Authoring DVD-SVCD discs

[DRP]

I've just bought my first DVD writer drive and so I'm a bit n00balicious as far as DVD authoring goes, but having said that, I'm an absolute GOD when it comes to SVCD

Most of my source material is AVI file and very rarely is the resolution (after cropping down, which I do as a matter of course) ever much greater than the 480 horizontal resolution of SVCD. Hence I believe that expanding the images greatly to get up to the DVD resolutions of 704 or 720 will actually result in a lower quality than just performing a mild resize to SVCD's 480 instead.

For this reason, I'd like to establish for myself a method of creating DVD-SVCD discs. I've downloaded the sample files and tried them in my players and they play perfectly, so compatibility isn't going to be a problem for me.

I have TMPGEnc DVD Author, can I use that to create DVD-SVCDs? With the audio on DVDs I know it needs to be 48kHz - no problem, but can it also be encoded as MP3 on a DVD-SVCD or does it need to remain as MP2?

Any advice or guides would be greatly appreciated.

[jimmalenko]

https://www.videohelp.com/svcddvdr.htm

Uses Ulead MovieFactory 2, but I don't see why you couldn't substitute TDA instead.

[mats.hogberg]

Also, take a look at svcd2dvdmpg. And MP3 is a no-no as far as DVD goes - mp2, LPCM or AC3 are the audio flavors available.

/Mats

[DRP]

Thanks for the advice guys, I've got the second program as well now and will work my way through the guide.

Just one more question if I may. What are the rules regarding bitrate when you're making DVD-SVCDs? Does the bitrate you choose have to comply with the SVCD spec or can you go to town and use DVD bitrates instead?

From my vast SVCD experience on my players, 2500+224kbps is the absolute maximum I can go otherwise I start to get skips in the audio track. On other players the bottom of the video becomes very broken up and pixelated with major visible macroblocks (just depends on whether the audio or video has priority on the player), when burnt to CD-R(W).

Seeing as how DVD-SVCD is burnt to a DVD disc with the much higher data trasfer rate that comes with, can you go much higher with the bitrate - as you would if making a genuine DVD?

[DRP]

First problem: I've converted an AVI file into two elementary streams of video and audio. The video is of SVCD intended compliant format and the audio I left as 48kHz sampling frequency (seeing as how I always intended for this to be put on DVD). The trouble now is that SVCD2DVDMPG won't accept the elementary stream of video as it isn't an MPG file and I can't mux the video and audio elementary streams together with any tool I've got because they all say it's an illegal MPEG file with 48kHz audio.

I've tried Womble MPEG-VCR, TMPGEnc Plus MPEG Tools and TMPGEnc MPEG Editor to do the muxing but none of them will with the audio at 48kHz.

It seems a bit unnecessary and odd to me if I have to resample the audio down to 44.1kHz just so I can input it into SVCD2DVDMPG for it to ultimately be resampled back out to 48kHz again. What am I missing here?

[guns1inger]

DVD Lab can do this.

[ZippyP.]

If you use 1/2 DVD resolution instead of SVCD then your disks would be 100% compliant and they would be very close to SVCD quality. For NTSC the 1/2 DVD resolution is 352x480 vs. 480x480 for SVCD. I recommend making them compliant.

[DRP]

https://www.videohelp.com/svcddvdr.htm

In the very last panel of that guide it illustrates how you are supposed to be able to multiplex an m2v stream with a 48kHz mp2 stream to create an mpg stream.

As soon as I try to do that I get an error message pop up saying "Invalid MPEG Stream".

My m2v stream was created with TMPGEnc and the mp2 stream was created by tooLAME via TMPGEnc as the frontend. So what I am I doing wrong? I can't get past this.

[DRP]

If you use 1/2 DVD resolution instead of SVCD then your disks would be 100% compliant and they would be very close to SVCD quality. For NTSC the 1/2 DVD resolution is 352x480 vs. 480x480 for SVCD. I recommend making them compliant.

Well yeah I know this, but I've downloaded the DVD-SVCD sample files from this website, burnt them to disc and found that they play perfectly in both my standalone DVD players. Given that's the case and that I don't share my encodes around with anyone else or that I don't keep them forevermore after I watched them, there's really no reason for me to be worried about future compliance issues at all. I'm only interested in getting the very best possible quality and having them work in my player. SVCD is going to be higher quality than CVD and I know they will work in my player, so why not strive for that?

[jimmalenko]

What are the rules regarding bitrate when you're making DVD-SVCDs? Does the bitrate you choose have to comply with the SVCD spec or can you go to town and use DVD bitrates instead?

DVD bitrates apply.

