25fps PAL to SVCD??

[grimlock_007]

Hi, I have an .avi that is 25 fps, and I want to re-encode it to an SVCD. But my player won't play pal discs. I know it plays NTSCFilm so does anyone know the best way to do so that will keep the quality and audio/video in sync? I've been trying but with no luck. Can someone please help me out. Thanx

[JoeCurry]

Im not 100% sure of the answer as im in the uk, but i convert everything from NTSC to PAL so i think oyu would be better converting the avi back to NTSC, id also recommend seperating the audio first, but im sute this link woll give better advice

https://www.videohelp.com/pal2ntsc/pal2ntsc.htm

[grimlock_007]

i'll try it out, but it's for vcd's not mpegs....thanx

[Isis.]

So did you figure it out?

I haven't been able to convert my PAL AVI to NTSC AVI. I've tried everything including that guide plus others I found.

Results have been messages that say it has an unsupported audio format, unknown audio format, and if I just try to make an mpeg it comes out with no sound. I was hoping to at least make a PAL VCD to try to play in my DVD player.

I'm quite the n00b so basic help is good.

[adam]

If you live in an NTSC region, and your dvd player does not support PAL to NTSC conversion, then you must convert to NTSC yourself before authoring the disk.

The easiest way to do this is to load the SVCD NTSCfilm template in TMPGenc, and then load the unlock template. On the advanced tab turn the "do not framerate conversion" filter on.

On the main screen, where you enter your audio and video sources, set the stream type to Video Only. Now convert and it will make either an m1v (for mpeg1) or an m2v (for mpeg2.)

Now take the audio from your original file. The easiest way to do this is to load it in TMPGenc and hit file/Output to file/wave file. Now load this wav in BeSweet and set it to convert to mp2 output. On the lower left there is an option for regional conversion. Set it to convert from PAL to NTSCfilm.

Once its BeSweet is done, multiplex your audio and video together in TMPGEnc. File/mpeg tools/simple multiplex. Make sure and set the Type correctly according to what you are making, ie: VCD, SVCD, etc..

[Isis.]

Thanks! Gonna try it out.

[twen]

I actually tried the guide here using VirtualDub, Besweet, etc. to convert the X-Men 2 (SVCD 25fps mpg file) from PAL to NTSC with no luck. VirtualDub shows error opening the .mpg file. I tried load it up in TMPGEnc directly and converted to NTSC DVD but the audio and video are all screwed up. Finally I found a post here that is so easy and it works:

Get DVD2AVI installed and open the PAL file (I think it will work with avi as well), then "Save Project" and give it a location. It will produce the .d2v (video) and .mpa (audio) files, then bring them into TMPGEnc and select your template and encode. I made my X-Men 2 NTSC DVD successfully this way. Try it, it should work with avi as well.

If it's a Divx avi, like those Ghibli Studio anime films, I use VirtualDub to open the avi and save (forgot exactly which function key, I think it's save wave file, not at home right now, but you can do a search here, it's in one of the guides). It will create a .wav file and a .m2v(?) file. Again, bring both files into TMPGEnc and encode and they'll come out insync. Good luck.

[grimlock_007]

adam, when you load the file into TMPGenc, you click "do not framerate conversion", but do you have to inverse telecine?, isn't that already checked? or does it just encode the video at 23.976, thinking that its NTSCFilm? oh yeah, how do you just load the video so TMPGenc just encodes the video and not the audio?

[adam]

Just do what I said and it will be fine. Forget about inverse telecine, it has nothing to do with this.

You film is 25fps, you simply want to slow it down to 23.976. Telecining and inverse telecining involves adding or removing new frames to go from 23.976 to 29.97, or vice versa.

Whether you just load the video, or if TMPGenc recognizes both audio and video, it doesn't matter. Just select Video Only under stream type. You want a video stream because you are going to have to multiplex in the end, because you are going to have to process the audio in something other than TMPGenc.

[grimlock_007]

Thanks a lot for the help, I'm trying it out right now, I'll let you know if it works.

[grimlock_007]

Well I tried it out and the audio and video are totally out of sync, and whats weird is that the movie is now like 15minutes longer than it origanally was. i dont get it. all i did was loaded it up in TMPGenc, encoded it as SVCD NTSCFilm, clicked do not frame rate convert, and just encoded the video. then extracted the audio as wav, converted that to 23.976 in bsweet, and multiplexed them together in TMPGenc, and its all screwed up. Any advice???

[adam]

Well the movie should be 4.03% longer after encoding. You have slowed it down by that much, so the playtime has been changed. This is how film to PAL transfers work, and this is the result when you reverse the process. Look on something like IMDB.com, all PAL movies have a runtime 4% shorter than their NTSC counterparts. 15 mins seems like too long a difference though. Does the video look normal or is it playing too slow?

How are you testing the sync, by the way? Unless you are using a dedicated software dvd player you will get sync problems everytime. The best test is always to play it on a hardware dvd player.

