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[homerpez]

question (assuming I can multiplex at all)...

for my application here, I end up with an .mp2 file from DVD2AVI anyway... so I assume I can just use that instead...

Problem is DVD2AVI makes it have a -99ms delay (usually)... can this be fixed in bbMPEG?

Just edited this too... I just tried an VFAPI made avi, and it works directly in CCE. BUT, the avs file brings up errors... I type this into my avs file:

LoadPlugin("D:\winnt\system\AVISYNTH.DLL")
AVISource("D:\video\vobs\meaning\meaning of life_d2v-vfapi.avi").BicubicResize(640,480,352,240)
WAVsource("D:\video\vobs\meaning\meaning of life AC3 T01 2_0ch 192Kbps 44.1KHz.wav")
audiodub(video,audio)

and get this error:


Frame size 760x56 not supported. Supported frame size is up to 720x576.

Why is this happening? Isn't there a better way to resize the video before it gets to CCE?


<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: homerpez on 2001-07-14 12:28:08 ]</font>

[Sully]

Sorry, missed the post before.

If you use SAVE PROJECT with DVD2AVI you should end up with a .wav file for your audio. That you encode to .mp2 later with tooLame.

First of all one problem could be you've copied (or at least give the path to) you AVISynth.dll to the wrong folder. Win NT/2k require it to be copied to the Windows\System32 folder. You shouldn't need to point to the .dll in the script. If AVISynth is corecctly installed all progams on your system suppoting AVISynth will pick it up by itself.

An easy way to do your resizing & borders is to use FitCD (here in the tools section). Just copy & paste the resize & border info to your own script.

I've NEVER had a problem muxing with bbMPEG. So yes it does it right.

[homerpez]

I've sucessfully done this now, using a template someone made (my real problem lied in trying to trick CCE to not crash while loading it)... now I've hopefully taken care of that.

Now I'm having a new problem.... Toolame! When I used it as an external encoder for TMPGEnc, the end result was the same as if I used TMPGEnc to encode from .mp2 to .mp2... lots of "ringing" effect in voices, bad conversion!

What's odd is that everyone here is saying "USE TOOLAME INSTEAD!", but for me, TMPGEnc sounds infinitely better than Toolame going from WAV to .mp2 at 128k!

Am I doing something wrong? Could TMPGEnc multiplexing it at the end (I assume that's what it's doing) screw it up?

I guess maybe I need to find a TRUE Layer-2 audio encoder to test out this theory, I suspect Toolame is not nearly as nice as everyone says... UNLESS I'm doing something wrong here...

I am now trying a 5-pass MPEG-1 using CCE, but I have not yet seen the results... it was acting funny when I left for work, so I don't think it will turn out. It stopped after the first pass (info), and left a 300 meg file, no extension, sitting there. The finished video should have been 600 megs or more. I set it to go again before leaving, maybe it'll work. I still need to encode my WAV to .mp2 for it, then I'll multiplex with bbMPEG and see if it's any good.

Would LSX (?) encoder be a better option than all this? Does it do VBR?

<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: homerpez on 2001-07-17 08:55:38 ]</font>

[Sully]

Since you say it's producing a .mp2 I assume you're choosing AUDIO ONLY with TMPGEnc. If you don't like the quality you can try 2 things. First raise your bitrate to at least 192 and/or in DVD2AVI under AUDIO - 48 to 44.1KHz, change it to at least high. It'll take longer to process, but it produces better quality audio.

Other than that there's not many alternatives. There are one or two other methods, but they're a lot more complicated & time consuming.

[homerpez]

<TABLE BORDER=0 ALIGN=CENTER WIDTH=85%><TR><TD><font size=-1>Quote:</font><HR size=1 color=black></TD></TR><TR><TD><FONT SIZE=-1><BLOCKQUOTE>
On 2001-07-18 06:31:05, Sully wrote:
Since you say it's producing a .mp2 I assume you're choosing AUDIO ONLY with TMPGEnc. If you don't like the quality you can try 2 things. First raise your bitrate to at least 192 and/or in DVD2AVI under AUDIO - 48 to 44.1KHz, change it to at least high. It'll take longer to process, but it produces better quality audio.

