How to get the most minutes on a DVD?

[zythe84]

My question is simple. What is the maximum number of minutes a DVD can hold and still have good quality? When using Click to DVD, it has three modes of quality (High, 60m; Standard, 90min; and Long Play, 120min). I have also read that a DVD can hold 2 hours of very good quality footage, but when I burned videos in Long Play mode, they didn't look good on the TV. High is the mode I would prefer to use, but it seems odd to me that you can only get an hour of footage. I just want quality that is greater or equal to the original footage that was captured on a Sony Handycam (DCR-TRV103).

Can anyone tell me what I can do to fit about 2 hours of video onto a DVD and still have acceptable quality?

Thanks,

JohnBen

[cyflyer]

normally its high-60, standard-120, long play 240 . Your figures are somewhat unusual.

I just want quality that is greater

Don't expect greater, expect at least as good, as the original source. You can't get better than what you put in.

personally I have found that:
240 mins is really crap quality, only useful for a tv show with lots of episodes that you'll sporadically watch, definately worse than the source,

120 mins is about equal to the quality of most vhs movies that I have and use this time for movies. This is also a more practical time for most movies, as you don't want 240 mins crap quality for a 2 hour movie, and you definately don't want to split all your vhs movies to 2 dvd's by using high mode. This is a waste of time and resource.

60 mins is good for your home movies/camcorder. Best possible quality for your treasured memories, rarely more than an hour-ish.

[edDV]

...

I just want quality that is greater or equal to the original footage that was captured on a Sony Handycam (DCR-TRV103).

Can anyone tell me what I can do to fit about 2 hours of video onto a DVD and still have acceptable quality?

Thanks,

JohnBen

My experience with DV camcorder material draws the line around 7000 Kb/s CBR or VBR + 224Kb/s for audio or 85 min.

For high quality 3CCD DV material I like 8500Kb/s CBR for 70 min.

For 2 hr stationary talking heads (little motion) 4853 Kb/s VBR is possible but it won't look good for anything shot hand held. This will depend on personal taste.

Use the calculator
https://www.videohelp.com/calc

[guns1inger]

You have several questions there.

They basically all come down to the same answers though

1. High quality source
2. High quality mpeg2 encoder
3. Bitrate

Bitrate determines space usage. A DVD has finite space, therefore bitrate also determines running time. The higher the bitrate, the more space is required, therefore the less running time can fit on a disc.

However, bitrate comes in two flavours. There is Constant BitRate (CBR), and Variable Bitrate (VBR). CBR is easy. The same bitrate is applied throughout the movie, regardless of what bitrate is required by the images at any given point.

VBR is more complex. It essentially means that bitrate is apportioned based on the requirements of the image. Scenes with little to no motion get less bitrate than secenes with high motion or great change (a fade to black or cross fade can require a high bitrate). How the bitrate is calculated can also vary, leading to different labels for VBR methods.

Constant Quality (CQ) is a single-pass VBR method that uses a quality scale to determine how bitrate is allocated. Although it can give you a higher quality image, you have not control over the bitrate allocation, and therefore no control of the space requirement.

Single-pass VBR is similar to CQ, however you place constraints (average/min/max) bitrate numbers to try to shape the distribution of bitrate. As this is a single pass method, with dubious prediction of need, the actual accruracy of the distribution is usually low, and again, total size unpredictable.

Two-pass (or more, with some encoders) VBR is a method whereby an analysis of the data is done before bitrate is allocated. This is the first-pass. The second (and subsequent passes, is applicable), refine the allocation to ensure the best distribution as well as accurate prdection of file size.

And herein lies the problem with quality and real-time encoders (such as capture devices and DVD recorders) - they can only capture is either CBR, or single pass VBR. This means you can set a length (running time) and encode to a bitrate that will meet this (with quality diminishing over time), or try to use a variable bitrate without true prediction, again leading to lowering quality. The best option in these cases is to capture at the highest available bitrate to your HDD (PC or DVDR HDD), then re-encode using a better method when transfering to blank disc.

You also need the best possible source material when working with lonegr encodes. Commercial DVDs start with source of a quality you or I can only dream of (if they don't, they end up in the $1 bin). DV is not in the same league.

That is not to say you cannot do it. However you also need the third component, a good encoder. Not all DVD recorders have good encoders built in, and a lot of software has very poor encoding abilities. Certainly, ant software that uses a stupid scale like High, Good and Low instead of actual bitrates is to be looked at with dubious eyes.

