Combining two AVIs and burning to DVD?

[Riot Nrrrd]

Today's stupid Mac question:

I have two AVI files, part 1 and part 2. I want to combine them into one giant AVI file and author a DVD from it. The total data is about 860 Mbytes.

I can do the simpleton route and open up a new Video DVD in Toast 6.0.7 and drop the 2 files onto it, but that gets me a DVD with the 2 videos separate. I'd like to find something that can combine the 2 AVIs into one long AVI, and *then* author the resulting single long AVI to DVD.

[Edit: VLC says the video is 672x400, and encoded with a "DX50" codec. Toast seems to want to create 720x480 video on the output side. Does it automatically letterbox to fill up the 48x80 extra pixels?]

Can ffmpegX do this sort of thing? (That program is rather daunting - too many bells and whistles) At least the concatenation part? (I'm assuming I could still use Toast to do the AVI -> DVD conversion if I could just get a single long AVI made)

[Edit: I just saw the Multiple Avi to dvd thread below mine, but that person wanted to put several TV episodes on one DVD, which to me means s/he wants to keep them separate, whereas in my case I really want to combine 2 AVI files into one long DVD.]

[G13]

Quicktime Pro can do it (make sure you have the DivX and 3ivX codecs installed) for $30.

SimpleMovieX is supposed to do what you want for free (I haven't used it yet). Here's the download link:

http://homepage.mac.com/WebObjects/FileSharing.woa/wa/downloadFile?user=getclockworks&...SimpleMovX.dmg

[Riot Nrrrd]

Quicktime Pro can do it (make sure you have the DivX and 3ivX codecs installed) for $30.

SimpleMovieX is supposed to do what you want for free (I haven't used it yet). Here's the download link:

http://homepage.mac.com/WebObjects/FileSharing.woa/wa/downloadFile?user=getclockworks&...SimpleMovX.dmg

Thanks G13 ... downloaded SimpleMovieX, will try it tonight.

Just out of curiousity, what does QuickTime Pro have in it to do this sort of thing? I thought QuickTime Pro was just a bunch of extra codecs and stuff, not any video manipulation tools. I have QuickTime Pro (at least, my Preferences say I do!) but I thought it only enabled those additional codecs and let you play movies in full-screen. Apparently I must be missing something ... (I tried importing the first AVI, then doing "Add", and a grey box appeared below the original AVI in the Player, but I couldn't get it to add the 2nd AVI to that grey area/box. It just brought up another Player window when I tried to import the 2nd AVI file.)

[SERBIAN]

QuickTime PRO is not like Windows Media player /just a player/...It is a very good video manipulation tool...and very easy also...You can do lot of things within it like export to different format /conversion/, setting out of sync, basic cutting and adding, adding subtitles etc...

To combine 2 AVIs install DivX and 3ViX components for QuickTime /freeware both of them/ then open second AVI, do "Select All" then "Copy" from "Edit" menu...Then open first AVI, move the playhead to the end and do "Add"...Youll get one movie...Now just export it to whatever You want or "Save As.." self-contained movie...

[galactica]

ffmpegx can do that. there is JOIN under tools, and then you can select the joined .avi and begin to author your dvd

you can slso use serbians mpeg2works program and do the similar feat of taking a jioned .avi and authoring a dvd, however i dont believe mpeg2works does main menu etc.

Sizzle is a free dvd authoring app that can handle the process if you get the .avi's over to mpeg

[Riot Nrrrd]

To combine 2 AVIs install DivX and 3ViX components for QuickTime /freeware both of them/ then open second AVI, do "Select All" then "Copy" from "Edit" menu...Then open first AVI, move the playhead to the end and do "Add"...Youll get one movie...Now just export it to whatever You want or "Save As.." self-contained movie...

I think I've got them both:

[16:45] pb17:/<5>DVD backups/Roxio Converted Items % ls -l /Library/QuickTime/*v*
-rw-r--r--  1 riot   admin  541619 12 Jan  2004 /Library/QuickTime/3ivx D4 4.5.1 for OSX

/Library/QuickTime/DivX 5.component:
total 0
drwxrwxr-x  7 riot   staff  238 10 Sep 00:07 Contents/

By "open first AVI" I assume you mean in QuickTime™ Player (yes, I know that's a stupid question ... )

Assuming I can get the 2 AVI's merged this way ...

Should I be doing a Save As... to a QuickTime™ Movie file? Or an Export and choose Movie to AVI? (But wouldn't that mean I'd need to have saved to a Movie first?) And, if so, what to choose for Settings... in the AVI Settings box? (Given that I want to convert it to DVD ultimately) This gets confusing fast

And Galactica, thanks, I'll definitely try ffmpegX as Plan B if I can't figure out QuickTime™ Pro ...

[SERBIAN]

By "open first AVI" I assume you mean in QuickTime™ Player

Yes...In QuickTime...

Should I be doing a Save As... to a QuickTime™ Movie file?

Yes...Just do that...Youll get AVI movie in QuickTime container with .mov extension...Then just use MPEG2 encoder of Your choice to encode that .mov in a proper MPEG2 file for DVD..

[Riot Nrrrd]

Should I be doing a Save As... to a QuickTime™ Movie file?

Yes...Just do that...Youll get an AVI movie in a QuickTime container with a .mov extension...Then just use the MPEG2 encoder of your choice to encode that .mov into a proper MPEG2 file for DVD..

Well, that was interesting.

I chose two methods:

• Let Toast 6.0.7 do it (Video tab -> Advanced -> DVD-Video, NTSC option, Video Quality: High, Auto-Play Items check box enabled, Create DVD Menu check box enabled)

• Let ffmpegX (0.0.9m) do it (chose the DVD entry in the Quick Presets)

Net result:

ffmpegX produced a 3.1 GB VIDEO_TS folder
Toast 6.0.7 produced a 3.3 GB disc image file (I did Save as Disc Image...)

Haven't really compared the two in depth, yet, video-wise; they both look pretty similar from first glance.

On the audio front, however - big difference. The audio produced by Toast is loud and clear, with a volume much like the original AVI's. The audio produced by ffmpegX is lower in volume by a noticable amount - and the mix seems to be a little different (more "centered", perhaps) but maybe I'm hallucinating

I'm not hallucinating the volume differential, however. The ffmpegX version is noticably quieter. I wonder why it came out so different?

[SERBIAN]

Well, both apps uses different way of encoding audio track /and video too/, so there have to be some differences...Anyway, the good thing is that You have more then one option to choose for encoding so make some tests with various input files and choose one which is best for You...