to use. You also have an option to deinterlace (ST was shot on video, if I'm not mistaken, which is interlaced), which will help you even further since interlaced material tends to need higher bitrates to look good... but if you first convert the material into progressive-scanned images, the space you have availible on your blank disks will stretch further. Relax! It's pretty much all automated!

It'll take more time than most of the transcoders... but you'll wind up with higher quality. Just browse the Rebuilder thread and read up a bit on it, and see if it fits your needs. There's links posted to all the software you'll need.

Hope that helps!

[TheSeeker]

I agree that you should use dvd rebuilder to do this project but I would suggest not to deinterlace. The field deinterlace that comes with dvd rebuilder isnt as good as the hardware deinterlacer that you are going to find in most decent dvd players or tv's.

[writersblock29]

@TheSeeker

I'll agree that the provided deinterlacer (the Decomb plugin) isn't the best in the world... but it's better than nothing, and progressive frames tend to handle lower bitrates with far more grace than interlaced ones will. True, Commander XJL can edit the script -- and use a different filter -- through Rebuilder, but that tends to complicate matters, and steps away from the "one-clicker" philosophy.

*Shrug*

Not that I'm any less guilty as pretty much anyone else on these threads, of taking the long way around! ;) If it were me, I'd first run the project through DVDRemake and remove absolutely anything that I couldn't see myself needing (FBI warnings and the like), then I'd run it through DVD Shrink to compress *only* the menus to gain more space. Then I'd DVDRebuilder that puppy with the Decomb filter. If DVDRebuilder wound up oversizing (which I've found it will often do with episode disks and a CCETargetSectors=2260007 setting under "options"), I'd then run Rebuilder's output through DVD Shrink yet AGAIN and call 'er good.

Something else he could try -- since DVD blanks are dropping in price and becoming more and more reasonable -- would be to use DVD Shrink and create "movie-only" disks of each episode. In that instance, he may not lose any quality whatsoever, regardless of the sound streams he chooses to keep. Depends on how many episodes he choses to put on his blank DVD.

Cool that we've arrived at the point where we have such options! :cool:

[TheSeeker]

Personally, I have found this, and JDObbs, wmansir, and pretty much any other big dog genius on these boards has recommended not deinterlacing material at all. They say it can actually degrade quality. Plus they bring up a good point. You really shouldnt need to deinterlace at all because the only time content should absolutely be deinterlaced is if you are playing the movie on a nice Progressive scan tv. And if your playing it on a nice progressive scan tv then the tv or your dvd player will definately have a hardware deinterlacer, and will deinterlace on the fly. These do a much better job. If you are just watching on a regular tv that doesnt even display progressive frames anyways then deinterlacing doesnt make a whole lot of sense at all does it? Also I did the Taken miniseries and those where like 7.5 gbs of all main movie video. So i couldnt cut anything out. And i did that with DVD REbuilder no deinterlacing and they look fine. I would just use RB- OPT and use kvcd's notch custom matrice, because this is a nice one for low low bitrates. SO there it is. My recommendation. Encode with rebuilder DO NOT deinterlace with Decomb, use rb-opt and use kvcd notchs custom matrice on the whole thing. maybe tweak some settings. Use the cce built in natural picture filter if you want. Tweak some cell bitrates if you feel the need, and then run the encode. When its done burn it and enjoy. I did Taken this way and they turned out great.

[ux-3]

Hello there.
I will offer my advice too. If I where in your place (and in a way, I am :-), I would go a different route. I would put only two episodes on a single DVD, retaining the menues if you like. Alternatively, if you are willing to let go of menues and most foreign audio tracks, you could put three episodes on, at over 90%.

Due to the interlaced character, field order problems and such, I would avoid CCE based tools on this material. I know it can be done, but it may involve A LOT of frustration at first. (I agree with theseeker: do not deinterlace, but watch for field order!)

My current approach ist to keep the "reunification" option open. I like the idea of creating a DVD+R9 from my backups in case an original fails. I am seeking ways to do this in another thread.