I was trying to give you a very simple process, hoping everything would work out. In reality, the process needed may depend on the source. For instance, if your source has mp3 audio than you may get desync when exporting to wav in TMPGenc. Try using Virtual Dub instead. Vdub will report if there is any desync, which often happens with mp3, and it will give you the amount of milisecs it is off. You can then use BBMmpeg to multiplex and offset this amountl

[grimlock_007]

I'll try that out, it is mp3 source, when I load it into vdub, it says vbr audio stream detected with up to 16569ms of skew. I did use vdub to extract the audio too. And to test I used WinDVD 4, and its out of sync. The audio is playing faster than the video. What mod of vdub can you use so you won't get the offset? There is one isn't there?

[grimlock_007]

Well I'm completely confused. When I load the file into TMPGenc as an NTSCFilm, and click do not frame rate convert, the movie encodes as 1 hour 37 minutes instead of 1 hour 17 minutes...how is the movie 20 minutes longer???? When I change the audio in bsweet its nowhere near that long, so when i multiplex them together the last 20 minutes of the movie has no sound and the a/v is totally out of sync throughout. I'm lost, if anyone has any advice it would be much appreciated. Thanx

[twen]

Have you tried my suggestion using DVD2AVI? It's much simpler and uses only two programs - DVD2AVI and TMPGEnc. Try it and see what happens.

[grimlock_007]

I just tried that and the file won't open in dvd2avi, nothing to save, the option isn't higlighted. I just find it weird that when I encode it from 25 fps PAL to 23.976 NTSCFilm SVCD, it extends the movie to 1hr 37 mins. then when I convert the audio it stays at about 1 hr 17mins, not 1 hr 37mins. ITs just weird, why would it extend it that much?? And I've done everything correctly too by doing the audio and video seperately. If anyone has any advice it would be greatly appreciated.

[Bluesilo]

Wow Man im having the same exact problem

Im trying to Encode Matrix Reloaded from 25fps Pal to 23.... NTSC and the video will go fine and the audio goes fine but interweave them together and out of sync they go.....its really aggrevating....

Looking for answers as well

[grimlock_007]

Let me know if you find anything, i've been trying different methods for over a week and nothing seems to work....

[adam]

Last time I checked Matrix Reloaded was not released in any commercial form. When dealing with problems resulting from downloaded files, we try to give everyone the benefit of the doubt, unless you give us reason to believe otherwise. Please read the rules and refrain from discussing warez here.

Sorry Grimlock, I'm stumped. It should have worked. I've done lots of PAL to NTSC transfers using that same method.

[grimlock_007]

Hey no prob adam, thanks for the info, ill keep trying but im stumped too. Thanx a lot

grimlock_007

[Bluesilo]

yea I understand...but I was hoping I would get more feedback discussing what my problem was........Will keep knowledge for future posts....

Nontheless... I need help encoding "a" video from 25 fps PAL to 23.. NTSCfilm any help is well appreciated

[macleod]

I am doing 2 movie conversions from PAL to NTSC 29.97, which will then be put onto DVD-R. I haven't burned the movie yet, but when I loaded the image onto dameon tools, the movie plays in synch no problem.

What I did was use DVD2AVI and saved the project for both of them, then loaded the .d2v into TMPGENC's video input and the .mpa into the audio. Used the standard DVD template and then changed the Bit rate to 2000, and upped the audio to 48mhz.

When I burn the movies tonight and watch them on my DVD player, I'll post back the results as well as a more detailed process (however, the above pretty much covers it.

[adam]

You really can't convert PAL directly to NTSC. When you do this, all the encoder is doing is randomly duplicating whole frames. This will lead to extremely choppy playback. If you must do this conversion, its best to just slow the PAL clip down to 23.976fps, and then telecine it to 29.97fps. TMPGenc has a filter specifically for this.

[twen]

Adam,

I hate to say this but like I posted before, it works perfectly for me when taking the PAL mpg file through DVD2AVI then TMPGEnc as NTSC 29.976fps, then authored and burnt to DVD with Ulead Movie Factory. I even bumped up the bitrate to as high as the DVD+R will hold it. It plays in my SONY standalone as sharp as the original (even better).

I also did a PAL avi directly with TMPGEnc to NTSC 29.976fps DVD then authored and burnt the same way. Again, it works perfectly.

Now, both sources were in PAL SVCD format, you think because they are already mpg-2 would that have been the reason that I was successful in converting them?

[adam]

Of course it works, all I'm saying is that this is not how PAL is transferred to NTSC. Film is telecined to NTSC (new frames are created by repeating fields in a specific pattern). Film is sped up to PAL. You can't mix and match processes. Once one has been done, you must reverse it before converting to the other. I'm sure your newly transferred files play fine, and I'm sure the sync is fine too, there is no reason why it should be otherwise. But the point is that every second you have about 5 repeated frames that should not be there. Everytime one of these frames gets played you will have two identical frames being played back to back, which gives the appearance that the movie has paused for a split second. This sounds trivial but its not because it is happening on 1/6 of all frames. On some scenes it won't be noticable, but on many it will be unbearable. I had several such conversions which I made long ago before I knew better. After I went back and watched them I had to throw them out, the skipping was incredibly intrusive and ruined the movie.