**********

First problem: I've converted an AVI file into two elementary streams of video and audio. The video is of SVCD intended compliant format and the audio I left as 48kHz sampling frequency (seeing as how I always intended for this to be put on DVD). The trouble now is that SVCD2DVDMPG won't accept the elementary stream of video as it isn't an MPG file and I can't mux the video and audio elementary streams together with any tool I've got because they all say it's an illegal MPEG file with 48kHz audio.

...

In the very last panel of that guide it illustrates how you are supposed to be able to multiplex an m2v stream with a 48kHz mp2 stream to create an mpg stream.

As soon as I try to do that I get an error message pop up saying "Invalid MPEG Stream".

My m2v stream was created with TMPGEnc and the mp2 stream was created by tooLAME via TMPGEnc as the frontend. So what I am I doing wrong? I can't get past this.

If you're using TMPGEnc to make the M2V, and toolame via TMPGEnc to make the MP2 (and I'd recommend SSRC as your sample rate converter), why are you outputting to elementary streams when you need to output to a program stream for SVCD2DVDMPG anyway ? Just output to a Program (System) stream !

[mats.hogberg]

In fact, if you already have the audio in 48 kHz, it's simpler to just alter the resolution setting in the mpg with DVDPatcher, instead of going thru the whole svcd2dvdmpg process.
If you use DVD-Lab Pro to author, you don't even have to do that - after a warning, it will accept svcd mpg as is, and author it as DVD.

/Mats

[DRP]

If you're using TMPGEnc to make the M2V, and toolame via TMPGEnc to make the MP2 (and I'd recommend SSRC as your sample rate converter), why are you outputting to elementary streams when you need to output to a program stream for SVCD2DVDMPG anyway ? Just output to a Program or System stream !

Okay, here's why I'm doing it to elementary streams:

My source is split across two AVI files. From experience I know that I can just join the two halves together with VDubMod and encode the joined result in one pass with TMPGEnc and it works fine for the video. Unfortunately it quite often doesn't work terribly well with the audio. If I do it this way, I quite often end up with a full-scale click at the join in the audio. That isn't very nice and probably doesn't do my speakers much good either. To avoid the click, I extract the audio from both halves individually with GoldWave and then join them together with WavCat before encoding to mp2. This achieves the same thing but without the annoying click at the join. Unfortunately in this case, that procedure is quite time consuming, so I start the video encoding while I do the audio extraction/joining at the same time. Doing this I end up handling the audio and video separately so that all is required is to mux them back together at the end which is normally not a problem, but now with 48kHz audio it is a problem.

[DRP]

DVD Lab can do this.

Thanks for the heads up. I'm getting DVD-lab Pro now and it sounds like just the thing I need. I like the description that it treats adults like adults instead of all the other DVD Authoring tools out there.

Cheers.

[mats.hogberg]

Again, here TMPGEnc DVD Author comes to use: You can well take two mpg files and add them as 2 parts of the same title, and they will play back as if it's one continous video. (Some say you have to remove the chapter point TDA inserts at the "join" to avoid a slight pause)
I might have missed something here, but if your source is AVI, why struggle with SVCD files if it's a DVD you're creating? All this trouble might be worth something if your source is SVCD files, but surely not if you have to encode anyway?

/Mats

[DRP]

In fact, if you already have the audio in 48 kHz, it's simpler to just alter the resolution setting in the mpg with DVDPatcher, instead of going thru the whole svcd2dvdmpg process.
If you use DVD-Lab Pro to author, you don't even have to do that - after a warning, it will accept svcd mpg as is, and author it as DVD.

/Mats

Perfect!! That's what I like to hear! I'm getting DVD-lab Pro right now in fact, so I shall try that first.

Cheers.

[DRP]

Again, here TMPGEnc DVD Author comes to use: You can well take two mpg files and add them as 2 parts of the same title, and they will play back as if it's one continous video. (Some say you have to remove the chapter point TDA inserts at the "join" to avoid a slight pause)
I might have missed something here, but if your source is AVI, why struggle with SVCD files if it's a DVD you're creating? All this trouble might be worth something if your source is SVCD files, but surely not if you have to encode anyway?

/Mats

I can understand your confusion and questioning as to why I want to do this, but there is a genuine reason why I want to use SVCD resolution. Firstly I know it will work on my players so that isn't an issue. Secondly I'm only making the DVDs for my own use on my own players so I don't care about compatability issues with anyone else's player, but the main reason is so I don't have to do a large resize of the horizontal resolution of my source to make it DVD compliant.

