home DV conversion?

[martinh]

what is the best format to convert my home DV to preserve the high resolution but to be able to fit it on a CD (mainly for archiving purposes)?

[Craig Tucker]

You dont say what you want to play it on. If you want to play it on a stand alone DVD player, then SVCD is probrably the way to go, if your player supports it. Only 35-40 min per disc though at high quality. If you just want to be able to play it on your PC you could try divx which can compress better than mpeg and still retain good quality.

Craig

[David M]

I am not happy with quality of an SVCD I've edited from a DV source. Sometimes it looks OK, other times it's a little blurry, as if I'm looking through a slightly fogged window.

I've used Pinnacle Studio V7 to capture from my Sony DV camcorder and when I created the movie I selected SVCD. I burned a CD-RW using Nero 5 with the MPEG2 upgrade. I am playing on a Pioneer DVD player.

Is there an inevitable quality loss? Or should I be doing something different? Also, can the SVCD be created in such a way that I can see scenes (like on a DVD) or move ahead.

Thanks,
David

[Craig Tucker]

You don't say what you used to encode your mpeg2(svcd) file. If you let nero do it then that is probrably your problem. Although nero is a very good piece of burning software, the encoding is not that great. Try encoding using TMPGEnc and burn using nero.

I am assuming the original captured source is of good quality, if so, you should be able to make a very good looking SVCD from it. I make VCD's from dv captures, and the quality is on a par to that of a vhs tape.

Quality loss is inevitable as you are compressing the source video, but should barely be noticable on a well encoded SVCD.

You can split your mpeg file up into sections and burn them all to one disc using nero, this allows you to skip to the next section, as if it were a chapter on a DVD. You can also create entry points on a disc which act like chapters, although I have never done this myself, apart from on a ripped DVD. Try searching the forum for entry points.

Craig

Craig

[PhilipL]

Withdrawn

[bachkhoa]

Hi Martinh,

I have a Sony D8 (using Hi8 tapes), Pinnacle PCDV. For archiving purpose,
. I captured the scenes using Studio PCDV
. Save the capture file in DV (AVI) format
. Edited the DV file to eliminate unwanted footstage and group scenes together based on the event
. Made (saved) then movie using Indeo 5.x format.

Doing this I will have several huge AVI files with all the footstages that I wanted. If any of the AVI file fit on a CD-R, then just burn it. I used winRAR to split ALL of them to smaller files which fit on a 80min. CD-R.

I can always go back and reedit these files. Since the source now came from CDs, I don't have to worry about the media. All I have to do is restore the archives into my harddrive. It's very easy to find an AVI editor, but hard to get a good MPG editor, that not included different type of MPG (MPG,VCD.SVCD,...)

Hi David M,

I use TMPGEnc to encode my "movies" to SVCD, it worked great, I set the video bit rate to 2600 - (total audio bit rates). If you have only one stereo channel for sound, then use 2350 CBR.

I use Nero to burn SVCD, disabled the standard SVCD. Played it in my Pioneer DVD.

Some of my final SVCD "chapters" look blurry on some fast moving motion. I watched the orinal mpg and it played fine. After digging from this forum, I used VCDImage to prepare the bin/cue file, then burn it with CDRWin in 2x.

Hope this long response help you. Good luck and have fun :]

[David M]

Martinh, Craig, Phillipl and Bachkhoa,
Thanks for all the replies. Sounds like "taking care with encoding" is important, and that Nero may not be the best tool to use.

So could I try again editing with Pinnacle Studio 7, and then "make movie" (I guess this = encoding) to AVI format, again using Studio. Next encode to MPEG2 using TMPGenc, and finally burn the SCVD with Nero.

Not sure if this is the right forum to ask, but since there's been so much good advice so quickly I'll try. When I've tried to "make movie" of the same edited film again in Studio but this time in DV format instead of MPEG2, it doesn't work. I think because it's still in MPEG2 mode. How do I get rid of this, or what of the many gig of files can I delete without erasing the editing I've done?

Thanks,
David

[bachkhoa]

Hi David M,

When you click on the "3 Make Movie" tab, on the left handside, there are buttons like "Tape/AVI/MPEG/Stream/Share", click on AVI button, then click on "Settings...". Studio DV will popup the "Pinnacle Studio Setup Options" window. You can choose your desired setting here on the "Make AVI File" tab.

I chose "DV Video Encoder" for my Hi8/D8 tape (captured from), the file size about the same as when I captured through the firewire. I used "Indeo video 5.10" compression for my VHS tape, not sure if this is better than "Cinepak Codec" compression.

Hope this works for you. :}

[nulles]

PhilipL (or anyone else),

I have had similar problems with home video. I was not satisfied with SVCD so I upgraded to DVD-R. I had thought I would get indistinguishable video from the miniDV footage, but as you noted, it does not look identical.

I am editing with premiere, then frameserving to TMPGEnc, and using the DVD settings for high quality from the vcdhelp page, although I've tried the bitrate at an even higher CBR (to the 9800 limit), but even at that level I can see a difference. No blocks, but the image isn't quite as crisp on my 50" TV.

I had pretty much assumed it was impossible to do better at home, so I am outputting the project to DVD, and then the DV avi back to miniDV for storage. I assume that professional DVDs get by wtih 6000CBR due to better quality source material. (correct?)

Have I missed something? Should my quality be better that it is? Thanks for any help!

[xavo]

I'm exactly in the same case. I'm looking for a cheap way to archive films taken with my DV camcorder.

I would like to have a copy that could be played by my standalone DVD player: I'll go for XSVCD.

I would like to have a copy stored on CD, balancing quality and size. I'm thinking about DivX, but I haven't found out the correct settings yet.

For films I consider specially important, I'll store a copy in a miniDV tape.


Does anybody know the best settings for the DivX version?
Why do you talk about MPEG-2 in your replies? Isn't it better to use MPEG-4 (DivX), assuming you're not going to play it on your DVD player?


Xavo
Galicia - EU

[Craig Tucker]

[quote="xavo"]
Why do you talk about MPEG-2 in your replies? Isn't it better to use MPEG-4 (DivX), assuming you're not going to play it on your DVD player?


You answered your own question there, most people want something that will play in there own DVD player. But for those that don't divx is an option which was what I suggested in my original reply to this question (see second post).

At the moment I make VCD but I keep the original on DV tape because in the future I want to make lossless copies to DVD.

Craig