Short Clips From DVDs

[mercator1]

I know this has probably been discussed here before, so please excuse a newbie's question. I've used the search function, but the amount of info is kind of overwhelming.

Someone shot a DV of our band, and gave us a DVD of it. It's just one long VOB file. I'd like to cut out a couple of 30 second clips to put on our website. I assume I need to convert it to an AVI first, and then trim out the clips.

Can someone tell me exactly what I need to do, and what software (hopefully freeware) will accomplish it?

Thanks.
Robert

[Soopafresh]

Use Mpeg2Cut2 to Cut the bits that you want to save

Use MpegStreamClip to convert the bits you've saved to AVI or Quicktime or MP4

Install Quicktime ALTERNATIVE so Mpegstreamclip will work properly

[redwudz]

If your final format is AVI, as in Divx, Xvid, DV or similar, you can drop the VOB into VirtualDub Mod and cut out what you want, then encode it to AVI. You may need the AC3 ACM Decompressor if the audio is AC3. If you want to encode it to DV, you will need a DV codec, such as the Pioneer DV Codec. Same with Divx or Xvid.

Or you can use VOB2MPG to convert the VOB to MPEG-2 format and use a MPEG editor to take out what you want. There are a lot of other methods also. Just look in 'EDIT' to the left for guides. <<<<<<

BTW, welcome to the forums.

And this post is more suited to the Editing, cutting and joining forum. Moving you.

[mercator1]

Thanks for the help. I installed VirtualDubMod, and can view my VOB, as well as capture still. However, when I click on "capture AVI" it tells me that no capture driver is available. Any idea what that means? Maybe I'm just not going about it right.

What I want is a clip viewable on the net, should that be AVI, mpeg, what?

[redwudz]

'Capture AVI' is for getting video from a capture card. Probably not what you want. If you wanted to save (Encode) it in a different format, those are under 'Compression'. You would select 'Full Processing' and a codec to use. You can install Xvid or other AVI codecs to use.

If you are planning to put it on the web, then you might want to use WMV or MPEG-1 format, neither are AVI. I just mention those two as they are universal to many computers and don't need extra codecs installed to play on many machines.

Here's one discussion of what others use for the web:
https://forum.videohelp.com/viewtopic.php?p=1494778#1494778

I'm afraid you may have a bit of studying ahead. There's a fair amount to learn.

Let's say you want to use MPEG-1. Then VOB2MPG is still good for extracting the MPEG-2. But you next could use a MPEG editor, like what Soopafresh suggested. Or I have used the freeware Cuttermaran. This can cut out your clips.

Then you would re-encode them to MPEG-1 format. A lot of ways to do that. Mainly you need a MPEG encoder. You might start out with TMPGEnc encoder. It's fairly easy to use. For WMV, then maybe Windows Movie Maker, though I don't use it and don't know much about it. Some of the freeware converters might be a better place to start, such as SUPER. It's easy to use and has enough options for simple conversions.

Dig into it and read a little more. It will get easier.