Can't fit 1hr mpeg2 on a DVD ???

[chaingang]

I have several Mpeg2 videos and wanna play them on my DVD. I used Sonic MyDVD or Ulead and when I put a 800mb video to be converted it will turn into over 3.5 gigs to be burned. Is there a program that wont inflate so much or a reason why the size will increase this much. also my DVD says it will play Mpeg, Is this referring to just audio.

Thanks in advance for any help,

[Baldrick]

tmpgenc dvd author, dvd-lab, dvdauthorgui, ifoedit does NOT reencode anything.

[chaingang]

I tried that and it kept getting error messages when I inserted video like=
Video Resolution, Framerate, Bitrate.

I even tried putting simple video's of Movie trailers and it still give an error. I noticed there where several links that you recommended. Do I need to convert the file with something else and then use the Tmpge DVD Author ?

So your also saying Sonic and Ulead makes files much larger than the are due to there format. I was just wondering if it was a MPeg2 Codec problem I was dealing with. I would assume 2 hrs of video should fit on a DVD

Thanks again

[chaingang]

I have several Mpeg2 movies that I recorded using Mytheatre 3.12 and cannot get them to burn on to a DVD. When i use MyDVD or Ulead a 1 hr movie {1gig) it gets so inflated it wont fit on a 4.7 gig disk. I up-dated all my mpeg2 codecs to rule that out. So then I tried 3 other programs just to Auythoring a DVD , tmpgenc dvd author, dvd-lab, dvdauthorgui, ifoedit

these give me errors like= Video Resolution, Framerate, Bitrate. Non DVD format size, Multiplexing. My recordings are 640x480 im assuming cause thats what comes acrossed as it tries to compile the DVD.

If anyone is aware of something im missing or have a better program. Or maybe im recording from MT wrong. I did'nt find and recording setting to change though.

Thanks in advance for any help.

[Baldrick]

640x480 is not dvd compliant, www.videohelp.com/dvd#tech. So you must reconvert to compliant dvd(mydvd does that, but try other better software encoders instead) or you can make "xdvd" using for example dvdpatcher and change the mpeg headers to dvd and author.

I don't know anything about "capturing" digital tv so you have to ask that in the digital tv forum.

[junkmalle]

First of all, if your DVD player will play MPEG files, you can just burn your files to an ISO data disk. When you put them in your player it will give you a menu of files to pick from. You won't have to resize, reencode, or anything. But your disks won't play on many other players and you won't have fancy menus, chapter stops, etc.

The other thing you need to know is that MPEG is a lossy format. You choose how much detail you want to lose when you encode. The more detail you choose to lose, the smaller the files will be.

Your 800 MB files are growing to 3.5 GB because the programs you are using are converting them to DVD compliant MPEG2 settings with high bit rates. This is wasteful as the details that were tossed out to make the videos 800 MB can't be recreated.

For example, it's very common for 1 hour TV episodes (45 minutes of video after removing commercials) to be compressed to 480x480, variable bitrate (<2500 kbps), SVCD compliant MPEG2 so that they fit on CDs. If you convert that to DVD compliant MPEG2 at 720x480, 8000 kpbs it will grow over 3 times larger. The key here is "bit rate" -- the higher the bitrate the larger the files.

Also, keep in mind that the writable DVD media is single layer (dual layer is just starting to become available) and only holds half as much data (~4.7 GB) as dual layer commercial movie DVDs (over 9 GB).

If your source files are 640x480 you will have to convert them to 720x480, 704x480 352x480, or 352x240 (legal DVD frame sizes) to make movie DVDs. If you want to put 2 hours of video on one DVD you'll have to pick a bitrate that's low enough to encode two hours into less than 4.7 GB -- about 4000 kbps. Since these were recorded off a TV signal your best bet is probably 352x480, two pass variable bitrate with an average of 4000 kbps.