Too Big Clip File

[kamyogi]

HI,
I'm trying to cut a clip from a 2 hour run-time video file (avi) of about 1.4 gb. I try to cut about 10 minutes of this file and VirtualDub gives me a clip of about 2.5 gbs!!
How come??

[videoninja]

Ah, the world-known bloated video drawback!
It is possible that the output was not encoded and it simply came out as uncompressed video. Try running your file through a high-quality codec like H.264. You can adjust the settings so that the filesize will decrease significantly. Try it around until you reach a satisfactory size / quality ratio.

Codecs are the bread and butter of what we do. - Great Master Nori

*Video Ninja returns to the shadows*

[Gavino]

This should really be a FAQ. (Maybe it is? It's certainly frequently asked)

You need to select Direct Stream Copy from the Video menu in VirtualDub, otherwise by default you will get uncompressed video output.
No need to recompress if all you have done is cut out some parts.

[hech54]

...and you'll most likely need to be cutting on key frames to do direct stream copy.