Other than that there's not many alternatives. There are one or two other methods, but they're a lot more complicated & time consuming.
</BLOCKQUOTE></FONT></TD></TR><TR><TD><HR size=1 color=black></TD></TR></TABLE>

I may try to use just TMPGEnc for audio only, for some reason I remember that being fine for WAV --> MP2 conversion (just the MP2 --> MP2 conversion sucks)...

I always do 44k downsample and "UltraHigh" filtering on DVD2AVI, and the WAV that comes out is great, just the conversion to MP2 is the problem... I'll try to sort it out, maybe even dust off "Cleaner 5" and encode audio with it or something...

[Sully]

To be honest I don't know for sure if DVD2AVI uses the sound card's processor, but that could be something to think about since it IS creating a .wav file.

[spr1nt]

first off, thx for the guide sully.

im running win2k with all the programs needed installed on my computer, when i get to this step...

Start CCE and in the window that opens right mouse click and click on the ADD button that appears. Change file type to ALL FILES and load your .avs file.

cce crashes on me. is anyone else having this problem or know of a fix?

-tia

<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: spr1nt on 2001-09-12 04:12:37 ]</font>

[Elco]

Yup, same problem I had, but after frameserving with VirtualDub. Directly after I added the signal CCE crashes.
But, picking up with TMPGEnc and even LSX works 100%.

Don't know if AviSynth of VirtualDub makes a different, but VirualDub seems to work more stable, Avisynth crashed several time on my system, or made W2k unstable in other applications..


<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: Elco on 2001-09-12 06:50:57 ]</font>

[Truman]

VidGuy wrote here:

I have had problems with CCE and avs files. TYpically what I do is to create an ecl file using the original d2v_vfapi.avi file, then edit the ecl file to change the width from 720 to 480 and the d2v_vfapi.avi filename to the avs filename.

This helped me, and searching the forum helped me too...

[spr1nt]

hi truman,
im SO new to this stuff, can you please tell me what an ecl file is? and more importantly how i create one? tried finding out the answer through your link but had no luck.

[Truman]

Add the d2v_vfapi.avi or any avi file to cce's encoder list according to this guide.
Then set everything like you would do if you had added the avs.
After that don't hit "encode", but select file> save as.... Save it as filename.ecl and exit.
Now open the .ecl file with notepad and edit. Then save the changes and close.
Start CCE, select file> open filename.ecl and encode.

[kreg]

I was hoping someone could help me make a more compliant SVCD. Seems everything is working great with CCE to bbMPEG, but when I burn the SVCD's, either with Nero or CDRwin, the timescale is basically double the time that the actual SVCD is. I've been trying different things, like checking and unchecking soemtinga bout svcd scan-somethings..I'm not sure. Maybe some would know what I'm supposed to do with that part. Anyhow, the SVCD's look and play great but the time is annoyingly way off.

Kreg

[icemanatvcd]

I have a question on this step:

"Now to AVISynth. The first thing is to create an .avs script. Create a new text document somewhere on your HD (I use the partition I encode to) naming it whatever you want. The important thing is to choose ALL FILES under file type and save it as .avs NOT .txt"

Why do you need to do that? You have already created a "fake" .avi using VFAPI Converter, which can be opened and recognised by CCE 2.5. Is the reason becuase we want to convert the frame size to 480x576 (PAL)and only AVISYnth can do that?

Please note that I am new to all this.

Thanking you in advance.

[CrazyMike]

Wich settings would you recomend to make a SVCD's that fits a 2hour movie into 2 cd's ? 3 passes is enogogh or would you recommend 4 or 5 ?
By the way I'm using FlashMpeg XIS with premier video server plugin set to creat an avs, then press start in flashmpeg and then with CCE 2.50 I open that avs file and then change all the settings and press start and the movie starts to be encoded. I don't have any audio but in the premier video server plugin there is an option that allows in the end of the decoding process, has soon has you press stop in the video server, to rip the wav and then convert it and in the end mutiplex it with the generated mpv file from CCE. It seems to be pretty fast. I also tryed with dvdx and it works too but its not has fast but I think that the quality is some how a little better. But Almost half of the speed.