Most of my source AVI files are never > 640 in horizontal resolution. I only have 4:3 televisions to watch them on as well. Because of that, I always crop the horizontal resolution down to something a bit "squarer" to better fill my TV screens. Specifically I will crop something in the realm of ~2.35:1 - ~2.5:1 AR down to 16:9 and I'll crop ~1.85:1 videos down to 22:15 AR and 4:3 stays at 4:3 obviously. Doing that typically reduces the horizontal resolution of my source AVI to something more like 464 or 455. It is a very small resize for the encoder to do to get from 455 or 464 up to 480 but not so to go to 352 or 704/720.

I believe that the smaller the resize that occurs, the smaller will be the quality loss as well, and quality is what is important to me. I don't have any hard evidence to prove me correct in that assumption, but I do know that when I resize a conventional image file like a JPG or something, the more I resize it, the worse it looks and since video is basically just a collection of still images shown very quickly I would imagine that the same basic principal applies.

Having said that, I have created many CVD's as well as SVCD's and I can't tell the difference between a CVD and an SVCD on my TV while watching it, but I do apply a more aggressive sharpen filter on the CVD horizontal resolution when I do, so maybe that is compensating enough for me to not see the difference.

[DRP]

Whoa!... this DVD authoring caper gets pretty damn complicated doesn't it? I think I now see why programs like TMPGEnc DVD Author that hold your hand and walk you through slowly are so popular - this DVD-lab Pro looks like the NASA Command Centre in comparison!!

Anyone wanna give me a hand on how to just get the simplest of streams together on the DVD so it plays? No menus or any other crap involved, just wanna have it so it plays the video - nothing more or less at this stage.

[mats.hogberg]

It's a bit more to work with than TDA, aint it?
Well, I found there are excellent guides and walk-thru's on the developers site - try some of them, and you'll get the general principle! The more I look at (and use) DVD-Lab, the more I like it (for more elaborate authoring, anyway...).
I think your theory about resizing is sound, but once you got this sorted, I suggest you try 720, 704 and 352 as well, to see if you can spot any difference - might save you some work in the future...

/Mats

[DRP]

It's a bit more to work with than TDA, aint it?

Sure is, but I'll stick with it I think. It looks like the right tool to me, whereas TDA looks and feels like a toy (it's too much like TMPGEnc 3.0 XPress which I put up for all of about 1 hour before I ditched it and reverted to TMPGEnc Plus 2.5 again)

I remember being bloody scared when I first started up TMPGEnc Plus for the first time, and to be perfectly honest I still don't know what everything in it does particularly with respect GOP structures, but I'm very confident with it now and can make it do everything I need it to do. It's just gonna take some learning that's all. The frustrating bit is that I don't want all the fruit, I just want to put a very simple though completely non-standard MPEG onto a DVD and have it play - like I did with SVCDs. Basically I just want a really big SVCD so I don't have to get up midway through the movie and change discs. I can see that DVD-lab can do a helluva lot more than that, but I don't need all that extra stuff just yet.

I think your theory about resizing is sound, but once you got this sorted, I suggest you try 720, 704 and 352 as well, to see if you can spot any difference - might save you some work in the future...

I will try that, but to be honest, once I've figured out this DVD-lab program I'll more than likely wanna stick with it. It's just the initial learning curve that's a bit of a pain.

The other reason for not wanting to go to a 704x576 or 720x576 resolution is that TMPGEnc takes considerably longer to process and encode that many pixels per frame than it does at 480x576. With a fairly heavy load on my computer (me using it all the time with encoding being done in the background), 2 hours of video typically takes around 8 hours to encode to SVCD 480x576 MPEG. The same to DVD 720x576 MPEG resolution takes at least 12 hours. That's a significant difference. I'm also reluctant to go down to 352x576 because at the end of the day it's going to be lower quality than SVCD and I don't think it's right to go backwards in quality having just purchased a DVD burner I can live with having the same quality, but not going backwards.

/Mats[/quote][/b]

[mats.hogberg]

12 hrs? What CPU are you on? I mainly use Mainconcept for my mpeg2 encodes (faster than TMPGEnc), and usually get around 30-40 frames/sec encoding AVI to DVD mpeg.

/Mats

[jimmalenko]

I'm also reluctant to go down to 352x576 because at the end of the day it's going to be lower quality than SVCD and I don't think it's right to go backwards in quality having just purchased a DVD burner I can live with having the same quality, but not going backwards.

Just a question (don't take this the wrong way, I'm simply asking so that I may better undestand you here):-

You've mentioned you're dealing with AVI files with horizontal res's of around 450-480 in rough terms, and that you normally have them in 2 parts - Now not to make any assumptions, but surely we're talking about downloaded AVIs here, aren't we ?

Call me a busybody and speaking out of turn but why go to the trouble of converting these to DVD-SVCDs when you could just buy the DVD and have the absolute best quality, since you're so concerned about going backwards having just purchased your new DVD burner ?

