Newbie HDTV-to-DVD guide

[eswrite]

I've come up with a rough draft for a newbie (written by a newbie for newbies) guide to HDTV to NTSC DVD conversion. I hope to beef it up in the future with diagrams, screen shots, links to referenced software, and updated scripts and or verbage as I learn more from folks here. I wrote it mostly for myself, in case I go into a coma, wake up, with no idea of what I've learned in the past few weeks. Anyway, here it is. All comments, even rude ones, welcomed:

HDTV to DVD Guide (http://eswrite.50megs.com/hdtv2dvd.html)

[Wilbert]

I didn't read everything but ...


#* Apply Pulldown: If the original content was telecined, you will need to restore pulldown. Use DGPullDown to convert the MPEG2 file you generated in the previous step from 24fps to 29.94fps. This could also take a while: time for another (shorter) nap.
When applying 2:3 pulldown the framerate isn't changed from 23.976 to 29.97. All that pulldown does is adding some flags such that your player knows which fields to duplicate so that the video is played back as 29.97 (but the framerate itself stays 23.976).

[kassandro]

In your guide you shouldn't forget ProjectX. I can hardly imagine that VideoReDo can compete with ProjectX as far as demuxing of HDTV transport streams is concerned. It certainly takes care of lost frames to keep audio and video in sync. You can also cut the transport streams within ProjectX, but mpeg2schnitt and Cuttermaran are more comfortable and can be used for demuxed HDTV as well. PVAStrumento should also be quite usable for HDTV transport streams.

If you have a suffciently powerful processor in your DVD player (unfortunately the Zoran Vaddis 7 in my Cyberhome CH 462 doesn't have this power) you can also burn the HDTV video without reencoding on a DVD (you probably need double layer media). To this end you use DVDPatcher to deceive the DVD authoring program about the video resolution and proceed in the same way as you burn DVB streams on DVDs without reencoding.

[eswrite]

@Wilbert

When applying 2:3 pulldown the framerate isn't changed from 23.976 to 29.97. All that pulldown does is adding some flags such that your player knows which fields to duplicate so that the video is played back as 29.97 (but the framerate itself stays 23.976).

Actually, my statement is inaccurate for another reason: I am muxing in Avisynth, prior to DGPullDown usage, but DGPullDown can only handle elementary streams (i.e., video only, no audio). I'll definitely be revising this part of the guide. Thanks.

[Boulder]

My suggestion to the guide is that you'll forget about loading the audio in the Avisynth script. Use the original audio, there's no reason to re-encode. There are tools for cutting the AC3 track if necessary, DelayCut for example.

You could also point to some video bitrate calculator.

[eswrite]

@kassandro
In your guide you shouldn't forget ProjectX.

I'm using DGIndex for that purpose: it demuxes the original (or cut clip, after VideoReDo) into its video and audio components.

If you have a suffciently powerful processor in your DVD player (unfortunately the Zoran Vaddis 7 in my Cyberhome CH 462 doesn't have this power) you can also burn the HDTV video without reencoding on a DVD...

Maybe that's worth a mention, but really beyond the scope of the guide, which aims to describe the process of converting HDTV martial to DVD-compliant (as in per the DVD-standard) output.

[eswrite]

With regards to the pulldown issue (i.e., after IVTC on telecined HD material), Nic has tentative plans to add pulldown capability to QuEnc which would solve the quandry I have right now. It would allow my process to stay as indicated in the original version of the guide, i.e., mux audio in Avisynth and use QuEnc to generate the final, DVD-compliant (NTSC) MPEG2 file.

See this thread (http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?s=&postid=639985#post639985)