AGAIN: Mpeg1 x Mpeg2 (war topic 2.4543234E+243)

[afreitas]

Ive a newbie to all this and Im still the in the "make and try".

After reading, reading and reading the forums from VCDhelp I decided to capture using 352x480 from my camcorder (NTSC) in Huffyuv. I would like to archieve the videos in CD (VCD/SVCD). Every body says Mpeg2 is better over Mpeg1 but Ive not been able to see it in my tests. My DVD player only plays till 2500kbps (Mpeg1 or Mpeg2). So I tried 352x240@2500kbps-Mpeg1 using a deinterlace filter (Even-Odd field) and it looks really great. So I tried 480x480@2500kbps-Mpeg2 and It looks bad. I also tried 352x480@2500kpbs-Mpeg2 and it still was not so good as 352x240@2500kpbs-Mpeg1. Last I tried 352x240@2500kpbs-Mpeg2 and only now I got the quality I want. But with 352x240-Mpeg2 I would loose the interlace from the original movie.

So, in this situation shouldnt I stay with 352x240@2500kbps-Mpeg1?? At this settings, what Mpeg2 could do better than Mpeg1??? Or... What am I doing wrong?

Thanks in advance.

[adam]

At the same settings mpeg1 and mpeg2 are identical in quality. Mpeg2 does have some benefits over mpeg1 such as...

support for interlacing, support for dual audio tracks, and support for multiple soft encoded subtitles.

Since you apparantly cannot achieve the level of quality you want at full frame resolution, none of these apply to you.

Svcd also has some additonal benefits over vcd such as...

Native support for vbr encoding and higher resolutions and bitrates.

Since the only thing limiting your bitrate is your dvd player, regardless of what format you use, and since you cannot use higher resolutions, again none of these apply to you.

For your purposes mpeg1 is probably best. You should do some further experimenting however. Is it possible for you to capture at 480x480 or even higher? If so then you may be able to do an inverse telecine if the origin of your material is film (originated at 24fps and undwent telecining process.) This will give you progressive footage and will also save you
%20 more bitrate. Bitrate is obviously your limiting factor here. Regardless of whether you use mpeg1 or mpeg2 you should look into inverse telecining your video. This can drastically improve the quality of your encodes. This extra bitrate may be enough to warrant using a higher resolution such as 352x480, in which case you may decide to use mpeg2 for compatibility reasons...mpeg2 @352x480 complies with the CVD standard which is backward compatible with the svcd standard and which is also dvd compliant should you ever choose to backup your encodes on dvd in the future.

[bbb]

Doesn't encoding into mpeg2 at vcd or cvcd resolution provide for compatibility with DVDRs?

That way, in the future, you can merge your vcds and cvcds into 1 file per movie on DVDRs, preventing quality loss from reencoding.

[afreitas]

For your purposes mpeg1 is probably best. You should do some further experimenting however. Is it possible for you to capture at 480x480 or even higher? If so then you may be able to do an inverse telecine if the origin of your material is film (originated at 24fps and undwent telecining process.) This will give you progressive footage and will also save you
%20 more bitrate. Bitrate is obviously your limiting factor here. Regardless of whether you use mpeg1 or mpeg2 you should look into inverse telecining your video. This can drastically improve the quality of your encodes. This extra bitrate may be enough to warrant using a higher resolution such as 352x480, in which case you may decide to use mpeg2 for compatibility reasons...mpeg2 @352x480 complies with the CVD standard which is backward compatible with the svcd standard and which is also dvd compliant should you ever choose to backup your encodes on dvd in the future.

Adam, your suggestions are really good. My source video is from a camcorder.

I was reading the topic about Mpeg2 ready for DVD and I think I must try every setting to be able to archieve my videos in that resolution and format.

And Yes, I can capture at any resolution till 720x480. Ive never thought about inverse telecining my videos... Thats really a good suggestion because the extra bitrate. I will try it too.

The war about mpeg1 x mpeg2 is still up