VOB files into svcd

[ima2hd]

Dear Sirs or Madam: I'm pretty ignorant with this whole thing! I started about a week ago and I'm closer to getting there but yet but more confused. I use Smartripper to put my dvd onto my hardrive that seems to be very simple. ( however if the disc is letterbox and pan & scan with a dual layer dvd it always records it in pan & scan? i.e. latest release of Mad Max redone beautifully from cinemascope) . I got Windvd to play back svcd & i have Nero with the mpeg2 plug in. I can drag and drop my vob files to nero and let it re-encode for me, however it sais there is no audio, but there is audio on there when i play it back from my harddrive. I have burned a short svcd with no sound using this method and when i played it back using windvd i was quite please with the results. I have tried using TMPGEnc-2.58, however when I go to browse for video and try to place my vob file in there it won't let me and as for the audio well i'm lost on that one??Also since each vob file is like a chapter when i play it back and put each vob file together there is a slight pause in between each one of the vob files. Will this be apparant if I ever do make a svcd? I don't mind using more to play back a 2 hr movie since 80min cdr's are so cheap and i want to maintian the highest quality. Any help wold be greatly appreciated. I have really enjoyed reading this forum aswell. Cheers, Will

[KingJohn]

The original sound track is probably Dolby surround sound 5.1, which sounds like your having problems with. Don’t know if the AC3 codec that Nimo codec pack provides will help.

When you hit the browse in TMPGEnc, select (*.*) from the bottom of the list, then you can load the VOB files, however since the files are split, you may need to join the mpeg 2 later with Merge&Cut. Normally the conversion is done by loading the ifo file, which specifies the parts of each movie

In TMPGEnc, you can specify different output aspect ratio, using full screen > keep aspect ratio or experimenting with the clip frame, and different source types 16:9 1:1 etc

You may find that using DvdX is much easier to use, but stick with Smartripper to rip, and DvdX to convert.

[wulf109]

Tmpeg can onlyopen one file,it cannot open a series of files. I would suggest you encode in Tmpeg,not Nero. Nero is an excellent burning program,bit not very good at encoding. The following method is what I use for DVD to SVCD conversion.

Rip the DVD as one large file.Most rippers have this option. Smartripper 2.41 has it.
Rip in stream mode and select only the video stream and the primary audio stream,this
will keep the file to the smallest size.The primary audio stream will normally be the
6-channel ac3 stream,but some movies also have a 2-channel ac3 stream also. Just be sure
that it's a soundtrack,many movies use the 2-channel stream for Director's comments.
Using the 2-channel stream will trim another 200Mb's from the final file size.
Now you want to determine if the vob file can be encoded directly by Tmpeg or needs to be
remuxed into an mpg file. To do this start Tmpeg and go into Wizard mode.
Load the vob file into the wizard and click next until you come to the screen that tells you the length of the
file in time. If it reports the length as the actual known running time of the movie you
can open and encode the vob itself in Tmpeg. If it reports a shorter time then you need to
remux the vob into an mpg. Most movies will require remuxing but many will not.
To remux the vob open Tmpeg and start Mpeg Tools. It will open in simple remux mode,stay in that
mode. Click the browse button in the video input line and select your vob file. Tmpeg will load the
vob into the video and audio input boxes,it will also load an mpg file in the output box.
Click Run and Tmpeg will create an mpg from the vob. This mpg can be opened and encoded in Tmpeg
and it will preserve the video and audio quality of the vob file.
Load whatever template you prefer and encode the movie. It does require addition hard disk space
with this method but it is only temporary. The remuxing time will be longer than frame serving.
The benefits however are resolution,color saturation,and contrast very close to the original
DVD. The improvement in color saturation and contrast is worth the extra effort. 480x480 and even
720x480 can be used and 720x480 will produce a visible improvement in resolution. 2-pass VBR is slow
but is very effective at getting rid of macroblocking and other motion artifacts at the lower bitrate
most users will need to fit a two hour movie on two or three CDR's.
Other benefits include natural,fluid movement when for example people walk thru a scene or the camera pans.
You will see no stuttering or stumbling.

[adam]

Sorry wulf I know you think I am just out to get you but I just can't stand to see people being mislead, over and over again. You need to STOP giving advice because you are flat out wrong.

"The benefits however are resolution,color saturation,and contrast very close to the original DVD. The improvement in color saturation and contrast is worth the extra effort. 480x480 and even 720x480 can be used and 720x480 will produce a visible improvement in resolution."

Everything in this paragraph is completely false. Frameserving has no effect on resolution, color saturation, or contrast. Frameserving is no different than loading the vobs directly into your encoder, it just simplifies the process and gives you some extra options which are very advantageous if used correctly. If you choose not to frameserve that is perfectly ok, but you have to realize that this will not increase quality in any way....it can't since it is basically doing the EXACT same thing as the frameserver.

The guy specifically asked how to make a svcd, so 720x480 resolution is not even an option and using this resolution at SVCD'ish bitrates is generally a VERY BAD idea. You are just about doubling your pixels yet your bitrate stays the same, the result is a very clear and crisp screen full of macroblocks and artifacts. 480x480 will definitely yield higher quality results, not to mention its the only compliant ntsc resolution for svcd.

ima2hd I highly recommend you get dvd2avi and follow one of the svcd conversion guides on this site. Dvd2avi will allow you to frameserve your vobs to your encoder and preserve the original framerate of your movie, something which you can't do by simply loading the vobs into your encoder. This more economical framerate will literally increase your quality by %20. It is an utter waste not to take advantage of it since all hardware players support it.

Just follow the guides and you shouldn't have any problems, the
dvd2avi->encoder method is tried and true and works every time, but only if you know what your doing.

[wulf109]

adam

I have made numerous A/B comarison's of frame-served,both with and without forced-film comparing them to the direct method. The difference is clear. Frame-serving does degrade color saturation and contrast on DVD conversion's.

As the they say in Israel "Just because I'm paranoid doesn't mean there not out to get me"

[adam]

Your quote sums up my point exactly. You cannot get dvd2avi to work correctly so you assume there must be a problem with it. Your neglecting to face the fact that you are the cause of the problem, not the software.

Its not hard to learn how to use dvd2avi correctly but it seems you are not willing to try. That's fine, and if you want to suggest the same to others thats fine too. But to make erroneous claims based on erroneus tests is NOT fine. Just stop suggesting that frameserving somehow degrades quality because it doesnt. You don't seem to understand the underlying fact in this matter....the source is the SAME. It doesnt matter if you frameserve or not you are still giving the exact same set of frames to the encoder. The only way the quality, or any facet of the source for that matter, can change is if you specifically set your frameserver to do so.

As any experienced dvd2avi would say, "The problem you are having with dvd2avi exists somewhere between the chair and the monitor, the problem that you assert exists in dvd2avi does not exist."

I'm sure ima2hd didn't expect or want to start an argument with his post but every time someone asks a question about frameserving it always turns out that way, because you keep spitting out the same bad advice. This is like the sixth time we have had this discussion. Please until you learn how to use dvd2avi correctly stop suggesting that something is wrong with it because you are only making things harder for those people who genuinely need help.