DivXToDVD: NTSC to PAL

[Seagrass]

I am having trouble with NTSC source avi's. There is like, short pauses during playback when using the PAL setting.

Is this normal for DivXToDVD, should I start looking for a new transcoder?

[redwudz]

If it's removing frames to get to 25fps, that might cause problems. I have no idea how it does the conversion as I usually go the other way, PAL to NTSC.

But you might try a different method. There's only so much those All-in-ones can do. Framerate conversion can be tricky.

One of these guides from the "Convert' heading to the left will probably show you how to do a much better job.

https://www.videohelp.com/convert#4;41

[Seagrass]

why would you want to convert PAL to NTSC?
PAL has much higher resolution

[jimmalenko]

Because a lot of US TVs only play NTSC. We have it good here in PAL land

[Ennio]

Seagrass, if I read correctly your source is ntsc avi, right? In the first place I would leave ntsc just as it is. If you can't play that and you wanna convert to PAL dvd, I'd suggest you try using the DGPulldown method. Works like a charm, even with original 5.1 sound. No A/V sync issues.

cheers

[guns1inger]

Seagrass, you have your location down as Australia. Your player should be able to play back NTSC material without any problems. If you are not sure, create a NTSC version and put it on an RW disk and test it out. Even my first DVD player (one of the first models sold in Australia) could do this.

[Seagrass]

Yeah my TV can play both its just i dont like how blocky NTSC is.

Plus some of my friends have TV's that only do PAL

[guns1inger]

Converting to PAL wont reduce blockiness. Not downloading over-compressed Divx from the net will. If anything, converting to PAL will only enhance the blockiness as PAL has a higher resolution so the resize up will be bigger, and the blockiness more apparent.

[SatStorm]

Convertion from NTSC to PAL is not neccessary, but when I have to mix stuff from both worlds it is neccessary!
There are no perfect convertion: The only way works with NTSC Film material, which is not the case always. The "convertion" works, but it is not perfect (or even near perfect...) with true NTSC 29.97 material

The steps for a NTSC to PAL convertion go like this:

1. IVTC from 29.97 to 23.97. Since you save to a new avi, better resize also to a PAL framesize (576 vertical lines)
2. Seperate video / audio
3. boost 23.97 to 25 fps using avifrate
4. count new lenght of video and scretch the audio so to match
5 Load boosted Avi with Boosted audio to virtualdub. Frameserve both to the encoder (or save to a new avi)
6 Encode to a new avi / mpeg 2 whatever

It works, it takes time, if the source ain't come from NTSC Film a field jump on the screen once and then in a screen and it is the best you can do the easy / cheap way

The alternative is to buy a DVD standalone that converts NTSC to PAL on the fly. So you playback NTSC as PAL and you grabb that with the card. Much faster may look better (but I prefer the hard way, because in my eyes has better motion)

[Ennio]

Yes, if the source isn't good quality, re-encoding can't improve that. As far as I know, "blockyness" has nothing to do with PAL or NTSC. Imo, it says something about the (poor) settings when the source was created, my guess

cheers

[Seagrass]

NTSC is a lower resolution making it blocky compared to PAL.

It has nothing to do with the quality of the source

[jimmalenko]

NTSC is a lower resolution making it blocky compared to PAL.

It has nothing to do with the quality of the source