Just my 2 cents

Live long and prosper!

[TheSeeker]

Although UX-3's recommendation may result in the best absolute quality, I would say personally that I feel it really would be a humungous waste of time. You would need to totally reauthor everything if you wanted to break up the dvd to fit onto 2 dvd-r's. Really that is a hassle you dont need. And sure cce isnt the best for interlaced content (on a side note you may want to try Procoder with dvd rebuilder instead of cce as i hear it is much better at interlaced content) but really i guarantee if you follow my above post and encode with cce, (getting rid of any uneeded audio) you wont be dissapointed with the resulting quality. And as far as field order i believe that dvd rebuilder rebuilds the frame exactly how it was in the original.

[ux-3]

Originally posted by TheSeeker
Although UX-3's recommendation may result in the best absolute quality, I would say personally that I feel it really would be a humungous waste of time. You would need to totally reauthor everything if you wanted to break up the dvd to fit onto 2 dvd-r's.

Oh come on, we talk about 5 minutes for the creation of the master file layout. I don't think any other method is faster for that matter.
You simply select a DVD copy in Recoder or Shrink and deselect two episodes. Hit go! It won't recode anything, cause the rest will fit. So it simply compiles the new "two episode backup" at 100% quality. All audio, subtitles etc. included. And that in less time than any other compromise. You pay a little more per backed up episode, but you gain quality and save time. And I just found that you can very easily put them back together to form a DVD-9 for future data migration.

[TheSeeker]

Oh yea i thought you were saying split it off and keep the menus.. cause if you use shrinks reauthor mode then no menus are kept. But yea if you dont care about menus then more power to ya go ahead and reauthor but I personally like to have the menus just for audio selects and for the scene selects. But yes you are right. IF you want to keep 100 percent quality then by all means reauthor with shrink and break up the one disc into 2 discs or something. But again if you use shrink you wont have menus.

EDIT: One more thing.. You can split one dvd to 2 dvd-r's using dvd fab and still keep the menus i think. but i have never used it so i dont know the specifics

[ux-3]

Originally posted by TheSeeker
Oh yea i thought you were saying split it off and keep the menus.. cause if you use shrinks reauthor mode then no menus are kept.


Well, actually I mean to use Nero Recode in Full Disk Mode. Recode differs from Shrink in that you can replace an episode with monocolor frames, while shrink offers stills at best. Stills still take too much space, empty frames don't! So you can get two episodes with full menues readied in 5 Minutes at 100%.

I did not remember that Shrink didn't have that empty-frame feature, so I apologize for being confusing. But recode will allow you to pull the trick: 100% quality, full menues, very fast. And it seems that you can easily reauther back to DVD-9 if the desire or need arises.

Greetings
ux-3

[TheSeeker]

Example.... you have a disc with 4 episodes on it. Your saying that recode can take and split it and put two episodes on one disc and two on the other and keep all menus? SO then i have to ask this... what does recode do with the buttons that link to the two episodes on the other disc. because obviously they need to be removed...

[ux-3]

Originally posted by TheSeeker
what does recode do with the buttons that link to the two episodes on the other disc. because obviously they need to be removed...

No, the buttons don't get removed. Instead you have the coice between a single picture, an audio slide show, or simply an empty frame. (Shrink would only offer a slide show) The missing episode is faithfully filled up with this instead, keeping its length and chapters. It only takes about 80 MB if it is an empty frame. I suspect that this is the reason why you could remerge then easily again to form a DVD-9.


The other quick option seems to be Vobblanker. There, by hitting the wrong button, you would simply drop back to the menu. Unfortunately, I can't really test it further, since it can't currently open most of those DVDs, the number of Menus exceeds the predesignated amount. But it does look promising too.

[Lagoon]

dvdshrink since version 3.2 can replace a title by a still image just like nero.

