25fps pal svcd res -> 29.97 fps ntsc dvd res

[Blue_MiSfit]

Hey all...

So I've got a pal svcd on 3 discs that I am converting to a dvd. I want it to play nicely with my dvd player, so I am going to do a pal -> ntsc conversion. I can open the merged mpeg2 without issue in avisynth with dgdecode, but I am wondering which commands to use in order to do the pal to ntsc conversion.

Also, I would like to (if possible) put a deblocking filter in the script, possibly to ffdshow (if such a thing can be done), although the quality of the svcds is pretty good, there is blocking in high motion scenes, and I would like to kill that if possible. I tried using directshowsource with ffdshow's mpeg2 decoder enabled, but got really buggy results going into HC.

BTW, I am now using CCE for MPEG2 encoding.

Thanks in advance
-MiSfit

[Guest]

Encode to a 25fps M2V and then use DGPulldown to flag it to 29.97fps.

[Boulder]

The latest DGDecode.dll includes both the internal deblocking feature and Manao's Deblock(), so there's no need to use DirectShowSource. Better use DGIndex+DGDecode instead, saves you from a lot of trouble.

[Blue_MiSfit]

I am not familiar with DGPulldown - where/what is it?

Also, how do I enable DGDecode's internal deblocking?

Thanks!

-Misfit

[manono]

Hi-

I am not familiar with DGPulldown - where/what is it?

http://neuron2.net/dgpulldown/dgpulldown.html

By reencoding your PAL DVD/MPG source to 720x480, it'll then allow you to keep the 25fps framerate, and untouched audio, to make a compliant NTSC DVD. I don't know if your player will accept MP2 audio (if that's what you have on the SVCD). Some do and some don't. You may wind up reencoding that anyway.

Also, how do I enable DGDecode's internal deblocking?

Read the DGDecode.html included with the DGMPGDec package.

[Piper]

Is the purpose of resizing to 720x480 simply to ensure a DVD compliant resolution? If so, would 704x480, 352x480 also work? I'm trying to establish whether "resize to 720x480" should be taken literally or not.

[Wilbert]

I'm trying to establish whether "resize to 720x480" should be taken literally or not.
No. DGPulldown adds flags so that the video (which is 25 fps) is played back at 29.97 fps by your dvd player.

I thought your were a NTSC guy, then you should know how Pulldown works :p

[Piper]

No. DGPulldown adds flags so that the video (which is 25 fps) is played back at 29.97 fps by your dvd player.

Thanks for confirming Wilbert.

I thought your were a NTSC guy, then you should know how Pulldown works

Oh I am. ;)

I just thought it might be useful to point out that other resolutions are available to, you know, to those who may potentially be upsizing their downloaded, wonky-res, ultra low bitrate PAL Xvid files to 720x480 to play on their NTSC dvd players. :p

Mind you, if that's who we're helping, then I retract my question. lol

[manono]

Hi-

Coming back to this, I see where I may have been unclear. Thanks, Wilbert, for elaborating. Yes, it allows you to keep your 25fps base framerate, or stored framerate, by setting the proper flags to output 29.97fps.

And I said 720x480 because that's the most common NTSC resolution. You can encode to any NTSC DVD supported resolution, of course.

[Bexley]

I'm not sure exactly what Blue_MiSfit's needs are here, so this may not be applicable, but....

Since most North American players (in my experience) will play PAL just fine, it may be that you can use this trick (http://www.doom9.org/index.html?/mpg/svcd2dvdr.htm) to put the SVCDs directly onto a PAL DVD without re-encoding. I recently did this with some PAL discs I had lying around. I patched to 352x576, authored as a PAL DVD, then patched back, and it works like a champ on my player.

Just thought I would throw that out there. Unless you're particularly set on filtering and deblocking, this is a lot easier.

[Chainmax]

Is using DGPulldown for 25fps-->29.97fps standards-safe like NTSC FILM is?

[Guest]

Originally posted by Chainmax
Is using DGPulldown for 25fps-->29.97fps standards-safe like NTSC FILM is? The resulting streams adhere rigorously to the MPEG2 standards and I don't know of any players that cannot play them correctly.

[Chainmax]

This will definitely come in handy for a multiclip SVCD I'm working on, thanks a million :) http://instagiber.net/smiliesdotcom/otn/wink/thumb.gif.

[PhillipWyllie]

Won't all this make the film play faster?

[Guest]

Well, 29.97fps *is* faster that 25fps. But DGPulldown adds flags that cause the player to repeat just enough fields so that the running time remains the same. That is why the audio does not have to be changed.

[Mug Funky]

manao: yes, mp2 audio is supported (in theory) in DVD. my copy of "seven" has it.

i think it's a backward-compatibility thing. DVD spec includes 352x288/240 mpeg-1 with mp1 or mp2 audio. a lot of DVD players will handle this by simply feeding it to their mp3 decoder (which has nothing to do with DVD specs) because mp3 is backward compatible and will play mp1 and mp2.

as far as other resolutions than 720 width go, try it and see. non 720 resolutions may mess up subtitles (either CE manufacturers are being naughty, or the DVD spec is unclear about how subpictures are to be handled), but if you don't have them you'll be fine with 352 or 704.

if you're using 720, resize to 704 and add borders to maintain correct AR.

[Boulder]

Originally posted by Mug Funky
manao: yes, mp2 audio is supported (in theory) in DVD.

At least it's somewhere in the DVD standard, if I remember correctly, the support is mandatory for PAL but might not be so for NTSC. Some say their players (NTSC) want to have at least one AC3 track as well if MP2 is used.

Then again, I've never heard of any standalone that didn't play the mp2 track.

[kassandro]

If your SVCDs are progressive PAL, you should not reencode. Rather you should use DVDpatcher to patch all mpeg2 headers to NTSC film. Then the DVD player will telecine it during play back. At the same time you should also patch first header to 720x480, such that the authoring program accepts the mpeg2 stream (which should be demuxed with ProjectX before). After the authoring program (I recommend Tmpgenc DVD Author) has accepted the stream, you must patch back the resolution in the first header, but not the NTSC film flag. You can put all your three SVCDs on one DVD. If your DVD player doesn't play this slightly non-standard NTSC you should replace it by a more recent one.

Do not forget to patch all MPEG2 headers to NTSC film. By default DVDPatcher patches only the first header, because it is primarily a utility for deceiving DVD authoring programs.

If your SVCDs are interlaced, telecining is a bad idea, because motion really gets corrupted. Then I would deinterlace the Video and encode it as progressive PAL MPEG2 and then I would do the same as above with newly encoded video. As resizing interlaced material is a poor idea, I would neither resize before or after deinterlacing.

EDIT: There is probably an audio problem with this procedure. After the above procedure the video is now 23.97 fps, while the audio is still 25 fps. In particular the audio too short. In principle the audio should be played also slightly slower, but this would lead to a non-standard audio sampling. Thus you have to reencode the audio. It can be done with Avisynth and avs2wav and an mp2 encoder like toolame. After loading the audio into Avisynth with mpasource, you use AssumeSampleRate((44100*23.97)/25).ResampleAudio(48000) (23.97 may not be precise enough) and then you pipe the Avisynth audio with avs2wav into the audio encoder. I have assumed that you have standard SVCD audio with 44.1 KHZ sampling rate.