Opinions on Max Movie Length to Author onto One Disc

[fiiido]

Hi,
Your opinions would be greatly appreaciated. I have a number of movies and I am sure that for some I can fit onto one disc. I use 80mins CD-Rs.

From your experience what would be the maximum movie length you would try to fit onto one 80mins CD-R and also what is the lowest video bitrate you would set for acceptable video quality.

Thanks

[sterno]

If you're making a standard VCD, the most you can fit on one 80-minute disc is 80 minutes. That's pretty clear-cut, though you can choose to ignore the standards and make an XVCD to meet your needs for quality/size.

If you're making SVCDs, the answer isn't as obvious as for VCD because SVCD doesn't have a fixed bitrate. It depends on your eye for quality and on the movie. A movie with lots of high-motion action needs a higher bitrate than one with lots of low-motion scenes. I usually avoid putting more than about an hour on a disc, though. Widescreen movies also compress better than full-screen video because you have the huge black borders, which don't need much bitrate.