[Truman]

icemanatvcd, both DVD2AVI and CCE can not resize. So if you need to resize, you have to use Avisynth (or VirtualDub or TMPG).
For example if you have a 16:9 anamorph encoded DVD, you probably want to resize to 4:3 and add borders to play it on a 4:3 TV properly.

[icemanatvcd]

Thanks for that Truman.

That was not my question or I do not understand your answer. I do not want to resize and add borders as I have a wide screen TV. I like to keep the same aspect ratio as the original DVD which is 16:9 but has to do in 480X576 ratio for the SVCD. Let me put my questoins it in an another form:

What is VFAPI Convertor used for? If it is make a "fake" .avi file then why bother with AVISYnth. CCE 2.5 recoginses the .avi file by VFAPI Convertor.

I hope I am making sense?

[icemanatvcd]

Sorry 480x576 Resoultion not ratio.

[Truman]

If you have a 720x576 source, convert it with VFAPI or not and feed it into CCE, CCE will encode to 720x576 unless
1)you select half vertical res-->720x288
2)you select half horizontal res-->352x576
3)you select both-->352x288
4)you edit the encoder control list .ecl: line 16, change width from 720 to whatever, for example 480

Avisynth wont recognize the .d2v unless you use the MPEG2DEC plugin. That's why sully used both VFAPI and Avisynth as he started the topic. Look, this topic is quite old and the MPEG2DEC plugin is quite new.

[Truman]

nevermind

<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: Truman on 2001-10-15 12:44:25 ]</font>

[Raider]

@icemanatvcd
as I understand it,
the .avi can be loaded, but there are no options for resize or filters, it has to be run through vdub or alternative.
The .avs file loaded into CCE,converts size, borders and resolution, etc....
If you used TMPGenc you would have to use a template to convert to SVCD, then encode, where do you propose to do this in CCE?
by loading the .avs file you are telling CCE what to do.
If you just used the converted .avi file from the .dv2 you converted in VFAPI, you would still end up with your original dvd resolution of 720x576
hope that helps
I gotta thank Truman and Sully, for help on this matter, as Avisynth has been the fastest method by far with the encoding in CCE.
oops, just seen Truman's post above, pretty much as I suggested....(of course it would be, its as Truman and Sully expalined it to me)

<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: Raider on 2001-10-15 08:51:15 ]</font>

[Truman]

Oh man, I smoke too much. If you want 480x576 resolution you have to resize anyway, Point 4) of my reply above is complete bullshit. I am sorry.

[icemanatvcd]

Truman, Do you know where can I find useful information on MPEG2DEC plugin? Thanks man.

[Truman]

http://www.doom9.org/mpg/d2a-mpeg2dec.htm
http://www.math.berkeley.edu/%7Ebenrg/avisynth.html
http://users.win.be/dividee
http://rilanparty.com/vbb/forumdisplay.php?s=b598a39dd3e0e3d13ef8e37112c43ac5&forumid=33

[Sully]

As Truman has mentioned this post is somewhat outdated. I myself have "moved on" to using the MPEG2DEC .dll. It's much faster than creating the "fake" .avi file. It's faster because you're not forcing CCE to convert from RGB to YUV.

The reason for frameserving to CCE (AVISynth, VDub, Flask) is because as great as an encoder that CCE is, it CANNOT resize. In case anyone is wondering... it takes longer to encode frameserving NOT just because you are frameserving to the encoder, but rather your giving the encoder more things to do (ie; resize).

Other than using MPEG2DEC there's another "update" to this guide I highly recommend. Use FitCD as your bitrate calculator! I congragulate the author of this program for a truely fine piece of work.

