My First DVD to VCD!

[Akai Rounin]

~*A Newbies' Tale*~

Firstly, I'd like to express deep thanks to Sefy, Truman, newgen and all other contributors to VCDHelp. Your latest guides made my first full-on backup of a DVD an absolute breeze! After going through the process from start to finish, it was amazingly easy to do. It would have been very hard to imagine this when I first began coming to this site a few months ago. Again, thank you very much!

I had been able to create VCDs before, but they were all either: a) captured from television or videotape; or b) sourced from downloads from the internet. I decided to try ripping a DVD once before, THe MaTRiX, using SmartRipper. I did it just to see if it would work, and it did, but I went no further and eventually deleted the VOBs from my PC. This time I decided to rip Shrek and cram it on a single disc following the tutorials I found here at VCDHelp.

I had at one time managed to get nearly two hours of video (1:55.18) on one videodisc. But the video quality was not up to snuff and the audio was rather crappy. On top of that, I forgot what settings I used to manage the feat and could never duplicate it. That is, until I read newgen's FAQ for getting a movie on one disc. Then I was reminded to choose the NONSTANDARD VCD option in TMPGEnc. So I was able to fit four episodes of Berserk anime (which had been captured from videotape) on one fully operational VCD. Cool. I knew I was ready to try ripping a DVD now.

I ripped the Shrek DVD (Disc 2, 1.78:1 Aspect Ratio) using SmartRipper. I chose a directory on the hard drive, left all the settings for Movie as is, clicked Start and had the VOBs on the hard drive shortly afterward. Easy as pie.

Then I loaded up DVD2AVI, chose the first VOB file and the rest were selected automatically. Excellent. I decided to do a test first, so I selected a range of the video. It was about 8 minutes long, from the moment Donkey encountered the Dragon until the escape from the Volcanic Castle. I exported both audio (WAV) and video (D2V), as I didn't want to work with an external audio program on this go around.

After the test D2V and WAV files were ready, I loaded an unlocked template into TMPGEnc and selected those files. Everything looked fine so far. I made sure to choose 16:9 NTSC for the aspect ratio. I selected a rather low bitrate of 800 CBR and encoded a test MPG file.

It took maybe ten minutes to complete, so I loaded it into Sasami2K to see the result. Imagine my complete surprise when I saw an absolutely pristine reproduction of the movie segment, complete with audio. Not only did this look good, it looked REALLY good.

I figured that it was time to do the whole disc now. I went back to DVD2AVI and selected the full length of the flick as the source range. Then I output all the audio and video.

I loaded those into TMPGEnc, making sure to adjust all relevant settings. In particular, I did a bit of calculation and determined I would be able to fit the entire movie, roughly 90 minutes running time, on one 80 minute CD-R if I encoded at 960 CBR. [NOTE: I usually choose multiples of 16 for CBR encoding. In this case 960 CBR is 16x60. I knew it would be tight, but I hoped for the best.]

After the full movie was encoded, I checked it once more in Sasami2K. Beautiful. I decided to also check it in Windows Media Player. Perfect. So it was time to burn the Shrek MPEG1 file (790,170 Kilobytes - 771 MB) as a VCD. First I tried NTI CD-Maker 2000 Plus, the program that came with the CD-Writer, but there was some type of error. I then loaded the file into VCDEasy, set the volume name, set up chapters at every six minutes, checked everything out once more, and burned the disc.

The disc finished burning, so I took it to a different computer to test its playback. That computer is much older (Pentium II 266 MHz, 160 MB RAM) and it had some trouble keeping up. There seemed to be an audio-synch problem. But I assumed this was just because I had fast forwarded the slide bar in Sasami2K. To make sure the VCD would really work I had one more test.

I recently purchased the Dreammovie VCD Player for the Sega Dreamcast. So I loaded that up in the Dreamcast, after hooking the console up to a VGA monitor. I threw in the VCD, when the directory menu came up, I selected the appropriate DAT file and... I was amazed.

The kid fishing from the clouds while perched on the Dreamworks logo was very clear. The entire opening title sequence played flawlessly. I watched the entire movie (including the ending credits) and there were absolutely no audio synch problems throughout. No skips, no jumps, no errors. I was happy about this, because some of my earlier VCDs did suffer from such problems. [NOTE: This I feel confirmed my suspicions. My audio synch problems had been due to dropped video frames during capture of other source files. So it is best to rip from DVD whenever possible. (~*DUH*~)]

When I had encoded the test file at 800 CBR, there had been some noticeable blocking in the rendering of the Dragon's flames at the castle. At 960 however, all was wonderful. In fact, for the whole course of the movie any artifacts could only be discerned through careful scrutiny. The only time they were more obviously visible was in moments of ~*EXTREME*~ high speed motion.

