Baldrick- question on DivxtoDVD

[jyeh74]

Baldrick, no one seems to understand what bitrate DivxtoDVD uses.

I tried two programs. The one you referred - DivxtoDVD and TMPGEnc

TMPGEnc - I used the bitrate calculator. For a 5 min music video it says to use 9603....TMPEGnc only lets me set up to 9200 - that is too much no? But the calculator says to use 9603!
The output using a 9200 bitrate on a 5 min mpg (50 mb) comes out to a ridiculous 377 mb in TPMGEnc!!!

DivxtoDVD - I did the same thing with the same file above. It only outputted at 122mb from the same 5 min mpg (50 mb) My question is how do you tell what bitrate it used? What is too low without sacrificing quality? Is it set on default?

I just want to be able to cram as much music videos (after conversion to dvd compliant) on a dvd-r without losing quality. Its already pretty low at 340 X 240 or something resolution. No one seems to be able to answer my question.....they kinda say guess or use the calculator - which is giving me weird conversions (9200??!?!)

[jyeh74]

http://www.vso-software.fr/download.htm#

Also, above is the lni kto download. There are two versions- a verison 2 and an older version. Whats the difference?

[jimmalenko]

http://www.vso-software.fr/download.htm#

Also, above is the lni kto download. There are two versions- a verison 2 and an older version. Whats the difference?

One is a payware version, and the other is a freeware version.


I for one am shaking my head at your explosion of postings in the last few days. I understand that you don't understand much of this yet and it's all new to you, but much can be said for reading. Pick a guide, follow it, and ask questions when you get stuck. We're certainly not going to be able to teach you all of the theory in a couple of easy lessons. A lot of this video craft is learnt by reading and experimentation on your part. You've started or hijacked at least 10 threads in the past couple of days, and from what I can gather you've also PM-ed at least 6 different people, and so you've got probably at least 6 different responses plus all of the forum content which won't be helping your confused state. You really need to get each stage of the process down-pat before progressing on to the next stage, instead of trying to comprehend the whole shebang in one go and getting lost.

I've already linked you to my guide http://members.dodo.net.au/~jimmalenko/AVI2DVD.htm which gives an explanation of bitrates and frame sizes, and how they both fit into the bigger picture. It also gives you examples of exactly what bitrates and rate control methods to use. The secret to knowing exactly what bitrate will be sufficient for what job really requires you to experiment.

If you don't want to have to think about this, use divxtoDVD. Let it do all the work and calculations for you. You can add one file at a time, or you can add multiple files. Multiple files means that each file you add is a different VTS. That is fine. When you have converted all the files (or enough to fill a disc), use something like TMPGEnc DVD Author to import the VIDEO_TS folders. You can make each one it's own title, or you can add multiple clips to the one track for a chapter-based setup.

[abc-123]

I completely agree with everything jim said. If you want to know how to make dvd's you actually have to go through the process of learning. You can't keep asking the teacher to tell you the answer and ignore the textbooks you've been given. It's annoying.


That said, there is a flaw in your method. Biterate calculator is telling you to use 9603 so that this 5 minute video fills up the whole disk. You obviously don't want to do that and wish to put several clips onto it. In this, you have 2 choices:

For best quality, use tmpgenc and select Constant Quality (CQ). Set the quality level at 100% with max biterate at 9000 and min at 0. Set both picture spoilage numbers to 0. This is the best quality picture you're going to get without wasting bites. Put as many clips as will fit onto your dvd.

For filesize, or to fit a specified number of clips onto one dvd, you must first add up all the runtimes of the clips and then input the total time into the biterate calculator for it to give you the right rate to encode at.


P.S. @jim: I'm impressed at your restraint.

[jtoolman2000]

Like I said here and via PM, JUST DO IT and you'll be done with it. Divide 2 hours into 5min and you will the max # of these videos you should fit. By my math , it is 24. Whether you can cram 25 of 30 clips is of no consequense. The Paid version of DivxtoDVD supposedly will show you what the bit rate as you add or subtract videos. The Bit rate calculator will give a max bit rate beacause it wants to take your smalling file and fit it to a full DVD. It's a miracle it doesn't suggest 100,000 bitrate for a one min file to a DVD. If I was doing this, I would cram the 20 - 30 or even 50 clips into DvixtoDVD and click convert. I could really care less about what bitrate it has chosen to use. If my results suck than I do it again, this time with less files. Eventually the DVD results will match your originals be they great, so so or bad.

DvixtoDVD is not doing that. It defaults at some mid way basic bitrate from the get go. That is why the projected sizes differ so much between TMPgenc and Dvixtodvd. Since it is free I guess they fell you don't need to know what it actually is.

I apologize for seemingly loosing my temper. Like I told you in private just do it, and you'll happier.
Stop agonizing over this. It really isn't very productive and besides , it will simply continue to annoy you.

[jyeh74]

yeah ok I just give it a shot. DivxtoDVD seems pretty easy except that TDA wont take it as a "add DVD Video" for some reason. Red X error sign. I guess I have to somehow fix it?

[jimmalenko]

yeah ok I just give it a shot. DivxtoDVD seems pretty easy except that TDA wont take it as a "add DVD Video" for some reason. Red X error sign. I guess I have to somehow fix it?

Didn't we deal with this in another thread ?

https://www.videohelp.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=1389143#1389143
https://www.videohelp.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=1389610#1389610

[abc-123]

Why don't you just find someone who knows how to make dvd's and pay them to do it for you?

[junkmalle]

I just want to be able to cram as much music videos (after conversion to dvd compliant) on a dvd-r without losing quality. Its already pretty low at 340 X 240 or something resolution. No one seems to be able to answer my question.....they kinda say guess or use the calculator - which is giving me weird conversions (9200??!?!)

I agree with abc-123. Since you're putting several short video's on a DVD and don't care about the exact running time, stop worrying about bitrate and use TMPGEnc's Constant Quality encoding. But a quality setting of 100 is probably too high. Try a few encodes at different quality settings and see what you can live with. The difference in visual quality between 90 and 100 is almost nil, but the file size difference will be substantial. At 80 you can see a little degredation if you look at enlarged still frames but you won't notice at normal viewing speeds.

By the way, there is no way anyone can tell you what bitrate to use to get an optimal balance of file size and visual quality. It varies with every video. There can be a several fold difference between a dark, low detail, low motion video and a bright, high action, high detail video. And then there's the subjective variation on top of that. What you find acceptable may be different that what anyone else finds acceptable.

Bitrate calculators are designed to tell you what bitrate to use to fit a certain amount of running time on a DVD. They tell you nothing about the quality of the result.