Its not any more difficult to just slow the film down from 25 to 23.976fps and allow the dvd player to do the telecine, or at least it shouldn't be. I think most of these problems in this thread are being caused by uncooperative sources, in which case you would have the same problems, plus the ones I mentioned above, using your method as well.

[illini19]

Adam, I understand what you saying.

For instance, planing on taking a SVCD (mpg) from PAL to NTSC DVD.

Load in TMPG (Video Only), use DVD NTSC settings, unlock.

720x480
23.976 FPS
aspect ratio is 4:3

Under Advanced tab

Non-interlaced
Top Field First
4:3 Display
Keep aspect ratio
do not framerate conversion

ENCODE

Then take the audio and load in BeSweet and convert to 48, and from PAL 25FPS-->23.976 NTSC. Load back into TMPG and multiplex audio and video then author (I use Maestro).

Sound about right?

I did try twen's method and it seems to paly fine in Sony DVD player but would love to try your method as well to see difference.

thoughts?

[illini19]

Well trid twen's method and after joining the 2 SVCD MPG's and encoding in TMPG, seemed to be alright except a couple scenes seem to freeze and get choppy causing the DVD player to stop playing.

I'm trying adam's method now and will post results based on the settings I listed in the prior post.

Adam, do those settings I listed for TMPG look about right?

[adam]

illini19 those settings will work as long as you make sure and the encode mode on the video tab to 3:2 pulldown while playack, or run your m2v through pulldown.exe to add pulldown flags before multiplexing.

I would recommend converting your SVCD down to 352x480 rather than up to 720x480. Increasing resolution should generally be avoided, if anything you will probably have worse quality than at 352x480. Also at this lower resolution, you can get away with a much lower bitrate and thus can fit more playtime on this DVD, if you wish.

[illini19]

Thanks Adam, I'll try at 352x480 next. Encoding now at the settings I had listed but next I will try what you recommend. I did use the 3:2 pulldown.

As far as interlaced vs non-interlaced and top field first vs bottom, which do you recommend?

In addtion, I read one of your earlier post saying that you have done many PAL->NTSC conversions and you use to use a different method before find the "right" method.

Is everything you recomended just the easiest way? I would be interested into hearing a more advanced method. I have seen many different thoughts on the issue.

http://www.geocities.com/xesdeeni2001/StandardsConversion/

I guess the closest thing to what we are doing is VI. PAL dvd -> NTSC DVD.

Comments?

Thanks for all your input, I really appreciate it.

[adam]

As far as interlaced vs non-interlaced and top field first vs bottom, which do you recommend?

There really is no recommendation to make. You set these according to what your source is. Generally, TMPGenc should set these to match your source by default, but of course it never hurts to check. Preview the movie in TMPGenc frame by frame. If you see any interlacing (comb like effect) then set the source to interlaced. If you need to determine your field order you can read my comments in this thread, https://www.videohelp.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=462635&highlight=tmpgenc+field+deinterlace#462635

If your source is progressive (non-interlaced) or your output is going to be progressive ie: you are deinterlacing, then it makes no difference what your field order is set to. You cannot have a field order if you have no fields.

In addtion, I read one of your earlier post saying that you have done many PAL->NTSC conversions and you use to use a different method before find the "right" method.

Is everything you recomended just the easiest way? I would be interested into hearing a more advanced method. I have seen many different thoughts on the issue.

Yes I would say the method I listed is probably the easiest way to do this kind of transfer, but it also depends on your preference. For instance, it is very easy to change the framerate through avisynth by just using the assumefps command, but I don't really see either method as being more difficult than the other.

Basically, you just want to slow the movie down by 4.03%, one way or another. By simply setting the fps to 23.976fps, most encoders will do this for you. TMPGenc has a feature, though I think of it more like a crutch for the newbie, where by default any framerate conversion simply adds or decimates frames to effect the change. The point of this is to maintain audio sync. In reality, this is never the way you want to process video. The "do not framerate conversion" filter turns this feature off, and from there you can just set your fps accordingly.

Audio is another issue. You must also slow it down by 4.03%, one way or another. If you decode the audio to wav, any wav editor should easily allow you to do this. A side effect of changing speed of audio, though, is that the pitch is also affected. It is very common in these types of conversions to raise the pitch of the audio by 4.03% to offset the speed change. In reality, whether or not you do a pitch change depends on the nature of the source. BeSweet has a built in function for regional conversions, and it is an otherwise excellent frontend for the most popular freeware audio processing tools available. So in my opinion, this is the probably the easiest way to process audio, and the results should be as good as anything you would do by hand.

Just a clarification. The above only applies to converting PAL to NTSCfilm, and vice versa if you were to reverse everything I just said. This is because film is simply sped up to PAL. When you bring NTSC (29.97fps) into the picture none of this applies. Film is telecined to NTSC in a fairly complex process which requires special treatment to undo.