To all those that have been in contact with me since the submission of this post with me trying to get an actual guide posted on a web site... it's still coming. On the one side I didn't manage to get it finished before I moved back to the States. Haven't gotten a PC up & running since I've been here yet, and I was trying some new stuff out before the move (ie; MPEG2DEC, VCDImager, TCSV, etc.).

It will be done sometime soon. In the meantime, if you're interested in using MPEG2DEC, check out Truman's links given here. In addition to info on AviSynth & co. there's a ggod one for using the MPEG2DEC .dll.

To all who've shown support for me... hang in there, it'll be done soon.

[Kdiddy]

Clear up something for me here...CCE CAN resize to a point, by using the 1/2 vertical & hrizontal optons, which yes I know is NOT ideal, but a resizer none the less....

"It's much faster than creating the "fake" .avi file. It's faster because you're not forcing CCE to convert from RGB to YUV."

Does this become a moot point if you output from DVD2AVI in YUV mode, and then have the option in CCE set to "try to decode only in YUV"??...I am of the thinking that it would, but am open to why this may be wrong....

Since I have to have 352x240 resolution, & most of my DVDs are 720/708x480, often I only "fake" avi the .d2v file from DVD2AVI and enocde with that in CCE in stead using an outside resizer. This caused my encode time to jump from .6-.7 to 1.0-1.1. Wondering if if MPEG2DEC.dll method will faster than this. will see..

[Sully]

Kdiddy - True, it can do half resolutions, but as you said yourself it's really not the ideal way to try & resize.

No, their IS a point to it. Since .avi is done using RGB, CCE will change this to YUV (mpeg). If output YUV with DVD2AVI, BUT do the "afke" avi, CCE will end up changing YUV > RGB > YUV. Pretty much a waste of time... True, if using the MPEG2DEC .dll you should set DVD2AVI to output a YUV signal. That's what makes the encoding faster using the .dll. If you're going to use VFAPI then output RGB with DVD2AVI. That way you're only changing the video signal once, instead of twice.

I doubt MPEG2DEC will be any faster, it all depends on your system specs. Besides if using the half resolution settings in CCE suites your needs than that's fine, go that way. MOST people using CCE are trying to make more "conform" SVCD's so that's not really an option for them.

[adam]

Just a couple of tips that werent mentioned about encoding with cce. Under the video tab if your video is progressive you should also check zigzagg scanning order in addition to the progressive frames tab. This should cause a noticable increase in quality. Also cce recommends checking linear quantizer when using low bitrates, which certainly applies to even the most off spec (x)svcds, although I can't notice any difference. For the intra DC precision check auto. Again I can't tell a difference but this theoretically gives you the best quality. There is also a patcher which lets you set custom made matrices to be used in cce. You can use the same ones that TMPGenc uses, theorectically giving you quality closer to that of TMPGenc's but at the speed of cce. I still prefer the default cce one but I havent had a chance to fully test them all. Let me know if anyone needs this patcher.

About the MPEG2DEC with avisynth frameserving method...If your frameserving there is no excuse not to use it unless you absolutely need a vdub filter that isnt supported through avisynth. While it may be more difficult to setup its much easier to use and it should speed up the conversion time significantly. I think the average speed increase is between .3 and .6

With this method I can encode full res svcds at 1.4 and at 352x240 I go at just under 2.0.

<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: adam on 2001-10-16 18:54:32 ]</font>

[Truman]

I did a bunch of tests with the patcher. Source was dvd pal 16:9 (1:2,35), interlaced. I tried different b/c parameters for bicubic resize and all available matrices and encoded at 1500kbps VBR3pass.
Finally the best result I got with BicubicResize(480,320,0,0.6)
and the "CCE SP 2.62 very low bitrate" matrix.
To improve the quality, if you encode at that low bitrate, I suggest to use the TemporalSmoother filter. It works wonder.
Keep in mind, this is my subjectiv opinion.

[icemanatvcd]

Thanks to Truman for the links. Thanks also to Sully, Adam and kdiddy for Their contributions. I have a lot to learn!