Changing PAL MPEG To NTSC

[Low Roller]

I have some mpegs I want to put on a VCD. However, they are all PAL format. I realize this type of question has been raised many times as I've looked through the guides and searched the forum.

The problem is there is SO much information here, and with me being a newbie, it gets confusing.

I would just like the simplest way to properly convert my PAL mpegs to NTSC without major sync problems before I burn them to VCDs.

Sorry if my question seems redundant to those familiar with all this.

Thanks,

Low Roller

[Low Roller]

Let me give some more info on what I'm doing and what I've tried so far.
I had some PAL avi's I wanted to change to NTSC. I saw the guide to convert a PAL vcd to NTSC vcd.
http://www.vcdhelp.com/pal2ntsc/pal2ntsc.htm

My approach was to just make a PAL vcd and follow the guide above.

I then converted my PAL AVI's to a PAL VCD using the following guide.
http://www.vcdhelp.com/divxtovcd.htm

Everything worked well. I took my PAL vcd to my friends place so I could try out my PAL VCD on a DVD player that can do PAL. (mine can't) It played fine.

Next, I tried to follow the guide mentioned above to convert my PAL VCD to NTSC VCD.

Here's where my trouble begins. At step 4, I got the error saying my .DAT file was invalid. I changed the DirectShow Multimedia priority as instructed, but still got the error. The guide then instructs you to convert the vcd to mpeg and do the framerate conversion there. Well, I already had the mpeg file so this was unnecessary.

The closest thing I could find to convert the PAL mpegs to NTSC was this guide.
http://www.vcdhelp.com/forum/userguides/78178.php

This guide, to me, is not explained very well and is difficult to follow. Do I change my mpegs NTSC or NTSC film? If I choose NTSC film will my DVD player be able to handle it?

These are just a few of many questions I have reguarding this guide.

Anyway, I'd appreciate any suggestions that could be offered.

Thanks,

Low Roller

[joe444455555]

I think VCD shouldn't be 23.976 for compatibility reasons; but I'm working on the same thing as yourself, just my audio gets all screwey when I convert (video is fine).

[oddbod77]

I would just like the simplest way to properly convert my PAL mpegs to NTSC without major sync problems before I burn them to VCDs.

First things first, there is no such thing as "proper" frame rate conversion it is achieved by accepting one of a series of compromises, you either have to add frames, delete frames, speed the video up/slow the audio or slow the video/speed up the audio. There are other methods (like frame-blending) but these are essentially combinations of the above.

[http://www.vcdhelp.com/pal2ntsc/pal2ntsc.htm is the one you want just skip the first 3 steps and open your original AVI instead of messing about with a PAL VCD. The other approach which does the same thing is to use the Project Wizard in TMPEGEnc (2.54 or above) - at step 1 choose the Video-CD NTSC template, step 2 choose the AVI you want to convert (the audio should be selected automatically), step 3 click on the "Clip Frame" checkbox, now click "Arrange Setting" and choose the Arrange Method which looks best, step 4 just click "Next", and step 5 is obvious.

This is the easiest way and works by duplicating approximately 1 frame in 5, try it first and see if you can put up with the glitches that this method creates, if the source video is not good quality it is quite hard to notice.

The closest thing I could find to convert the PAL mpegs to NTSC was this guide.
http://www.vcdhelp.com/forum/userguides/78178.php

This guide, to me, is not explained very well and is difficult to follow. Do I change my mpegs NTSC or NTSC film? If I choose NTSC film will my DVD player be able to handle it?

Agreed this guide is not suitable for beginners and is also NOT an example of frame rate conversion as the audio is being converted to fit the video which has had its frame rate forcibly changed (this is mentioned at the top of the guide).

I think VCD shouldn't be 23.976 for compatibility reasons; but I'm working on the same thing as yourself, just my audio gets all screwey when I convert (video is fine).

23.976fps is for NTSCFilm VCD's and should not be used unless you are sure the source file is at this rate already. Define screwey? Is it out of sync? distorted? missing? what?

[EddyH]

23.976 should be fine if it's part of the VCD standard; we already know the frame rate of the source, it's 25fps! You see we don't have these silly telecine problems in PAL zones hehe

You need to set either that or 29.97 in your encoder and experience some choppiness, or 23.976 with "do not frame rate conversion" in TMPGEnc... which will be smooth, but you'll have to alter the audio to fit somehow. I could write up a full guide here but i have no time now, sorry.. someone else want to volunteer?

Or even, if you have enough spare disc space, you could reverse(?)-telecine it to 31.25fps in virtualdub, etc, then do the same trick to 29.97 with TMPGEnc. Hell it may even be possible all in TMPGEnc but i've had problems combining the two before (going the other way) and had to revert to Vdub.