If you want any hope of getting 2 hours of home movies to a disc, start by transfering your DV as DV to your PC. Use a good encoder to do a 2-pass VBR encode, perhaps having edited and filtered your source before hand. Make sure you use a bitrate calculator to get the numbers for your encoder.

[zythe84]

Thanks for all your help!

[zythe84]

Can anyone recommend a better program that I can use to get 120min at Standard quality that cyflyer mentioned? Are there any that are free or relatively cheap?

[AlanHK]

If your burner is able to, you might use double-layer DVDs; i.e. 8.5 GB. The blanks however are currently several times more expensive than single layer

Otherwise, you have to try different encoding rates. I've been using HCenc recently, you can choose a filesize and it will set the encoding rate; or vice-versa. Then you could make a short clip and encode it at different rates and burn them (to a DVDRW preferably) and see what you get. There are also a bunch of other settings that may affect quality, but the defaults are okay. You can save some space for video by encoding audio at a lower rate; if it's just voice you can really cut it down with little perceived loss of quality; again, try it and test.

[zythe84]

I have 2hours 7 minutes 43 secs of footage that I would like to fit onto a 4.7GB DVD with quality equal to the Hi8 tapes from which they came.

I used the calculator and set the audio bitrate at 192kbps (I think this is a basic standard) and it then told me that the appropriate video bitrate is 4579kbps with a DVD Max Bitrate of 9603kbps. I am not yet familiar enough with bitrates and such to determine if this quality will be adequate. Is there a standard video bitrate that I can compare it to? I know that the max DVD combined bitrate is 10080kbps, but will there be a visible difference with mine being only 9603?

Thanks.

[cyflyer]

Sorry zythe84, I thought you were talking about a dvdrecorder as opposed to a computer.

[AlanHK]

appropriate video bitrate is 4579kbps with a DVD Max Bitrate of 9603kbps. I am not yet familiar enough with bitrates and such to determine if this quality will be adequate. Is there a standard video bitrate that I can compare it to? I know that the max DVD combined bitrate is 10080kbps, but will there be a visible difference with mine being only 9603?

Just burn one, to a DVDRW if you have one, and see. You can just do a few minutes at theat setting, enough to tell. It'll rather depend on your screen/monitor.

Basically, any DVD that fills up the disk that runs the same time will have the same bitrate.

[edDV]

I have 2hours 7 minutes 43 secs of footage that I would like to fit onto a 4.7GB DVD with quality equal to the Hi8 tapes from which they came.

I used the calculator and set the audio bitrate at 192kbps (I think this is a basic standard) and it then told me that the appropriate video bitrate is 4579kbps with a DVD Max Bitrate of 9603kbps. I am not yet familiar enough with bitrates and such to determine if this quality will be adequate. Is there a standard video bitrate that I can compare it to? I know that the max DVD combined bitrate is 10080kbps, but will there be a visible difference with mine being only 9603?

Thanks.

Are these hand held camcorder tapes or a dub from TV or a movie? If they are hand held camcorder tapes, you cannot get close to equal Hi8 quality at 720x480 4579 Kbps.

MPeg compression requires compressing over frames by estimating motion and encoding only motion changes over intermediate frames. Shaky handheld video including pans and zooms make interframe compression less successful. The encoder must turn to compressing each I frame more and quality deteriorates rapidly as you reduce bitrate.

Pros get high compression by shooting from a tripod, using proper lighting and limiting pans and zooms. Proper exposure minimizes noise that also affects compression quality. You just can't get close to either the compression rates or quality of a commercial movie.

My advice is split the material over two single layer DVDs at bit rates>7000 Kbps and up audio to 224 Kbps. Or if it has to be on a single DVD use dual layer DVD-9 8GB media. The calculator shows 2hr at 9030 Kb/s and 224 Kb/s sound.

[lordsmurf]

The content determines the bitrate needs. For a DV shot video, I'd put no more than 1 hour per disc. That's about 7000k 2-pass VBR interlaced MPEG-2 with 256k AC3 audio.

[Nelson37]

"Adequate Quality" is totally subjective and is based on the viewers opinion, nothing more.

Can you tell me the "adequate" amount of ketchup to put on one order of fries? Other than somewhere less than a quart and more than one drop, this is a JUDGEMENT CALL, isn't it?

Try some, look at the results, and decide for yourself. A starting point would be the maximum rate to make all the selected video fit on one disk. If you think that is good enough, all done. If you do not like the results, then either cut some video, use a DL disk, or use two disks. There is no other answer.

Or, if you just want someone to make your decisions for you, then use one tablespoon of ketchup per order of fries, no more, no less, that is the perfect amount, never vary from this.