If these items are rare/not available on DVD, then fair enough, I stand corrected, but it just sounded really "bizarre" to me that you would go to this sort of trouble.

Just my 2c

[DRP]

12 hrs? What CPU are you on? I mainly use Mainconcept for my mpeg2 encodes (faster than TMPGEnc), and usually get around 30-40 frames/sec encoding AVI to DVD mpeg.

Celeron 2GHz with 512DDR RAM using W2K SP4.

But remember I said with a heavy load on the computer while doing the encoding. The computer is running at least 10 other applications simultaneously while the encoding is running. It will be burning discs, printing, scanning etc. all at the same time. Some applications can be big ones like AutoCAD too, so it is far from an ideal environment for peak encoding performance.

If I leave it overnight to do the encoding with minimal other applications running a 2 hour video will take approximately 3 hours to complete to SVCD, but that's not the usual way I do it.

[DRP]

I'm also reluctant to go down to 352x576 because at the end of the day it's going to be lower quality than SVCD and I don't think it's right to go backwards in quality having just purchased a DVD burner I can live with having the same quality, but not going backwards.

Just a question (don't take this the wrong way, I'm simply asking so that I may better undestand you here):-

You've mentioned you're dealing with AVI files with horizontal res's of around 450-480 in rough terms, and that you normally have them in 2 parts - Now not to make any assumptions, but surely we're talking about downloaded AVIs here, aren't we ?

Yes. Sorry I thought I had made that clear from the outset.

Call me a busybody and speaking out of turn but why go to the trouble of converting these to DVD-SVCDs when you could just buy the DVD and have the absolute best quality, since you're so concerned about going backwards having just purchased your new DVD burner ?

I don't buy DVDs because I consider them a waste of money. They really are for me. I don't watch movies twice and I consider the 'extras' on retail DVD movies a worthless waste of time. I also don't have a 5.1 sound system, so for me, forking out $30-odd for a movie on DVD which I will only watch once and then use to simply collect dust is a tragic waste of $30. I understand that this isn't considered "normal" consumer behaviour and that other people do watch movies multiple times and enjoy creating a collection of retail DVDs, but I'm just not one of those people.

Where I am even hired latest DVD releases are no cheaper than a cinema ticket on tight-arse Tuesday at the local mega-screen complex, so even that isn't a cheap option.

If these items are rare/not available on DVD, then fair enough, I stand corrected, but it just sounded really "bizarre" to me that you would go to this sort of trouble.

Well, I actually enjoy the challenge of figuring it out and getting it to work. The end result is not necessarily the ultimate enjoyment to be gained from the exercise. I like figuring out and being able to do something the majority or others can't do. If, in the end of doing so, I end up with something useful to me which I didn't have to pay for then all the better.

At the end of the day, for the way I watch and use videos with the equipment I have there really isn't a decent comparable option to downloaded AVI files. I know they aren't exactly the ultimate in quality, but they are more than good enough for my purposes. In fact, because my source quality is only borderline acceptable in many cases, there's even more reason for me to be so anal about the ultimate retention of as much quality as possible. My starting point is lower than it would be if I was using DVD as the source. I have less to throw away from the word go, so I have to be especially careful about what methods I use.

[jimmalenko]

Thanks for that, DRP, and thanks for answering it matter of factly, instead of flying off the handle like so many overprotective people would. Now I know where you're coming from

Back to the problem at hand, I think we've all been overcomplicating the issue. I think we've gotta treat this as two separate operations; the first is an AVI-> SVCD conversion, the second a SVCD -> patched DVD solution. I think we're getting caught up in trying to streamline the process a bit, without doing it the long way first.

How about you work your way through an AVI -> SVCD guide as if you were going to burn the SVCD, then this guide I linked to, and then we can assess where we can take shortcuts ?

[DRP]

How about you work your way through an AVI -> SVCD guide as if you were going to burn the SVCD, then this guide I linked to, and then we can assess where we can take shortcuts ?

Converting any AVI to an SVCD compliant MPEG file isn't a problem at all. I am very experienced at doing this and need no help in this regard at all. The DVD authoring bit is the drama, but having said that, I think I have now found the right tool to do it for me... this DVD-lab Pro program. It looks like the weapon of choice to me. It's just a case of me learning how to use it. I've found a beginner's guide for it now and will work my way through that.

Thanks very much for all the suggestions and help offered in this thread to date, no doubt I will have more questions in the next few days but hopefully they will only be specific questions about the use of DVD-lab Pro, but for now I think it is now up to me to have a bit of a play with this program and figure out what I'm doing.