Make compilation from different dvds

[Slogra]

I want to make a compilations of chapters from different dvds. These DVDs are all PAL 4:3 interlaced.
So far i just ripped all the seperate chapters from the dvds to a vob each.
What is the best way to merge them all together to one DVD? One big movie with chapters would be nice.

[Internaut]

I have found the following works for me :-

1) Copy vob files from DVD's to HD
2) Bring the copied vobs on your HD into Womble MPEG Video Wizard - by far the best editor for simple cuts like this (www.womble.com), and mark out the sections you want
3) Save the extracted sections to a new file using the "Automatic" setting - this is important because you DON'T want to re-encode !
4) Use any DVD authoring package to re-author the files into a new compilation DVD.

Things you need to watch out for :-
5) vobs on DVD's are usually encrypted, do you will need DVD Decryptor for 1), otherwise you won't be able to edit the copies on your HD.
6) If you are extracting vobs from different DVD's, chances are that some will have AC-3 sound, some MPEG I Layer 2 etc. When you author these onto DVD's, the different sound format files will need to be grouped together onto different tracks - although everything is DVD compliant here, (since you extracted from DVD's in the first place :)), you can't mix different sound format files on the same track. You can have up to 99 tracks per DVD, (and 99 clips per track).
7) You can't mix PAL and NTSC files on the same DVD ! You will need to re-encode all to one format if you want to do this. MainConcept and TMPGEnc are handy for this.

This is the quickest way, as it needs no transcoding, which I absolutely avoid at all costs, due to loss of quality, and time wasted.

Hope this helps.

[Slogra]

Thx, i'm getting somewhere now. Me like Womble :)