Join or reauthor?

[Lucifers_Ghost]

I have a procedural question, for lack of a better term.

I have a bunch of files that I have recorded from Dv tapes. They are in AVI format as that seemed to be the easiest to capture to.

I have 3 files that I want to put on the same dvd. 2 of the files are from two different tapes but I want to join them into one file, then add the 3rd file as a separate track on the dvd giving me a total of 2 tracks.

So, what is the more effective procedure? Should I:

a) join the two avi files first using vdubmod, then convert to mpeg and burn
or
b) convert the 3 files to mpeg, reauthor the first two into one track, then burn. As well, with this option, any suggestions on which program to reauthor with? I would probably try to use dvd shrink off the top of my head.

I have seen guides going both ways but am unsure as to which way is more viable.

Any input would be appreciated.

Thank you.

LG

[guns1inger]

You can't use DVD Shrink to author from raw mpeg. You can use it to re-arrange or recompress an existing DVD structure.

I would use avisynth (although virtualdub will do) to join and frame serve the results to an encoder to get a single mpeg-2 video file. I would also save the combined audio file out as a single wav file and use ffmpeggui to create an AC3 file.

As for authoring, TDA is simple and gives you 30 days free. Your only free authoring system is DVD Author and one of the associated GUIs.