Overall, I must say I am greatly impressed by the result. Playing on the Dreamcast with a VGA monitor, I can tell that the video resolution has been halved. But you know what? I don't care. I am certain that most people would believe this VCD was the actual DVD when seen on a television set.

Once more, thanks a lot for your help, guys! I now feel a bit more literate in such matters. Hopefully I can also put this knowledge to use when making DivX movies for Dreamcast as well.

Unta Glebin Gloutin Globin,

Akai Rounin, The Cyber Sage

[pinoy2201]

Congratulations!!!!!!!!

[Sefy]

I'm glad to hear you found the guides and assistance of the Moderators helpful, and hopefully will be of help to you in the future if you need it

[VCD-Trading]

Dude, all that time and effort wasted on the Computer. Why are people trying to copy DVD to VCD using the computer?

Its such a waste of time and a pain in the ass to do it, especially when you have the Copy Protection to go around.

Just get a stand alone VCD recorder, It would have cost you less to get one of these then trying to do it on your computer.



-------------------------------
www.vcd-trading.com
Check it out and Start Trading Today!

[Sefy]

Because that thing costs like half a PC, and that's the only thing it can do, and as I have not spend money backing up what I want, that equipment is rather useless.

Not to mention it cannot do non-standard formats, you can't choose any of the settings, it's just does Standard and that's it.

[Akai Rounin]

Why oh Why...?

VCD-Trading: Hi! I've read your posts elsewhere on the forums here. I fully understand your point. From a strict consumer standpoint, the viewpoint of someone who wants to 'Burn-And-Go', a standalone VCD recorder is just perfect. You can quickly and easily get a convenient solution to recording video for archiving purposes without having to deal with the issue of a) degrading VHS tape; or b) complications of a PC. I don't think anyone here denies the viability of those arguments - for the intended audience. I think the mission of VCDHelp.com is different, and hence is aimed toward a completely different audience.

I really like cars, I am a big fan of the technology behind them. Primarily though, I prefer to spend my time driving them. I don't want to spend time under the hood or beneath the car cranking wrenches. Why do that when I could be tearing up PCH in Malibu? To me, cranking wrenches in a car is a complete waste of time. To others, it is the greatest thing on Earth.

I really like computers, I am a big fan of the technology behind them. However, I am not opposed to taking a more hands-on approach with computers. I like knowing how to build a computer from scratch. I like being able to tune a computer to meet my needs. I like tracking down solutions to complex problems and solving those issues with software. To me, this is a wonderful experience, even with the inherent frustrations I might face during the process. For others, this would be a complete waste of time.

I am sure the standalone VCD players do a decent job. I have an strong suspicion that by following the instructions found at VCDHelp.com, I can get an even better result. So there - now you know why I 'waste my time' with the computer, and why I am so happy this site is on the internet. Once again, thanks guys!

Clatu Verata Nicto,

Akai Rounin, The Cyber Sage

P.S. Why else would I be named after a Giant Robot...?

[poopyhead]

unless your dvd player has some serious compatbility problems, standard VCD 2.0 is way outdated, inferior quality

[Akai Rounin]

Watchoo Talkin Bout...?

poopyhead: Uhm, was that meant for VCD-Trading or me? 8) Anyway, I'm still a newbie, on the learning curve as it were... So I'm starting with VCDs and I'll try to perfect that. Besides, I think the Dreamcast only plays VCD 2.0 anyway. Strange that Dreammovie detects PBC on my discs, but won't switch chapters, except to change to a completely different file.

I tried my VCDs out on my Aunt's DVD player, a Panasonic, and they all played famously, chapters and all! The ancient POS Samsung at home won't play ~*anything*~ from CDR without potential for bloodletting, according to the database here. I'm thinking of picking up a couple of cheap APEX boxes, one for me, one for my Mom. Mother's day coming up, donchaknow!

Maybe sometime next month I'll post my success with "My First DVD to SVCD!" Until then, I'm quite happy. Besides, each time I have tried to make a variable bit rate MPEG file, the result took forever to process and looked like it was smeared in Jell-O or Vaseline when done (yep, worse than WMV or RM). I'll stick to CBR for now.

My next VCD? Probably another for the kids and Dreamcast, Cats & Dogs. Then I'll move on to THe MaTRiX, UnbrEAkAblE and the ever-popular GLADIATOR. Have fun, all!

HUN-YA!

Akai Rounin

"Angels forced from heaven have to become demons, and God Himself will weep at the carnage." - Cowboy BeBop, I think...