[dannyv]

Originally posted by Commander XJL
I was about to start backing up the Star Trek Next Generation series. I was going to use ShrinkDVD. If I keep the 5.1 audio track the encode will be 53.8%. If I go with the 2 channel audio the encode will be 58.5%. What will the audio difference be with a series disk like this between 5.1 audio and the 2 channel audio? I don't like encoding below 55% but I did a test and it looks pretty good. But if there isn't must noticable difference in the audio I would rather encode higher.

I've backed up the entire TNG, DS9 seasons as well as Season 1 of the original series and Seasons 1-4 of voyager. I highly recommend you use DVD Rebuilder on this. I've used shrink and found the result to be grainy, have a lack of sharpness and looked washed out as compaired to rebuilder. Rebuilder had a sharper picture and less grainyness but the pan scenes were not as smooth as with shrink. The pan scenes from rebuilder in my opinon did not detract from the viewing experience as much as the grainyness and lack of sharpness produced by shrink. As mentioned in this as well as other threads shrink is better with compressions greater then 70% but with the amount of compression these sets need rebuilder is the better choice.

[wmansir]

If you do try DVD ReBuilder I would also recommend you try using EclPro/ProCoder. It should give much better quality than CCE for this material (low bitrate and interlaced). It will most likely beat QuEnc too, but then QuEnc is free. I also wouldn't recommend deinterlacing, for the reasons mentioned above and also because I believe ST is hybrid, with most of it being progressive film or telecined, not pure 30fps interlaced. By deinterlacing that type of material you'll likely see stuttering or introduced unnecessary artifacts.

[dannyv]

Originally posted by ux-3
You simply select a DVD copy in Recoder or Shrink and deselect two episodes. Hit go! It won't recode anything, cause the rest will fit.

I had a weired thought. Can't you use the existing menus by just simply incerting still pictures in the 2 episodes you wish to cut from the disk? I would think that you could select the first 2 episodes from the menu and if you select ether of the second 2 you would just see the still saying "this video was removed". I would think then that the whole project can be done in shrink.

<Edit> oops! I see this was coverd earler I guess I did'nt read far enough into the tread.

[jkbauer]

Originally posted by wmansir
If you do try DVD ReBuilder I would also recommend you try using EclPro/ProCoder. It should give much better quality than CCE for this material (low bitrate and interlaced). It will most likely beat QuEnc too, but then QuEnc is free. I also wouldn't recommend deinterlacing, for the reasons mentioned above and also because I believe ST is hybrid, with most of it being progressive film or telecined, not pure 30fps interlaced. By deinterlacing that type of material you'll likely see stuttering or introduced unnecessary artifacts.

What is considered as "low bitrate"? I have some dvd sets that I am thinking about backing up. They are tv series (foreign). They are definitely done on video, not film. When I open the files in Recode, it displays source as interlaced, 4:3, 29.97fps, and Avg Bitrate ~5.6 Mbs. The menus files are progressive (according to Bitrate Viewer) but I don't think I will keep the menus, just the main movies.

This avg bitrate seems reasonable. Would you suggest that I de-interlace with Rebuilder? I definitely need to do some kind of compression for these. 1:1 ratio would be too many backup discs.

Thanks for any advice.

[ux-3]

I would suggest you keep the material interlaced for optimum quality!

[TheSeeker]

@JKBauer

What you saw 5600 bitrate is probably the original average bitrate. That is not the bitrate you will see after encoding. A low bitrate is probably 3000 and below.

[theReal]

I will offer my advice too. If I where in your place (and in a way, I am :-), I would go a different route. I would put only two episodes on a single DVD, retaining the menues if you like. Alternatively, if you are willing to let go of menues and most foreign audio tracks, you could put three episodes on, at over 90%.


I'd also go for the 3 eps on one disc with DVDShrink. Transcoding with not too much compression (down to 70%) is very time efficient and results in good DVDs - I'm too lazy for encoding (much more work than transcoding)
I wouldn't keep the menus (I don't like DVD menus in general so I never keep them ;) )