Non-standard VCD with TMPGEnc

[BUL]

OK... I've been able to successfully make a VCD from an NTSC VHS movie. However, I'd like this 108 min 29.97 fps movie to fit on one 80-min CDR as a non-standard bitrate VCD. In a nutshell, the movie was captured from a VHS video that's poor quality (the limitation was the original film, NOT the VHS video) & mono with poor sound quality. I'm not sure if my DVD player can play non-standard VCDs (I know it can play standard ones I've made thru TMPGEnc/Nero), but I figure it's worth a try...

In the wizard & advanced options of TMPGEnc, I unlocked the "Rate Control Mode" & "Bitrate" in the Video tab and the "Bitrate" of the Audio tab. In the wizard (page 4/5), I've tried selecting different types of media to determine what settings would allow it to fit on one 80-min/700MB CD-R. Using the defaults of 1150/224 (video/audio), the movie is estimated at 156% of capacity using the "CD-R 700MB (ISO)" option, and 138% of capacity using the "CD-R 80min (VCD/SVCD)" option.

By adjusting the rates to 870/112 (video/audio), the video would be 777MB, using 98.8% capacity using the "CD-R 80min (VCD/SVCD)". On the other hand, using 760/112 and "CD-R 700MB (ISO)", the video file would be 690MB, using 99.3% capacity.

Now, for the 2 questions... 1) Why is it no matter what video/audio bitrates & CD-R setting I use in TMPGEnc (i.e. 1150/224 vs. 760/112), the MPG file keeps coming out at around 1.1GB (even though there is a quality difference between the 2 files)? 2) What is the difference between the "CD-R 80min (VCD/SVCD)" and "CD-R 700MB (ISO)" options? Why would the 'VCD' option allow me to store "more" than the 'ISO' option on one CD--even though 80min Red Book audio/700MB data are equivalent? Even if I select the "CD-R 80min (VCD/SVCD)" option and cut down the bitrates so the estimate believes that the output file would fit on one CD, the file encodes much larger & Nero comes back & tells me that the file is too large to fit on one Video CD... Thanks!

[sterno]

Now, for the 2 questions... 1) Why is it no matter what video/audio bitrates & CD-R setting I use in TMPGEnc (i.e. 1150/224 vs. 760/112), the MPG file keeps coming out at around 1.1GB (even though there is a quality difference between the 2 files)?

Demux the file to audio and video streams, then mux them as "VideoCD (non-standard)". If you don't explicitly set that tmpgenc tends to pad the file so that the total size is the same as for a standard VCD. You can set that somewhere in the encode settings so you don't have to remux it, but I don't remember where.

2) What is the difference between the "CD-R 80min (VCD/SVCD)" and "CD-R 700MB (ISO)" options? Why would the 'VCD' option allow me to store "more" than the 'ISO' option on one CD--even though 80min Red Book audio/700MB data are equivalent?

ISO means it's sizing it to be burned as a file on a 700MB data CD. VCD/SVCD burns raw data without error control to the CD so you can fit more (just over 800MB of SVCD on an 80-minute CD, or 80 minutes of standard VCD).

[ZeroKool]

Hey Bul,

It comes out 1.1 GB because, most likely, you are not chosing Non-Standard VCD which you MUST do if you change bitrates (it is done by clicking Other Settings on page 3 or 4 and going to the last tab in the window that pops up). Now it should come out around 780 MB - small enough to fit on 700MB/80min CDR if you chose 80min VCD/SVCD as medium to write to (forget about ISO).

[ZeroKool]

Yeah, almost forgot - go there to get everything right: http://www.vcdhelp.com/forum/userguides/84759.php
but skip the beginning until words "Open TMPGEnc" and instead of DVD files load AVI as video source and WAV file as audio source (which you should have had extracted beforehand using Virtual Dub) and follow the instructions not forgetting to choose NON-Standard VCD.

[BUL]

Thanks for the info... You're absolutely right--I haven't been choosing the non-standard VCD option. Another 11 hours before I see the fruits of this one change (300 MHz PC )... Thanks for the info...

Another question--why does everyone say to break out the audio from the video?

[ZeroKool]

Bul - i hope by now you have already seen the fruits of your labour as i think that 11 hours have passed. Regarding extracting audio - this only needs to be done if the source is an AVI file (DivX), for mpegs there is no need to do that. Reason is that if you load the AVI file in both video and audio source then the movie after encoding is likely to be out of synch (video and audio lengths will not mach) so it is advised to extract the audio first with something like Virtual Dub (only takes 5 minutes) and the load AVI as video source and resulting WAV as audio source. 8)

[sterno]

Regarding extracting audio - this only needs to be done if the source is an AVI file (DivX), for mpegs there is no need to do that.

I sometimes had sync problems encoding from MPEG without extracting the audio. Other times it worked fine. I just always demux and decompress the audio now.

[BUL]

Reason is that if you load the AVI file in both video and audio source then the movie after encoding is likely to be out of synch (video and audio lengths will not mach) so it is advised to extract the audio first with something like Virtual Dub (only takes 5 minutes) and the load AVI as video source and resulting WAV as audio source. 8)

Well, the fruits of my labor have happened--twice. Ironically, I didn't extract the audio & it was in sync (as much as the movie actually was--which was poorly sync'd when released). I extracted & burned the movie as a 765/128 CBR and it worked fine in my player (and fit on one CD). I also redid it as a VBR to see if my player would work properly. Of course, the VBR came out better and works in my Onkyo DVD player just fine--with no additional audio sync problems.

Thanks for everyone's help!