sony vegas 6.0 how the ####?

[slippers]

I have searched the forum here but could not find an answer to my problem (I am a noob at this).

I have a sony camcorder widescreen jobby mini dv. I have tried to put the content of a tape onto dvd but am having a few problems. I captured an avi but 6 mins takes up 1.4Gb space.

Searching the web it seems I need to save to the dvd as mpeg2 not avi?!?! I would like to be able to save on dvd and play on a dvd player if possible?

I noticed in Vegas if I go to File>Properties I can select a format to capture as...



Is this what I need to change to be able to do what I want? How do films do it, gettng a 2 hour film on a dvd when I only get 20 mins of home video?!?!

Thanks for any help folks

[aliali]

When recording from a cam corder or from a tv card, it will make a very large mpeg2 file. If you have an option on the cam corder to save the file as avi - do that then convert the avi to dvd with various software on this site IE convertx2dvd.

[sdmoore72]

slippers,

Leave your project properties as you had them (i.e. PAL DV Widescreen).
Captured DV AVI files from your camcorder will be large (about 3.6MB per second of video)
In order for the captured file to be put onto DVD it must be converted to MPG2 format. Fortunately, Vegas can do that for you.
In order to generate MPG2 files for DVD go to File->Render As...
On the "Save as type" dropdown select "MainConcept MPEG-2 (*.mpg)". In the Template drop down select "DVD PAL" then click Custom button then Video tab then select "16:9" in the "Aspect Ratio" drop down. Then OK back to "Render As" dialog. Enter a mpg filename in "File name" and hit "Save".
Once the mpg file has rendered you should be able to use any DVD authoring software (e.g. Sony's DVD Architect) to add your mpg file and then generate & burn a DVD

Hope that helps!

[edit: you asked at the end about how do you fit 2 hour films on DVD ... on the Video tab in the Custom menu .. you should see stuff at the bottom to do with bit rates. This is how you can squeeze more footage onto a DVD - you can get smaller filesizes by reducing the bitrate but that will impact the quality. Don't forget that most DVD films in the shops are dual layer so have twice the disc space as your standard DVD-R ... although you can get dual-layer DVD-Rs now so, if you have a dual-layer burner, you too can create a 2 hour masterpiece with a decent bitrate and fit it on a disc ]

[Richard_G]

Hmm, back to basics here I think. You are missing out on a few steps here, namely editing, encoding and authoring.

At least you are transferring in the correct format. You transfer over Firewire as a DV specification avi file. This is a direct file transfer of the digital data that is on your camcorder tape to your hard drive. This is around 13-14GB per hour of footage. DV is perfect for editing but is not normally regarded as a 'final product' format unless you are transferring your edited version back to camcorder tape (which is the most reliable storage media there is) or want to keep in the best possible quality. Do your editing on the DV file and, once you are happy with the result, you can then encode it to mpeg.

Mpeg2 is the standard for DVD but it is a compressed format. Basically, it keeps a full frame every 12 (an I frame) and in between these frames it sends a command that says, "the same as the last frame except for this bit, this bit, and this bit". This is a bit of an oversimplification, but a simple way of explaining it. This is why an mpeg file is a) much smaller, and b) not so good for editing. However, for a final product, it is fine. I'm not familiar with Vegas, but once you have finished your editing, you then need to either save as, or create file, or whatever command Veas uses. This will give you a choice of how you want it saving. For DVD you want 720 x 576 (the same as DV as they are made to go together) resolution and then pick a bitrate. DVD maximum bitrate is around 9800kbs (kilo bits per second) but you can go down to 8000 kbs without any noticable ill effects.

Your hour of DV which was around 13GB has suddenly become an hour of mpeg2 at around 4GB. This WILL fit on a DVD disc, but your player won't be able to play it. For a standalone DVD player to recognise it as a DVD, the mpeg2 file needs to be authored. Authoring can add menus and chapter points and then, from your mpeg file, creates a set of .vob, .ifo and .bup files (See What is DVD at the top left of this page) that can be read by a DVD player. I don't know if Vegas 6.0 includes an authoring module, some of the higher end editors do. You'll have to wait for a Vegas user to come along and answer that.

There are a number of authoring tools around, some good, some bad, some easy to use, others not so and, as with everything, they range in price from free to very expensive. I have a feeling Sony bundles a basic authoring tool with Vegas, but can't be sure. Again, hopefully someone will be able to help.

But, that should answer your question and give you some pointers to get you started on creating your own DVDs.

Edited to add, see, I knew a Vegas user would come along, he just didn't type as much as me and beat me to it!

[slippers]

wow guys, many thanks for the replies here it seems that I have definately stumbled upon the correct forum!!

I also have Sony Architect but didn`t know what it was for haha. I read on many sites that it was easy to pick up for a beginner but I looked at it and went wooooh! I even consider myself to be a proficient IT user, I am a computer programmer

I will give it another go tonight, best free up some space on my HDD, to many mp3's