Newbie sigh . . .

[mspace]

I get graphics and audio, but video . . . Oy!

My dad needs some of his DVDs made into mpegs, mpg1 ok maybe mpg2, for an optometric device he uses for testing. I am a newbie to this, but thought "how hard can it be?". Yeah, right . . .

I was trying all different things with ffmeg, slowly getting better at grasping what was going on, but now, the vob files that were opening fine by the program, won't open!

After searching the forum, I did a complete reinstall, re ripped the dvd via Mac the Ripper. ffmeg sees the vob file and did a conversion to avi. Quicktime played it, but no sound.

I then switched avi to svcd (ffmeg) and here's what I get-

Encoding started on Tue Feb 14 10:58:23 EST 2006
movtoy4m
Copyright 2002-2005 Johan Lindstr??m
All rights reserved. Used in ffmpegX under license.
## Component Manager: attempting to find symbols in a component alias of type (regR/carP/x!bt)
ERROR: Could not open movie: /Volumes/mspace/Attachments/DVD to MPEG test/PORKY_PIG/VIDEO_TS/VTS_02_2.VOB
pipe:: Error while opening file

I have gone over this a few times. Once I get this, nothing will get past the error. The vob files won't open. Tried different dvd. Tried copy of file. It even seemed that when I first used the program the files were having gradually more difficulties finishing.

I have been searching the forum for answers, but due to my limited knowledge, I'm having a hard time figuring out where to look and what top look for.

Please let me know if more info is needed from me. Thanks for ANY help, pointers, clues (as I am definitely clueless) in advance.

Did I say "HELP!"?('')

[Case]

I guess you did a 'Full Disc Extraction' with MacTheRipper. Try 'Title Only Extraction', to get each title in a VOB file of it's own.

[mspace]

Thanks for your reply!

I did "title only" as you suggested. Got one vob file. Dropped it into ffmpegx and it says no video and no audio in the file.

Very confused.

Double sigh . . .

[mwest]

mspace,

I have to do the exact same thing at work a lot. I am going from DVD to MOV (Quicktime MPEG4,) but the process should be similar. Any info about versions of MacTheRipper, OS, and ffmpegx would help with troubleshooting.

Here's my process, and it only fails when I screw it up...

I am assuming that you are using a fresh install of ffmpegx 0.0.9v and MacTheRipper 2+

DVD -> VIDEO_TS (.VOBs) on HD
---------------------------------------
- MTR: For chapter by chapter extraction, use "Title Only" and select your Title (usually corresponds to chapter.) Sometimes there are chapters within a title, so you may have to fool around to find exactly what you want. This will result in a .VOB file.
- Check location of .VOB file. Make sure there are no spaces or special characters in the path (i.e. /machd/users/me/Desktop/ is OK, but /Machintosh HD/users/me/Desktop is not.) Some of the UNIX decoder programs don't like spaces or special characters.

.VOB -> .MPG (mpeg1 or 2)
---------------------------------
- Open the .VOB file in ffmpegx
- You should see VOB in the FROM box. Change the TO box to MOV (mpeg4). Now since you want your MOV to be MPEG1, choose the "Video tab." This is where you fool around with size of video, encoding type, etc. In the drop down menu that says, MPEG4 (ffmpegx), choose MPEG1 (ffmpegx) or MPEG1(mencoder.)
- Check te video parameters to make sure it's the correct aspect (4:3, 16:9) etc.
- You shouldn't have to touch much more than that. Give the encoding a try.

Voila, you should have a portion of your DVD in MPEG1 or 2 format.

Write back it that doesn't work.

[mspace]

Finally figured some things out.

First thanks for all the help. My process seems to be similar to mwest. I ripped with MacTheRipper, then loaded a vob into ffmpegx.

This time I chose mpg1 (mpg2enc), made sure it was with "decode with mplayer" (found that little gem somewhere in the forum).

It failed at 94% with this error-

(Super) VideoCD xml description created successfully as `/Volumes/mspace/Attachments/DVDtoMPEGtest/agains-1.mpg.xml'
++ WARN: initializing libvcd 0.7.12 [darwin5.2/powerpc]
++ WARN:
++ WARN:
++ WARN: mpeg stream contained no scan information (user) data
(Super) VideoCD xml description created successfully as `/Volumes/mspace/Attachments/DVDtoMPEGtest/agains:.xml'
++ WARN: initializing libvcd 0.7.12 [darwin5.2/powerpc]
**ERROR: could not stat() file `/Volumes/mspace/Attachments/DVDtoMPEGtest/agains:': No such file or directory
++ WARN:
++ WARN:
Encoding completed on Wed Feb 15 19:45:47 EST 2006


. . . but the files were there. If someone can clue me in on that one I would appreciate it.

The mpg1 file plays, so I'm not sure what didn't complete. On one pass I had to mux the video and audio files and it worked.

Now I'll burn it to a cd and see if it works in my dad's equipment. Hopefully it will. If not . . . double sigh . . .

[Case]

/Volumes/mspace/Attachments/DVDtoMPEGtest/agains-1.mpg.xml
/Volumes/mspace/Attachments/DVDtoMPEGtest/agains:.xml

**ERROR: could not stat() file `/Volumes/mspace/Attachments/DVDtoMPEGtest/agains:': No such file or directory

The app needs a temp file (foo.xml), creates it, but then can't find it. As shown above, the filename gets truncated where the dash (-) is, and an illegal character (:) is placed in the filename. Try an ultra simple output filename, like a. Anyway, it seems that you got a good output file, in spite of the error.

This kind of filename problems has been reported before. Maybe it's in the code of mpeg2enc, not easy to fix in ffmpegX?

[mspace]

Thanks for the translation.

Nothing like another learning curve! ;->

[major]

Maybe it's in the code of mpeg2enc, not easy to fix in ffmpegX?

Yes, it is hardcoded in mplex, the mpeg-2 muxer tool.