Hi guys

I was previously using Flask and the Panasonic MPEG encoder for DVD to VCD conversions, and TMPGEnc for DIVX -> VCD encoding.
While I loved the quality of both encoders, I could not help notice, like I am sure many of you, that Panasonic is very slow. Would be nice if we could use TMPGEnc instead rite?

It so happens that we can. Here s how (those of you familiar with all this, forgive me for repeating trivial stuff).

Install Avisynth (avisynth.dll goes into windows\system directory) and its premiere frameserver plugin into the Flask directory (rename the plugin to whatever.flask to declare it). A new output option appears on Flask : avisynth frameserver.

Take the name of the output of the frameserver (IPCSource("videoout0")for instance) and write it into a little text file that you call Video.avs (handler file).
Go into TMPGEnc environment settings, disable the directshow filters, then open Video.avs like you would a normal AVI file. Load whatever template you want and encode away: works like a charm!

The result? DVD to VCD rips that are about 2.5 to 3 times faster than through Panasonic encoder, with beautiful quality too.

Feeling bolder, I ve even gone further:

Flask frameserve to VirtualDub
Use VirtualDub to resize the video, add subtitles at the bottom of the letterbox (rather than on top of the movie - more readable that way)
VirtualDub frameserve to TMPGEnc
TMPGEnc encode to MPEG

Sounds complicated, but this sets up in a couple of minutes at the very most once you re used to it.

Speed remains more or less the same: with my Pentium IV 1.7 ghz, this methods brings me very close to real time 1:1 VCD encoding. Am very pleased with the overall results (finally lets me apply subtitles the way I want to or edit them before applying them for instance), and speed-wise I see a very big gain.

Just thought I d share this with you guys.

For those of you who want to see more detailed instructions (not for the double frameserve though), have a look at Nicky's guides

http://nickyguides.digital-digest.com/index.htm

They are very well done, and a lot of the stuff I tried out comes from there.

Cheers