DV Cam

[Tbag]

hello, does anyone know if theres any free software that would let my transfer video from my DV cam into mpeg 2 rather than AVI.
Even software that can convert AVI to mpeg 2 with no loss of quality so I can then burn to DVD.

I would rather do it that way than use the software that burns a DVD straight away like DVD SANTA.
I think its mpeg 2 that I want, I was told that its really good quality.

any help would be appriciated

[SingSing]

Any DVDrecorder with firewire connection.

[redwudz]

It's not freeware, but Mainconcept encoder can convert the DV stream to MPEG-2 directly. However the quality is not as good as encoding it from the hard drive and it's takes a lot of CPU power.

I transfer the DV to the hard drive using WinDV, edit and filter in VirtualDub Mod, save out the sound as a WAV, encode that to AC3 with ffmpeggui, then frameserve just the video to TMPGEnc encoder. When I author with TMPGEnc DVD Author, I use the MPEG-2 video and the AC3 sound, author and burn.

The newest version of VirtualDub can accept DV directly from the Firewire card and save one step. Just the encoder and the authoring software are pay, but both are worth the $, IMO. There are freeware encoders and authoring programs available in 'Tools', though. <<<<<<

You can also use DivxToDVD to do the encoding and authoring. A freeware version is available.

[gadgetguy]

I use WinDV to capsfer from my Cam to DV-AVI.
Then I use VirtualDub or AviSynth to edit and frameserve to QuEnc to encode to DVD compliant mpeg2 with AC3 audio. Then I use TDA to author.
TDA is the only payware in that process, but there are free authoring programs available too.
IMO you don't want to capsfer via firewire direct to Mpeg2 because quality sacrifices are made encoding on the fly, in order to keep up with the incoming video stream.

[Tbag]

thanks for the replys but I am totaly confused
maybe I posted in wrong forum 'advanced conversion'

I am a total amature when it comes to this and I got lost with the "to edit and frameserve", "author" & "AC3 sound". I thought it would be a simple drag and drop the AVI file to end up with a MPEG 2 file ..... how wrong was I

Is all this software necessary or is it to end up with a professional look with different menus and stuff because i dont want to edit it or anything.

thanks

[edDV]

thanks for the replys but I am totaly confused
maybe I posted in wrong forum 'advanced conversion'

I am a total amature when it comes to this and I got lost with the "to edit and frameserve", "author" & "AC3 sound". I thought it would be a simple drag and drop the AVI file to end up with a MPEG 2 file ..... how wrong was I

Is all this software necessary or is it to end up with a professional look with different menus and stuff because i dont want to edit it or anything.

thanks

Alternatives

1. Stand alone DVD Recorder with IEEE-1394 input.

simple one or two step. Encoding is done in hardware.

2. Encode to MPeg2 on while capturing.

lower quality than #1 or #3 but fast. You would then need to use a DVD authoring program to make the DVD.

3. Capture (transfer) to DV format (DV-AVI). Then edit in DV format. Then encode to MPeg2. Then use a DVD authoring program to make the DVD.

This gets you full control and professional results but takes more time and effort.

[Baldrick]

I haven't seen any free all-in-one dv to dvd solution.

and moving you to the newbie forum...