Home Movies to DVDR..

[calhoun]

I am trying to make DVD's of my home movies but cannot fit much more than 80 mins on a DVDR. DVDR disks are supposed to hold 120 mins arent they? I am using PowerDirectorPro to capture my DV then encode into DVD format.

Can anyone shed any light on this for me? also can someone suggest the best DV capture software and encoding software for this purpose?

[jkapa]

I have never worked with DV but I know this: a DVDR holds 120m of video or 4.7 Gb (more like 4.38) of video data and obviously if your video is more than that size the DVDR will not hold it´s 120m promess.

Probably your video as a very high bitrate.

[calhoun]

The video I am tryin to put on DVDR at the moment is 3.87GB and only 87mins but PowerDirectorPro still says it is too big for the DVDR.

[rcb]

DVD capacities are really based on file size and can hold up to around 4.3 gigs of data.

The minutes allowable is a function of bitrate - higher bitrate (sharper iresolution/audio) reduces playing time, lower bitrate the opposite.

Very broadly put a DVD can hold about 1 hr of sharpest bitrate and possibly up to 3 hrs at extremely low bitrates.

Most encoding/authoring software packages have options or built-in tools to adjust bitrates, allowing user trade-offs on time vs. playing quality.

Check your program's help file for what features it may have along those lines. If so, a good time to use rw media and run your own setting tests to see what you prefer.

If the terminology is confusing to you, use the glossary section - l/h side of this page.

[calhoun]

I had thought maybe it was a bitrate issue..

So when a DVDR says 120mins capacity thats obviously not at the highest bitrate?

PowerDirectorPro doesnt seem to give the option of changing bitrates. Can you suggest any software that has DVD capture and variable bitrate encoding?

[rcb]

Ther are a number of good apps that offer same - see tools section > advanced video editors for listing.

But, before doing that, use Gspot and/or AviCodec (freeware utilities to get details on that 3.97 gig file you captured. If it's an mpg type file, your app may be trying to convert it again, making the burnin filezize way too big for a dvd... a 3.97gig dv-avi file should compress a bunch when converted to dvd complaint mpeg-2..... not get bigger.

OtOH, if the 3.97 gig file is already dvd compliant mpeg-2, download a trial copy of TMPGEnc DVD Author and try that. See it's helpfile for how to.

[calhoun]

The 87 min 3.87GB file I created with PowerDirectotPro is a DVD compliant Mpeg-2. TMPGEnc DVD Author crashed on me when i tried using it but I did manage to author the video using DVDLab and it would have fitted onto a DVDR disk except during the burn process Nero failed it at the end because of an "invalid block address"... I am fairly certain this particular problem is the Princo DVDR disks I purchased for 1$ Au each.. I'll try some other disks and see how I go. I am still a little confused as to why PowerDirectorPro creates this DVD-Mpeg-2 compliant video but thinks it is too big for a disk..

Anyhow thanks for the help..

[WuphonsReach]

A DVD-R has enough room for roughly 37,366,215 kilobits (4.35Gb * 1024 * 1024 * 1024 * 8 / 1000) of audio/video data. If you encode your video at 8000kbps (a common high-quality setting) with PCM audio at 1536kbps, you'll only manage to fit around 65 minutes of material on the disc.

Switching from PCM audio to 256kbps AC3 audio gets you 75 minutes. Dropping the video bitrate to 6000kbps with 256kbps AC3 gets you 100 minutes. Lowest that I would drop full-resolution (720x480 / 720x576) is probably 4000kbps, but that depends on the source.

Using half-D1 resolutions (352x480 / 352x576) allows you to push the video bitrate even lower. I've gone as low as 2350 for some material that I really didn't care much about (almost 4 hours), and 2900 is useful for fitting (4) 48min programs onto a single disc.

[Capmaster]

DVDR disks are supposed to hold 120 mins arent they?

I think it's a conspiracy by the hardware and media vendors to keep people confused. How many noob posts have we seen asking for an answer to the "4.7GB disc won't hold 4.7GB" or the "is it really 120 minutes on a disc?". They make it worse by printing "120 minutes" or "4.7GB" right on the disc....the first one is meaningless and the second one is an outright lie

[calhoun]

< NOOB


Though I consider myself more as someone with less experience than a noob... and hey! you dont learn if you dont ask.

[Capmaster]

< NOOB


Though I consider myself more as someone with less experience than a noob... and hey! you dont learn if you dont ask.

True enough. I wasn't using the term "noob" in a disparaging way, just a convenient word to describe those just starting out and trying to get a handle on this complicated hobby. Hey ...we've all been there