Standards?

[joeljoel]

Maybe im asking for the holy grail, but it seems to me that since everyone is doing the same thing (ie. converting say VHS to VCD), the process would be super-simple. VHS has standards, VCD has standards, so why is it so difficult?

Meaning, why isnt there a simple "recipe" to consistently go from point A to point B for all As and Bs for EVERYONE!!?

again, my 1st attempts are converting home VHS recording to VCD or SVCD --- so far, quality is bad and im hearing mostly from users / friends that "youve just got to play with the settings" -- basically, i dont completely buy it... i still think there's some fairly straight forward "recipe" using std tools to get this done w/o spending a lifetime learning the details behind HOW compress and video works...

[VidGuy]

Of course there are standards, but the beauty is there are so many to choose from.

Video encoding is full of compromises. If you want no compromises, then there's no problem - always do things the highest quality possible (VCD - use 352 x 240 1150 CBR, SVCD use 480 x 480, 2400 CBR, DVD use 720 x 480, 9800 CBR, for PAL use 288/576 instead of 240/480). This is a little oversimplified since the rules for encoding an image to mpeg1 or mpeg2 are not set - it's the decoding rules that are standards. How you encode it is up to the encoder, which allows for a wide variation in quality even using the maximum resolutions given above.

The other problem of course is that you then get the largest-sized video, so all the playing around comes from trying to make a smaller video that "looks" just as good.

It all revolves around what "looks" good to you, and that's subjective.

[flaninacupboard]

and don't double post! you'll get yourself banned! lousy mr. "joined today, gave up yesterday"

[joeljoel]

geez... lighten up.... who said im giving up ---- and more importantly what do you care?

the double-post was an accident