What's the appropriate video bitrate for old home movies?

[Grunberg]

I have a collection of home movies from 1974-1993 I'm encoding to my own collection. I have tons of these videos, so I'd like to get them on as few discs as possible. And knowing the age of these videos, I'm sure I can sacrifice some of the higher-quality technical numbers.

Now, I've tried test videos of MPEG2 and DivX in video bitrates between 4,000 and 6,000, but saw minimal difference.

What would you say is the appropriate video format and bitrate of these kinds of videos? Any information is appreciated. Thanks!

[zoobie]

I'd put them on the disk as large as possible given hq disks are a quarter each...
what's your goal & what's your source? super 8?

[Grunberg]

They came to me on about 40+ DVD-R's. I'm going to be chopping them up just a bit to my liking, and then putting them on DL DVD+R's.

[edDV]

If you aren't filtering them, just demux and cut the existing MPeg2 without recoding. That will preserve the quality that is there.

[fredfillis]

I've had some success around 2,500,000 max and avg with 192,000 min. This gives about 8 hours on a DL disk. I'd suggest dropping some footage at those bitrates on an RW disk and see how you like it before making a commitment to burning a DL.

[Grunberg]

I'm sorry - but what is demuxing? And by 2,500,000, you mean 2500 kbps?

[guns1inger]

Demux is the process of extracting the video and audio content out to separate streams (files) for later authoring. It can also refer to the process of extracting an mpg stream out of the VOB containers used in DVD Video.

Frankly, if you have DVD already, use VideoRedo or Womble to edit, then put it back on DVD without re-encoding. Mpeg compression hates being re-encoded. And for full D1, which yours will most likely be, 2500 is way too low.

[fredfillis]

And for full D1, which yours will most likely be, 2500 is way too low.

Yes, probably right. I should have qualified that by saying I'd used that setting for some of my home movies which were captured from low-ish quality source. Something close to the bitrate for VCD.

[guns1inger]

You can use VCD resolution with a bitrate up to 1860-ish, or move up to half-D1 and use whatever is appropriate.

[Grunberg]

I'm sorry again - what is D1?

[guns1inger]

Full-D1 is the full resolution for standard definition digital video. For NTSC it is 720 x 480. For PAL it is 720 x 576. This is for 4:3 or 16:9 material. Half-D1 uses half the horizontal resolution, which can make the image softer, but allows for lower bitrates to be used. Half-D1 is often used for VHS sourced material. VCD resolution is approx one quarter full-D1, and is used by diehards who would rather sit for 7 hours without changing a disc than have watchable image quality.

[fredfillis]

OUCH! :P

[guns1inger]

Sorry, but I never saw a VCD that looked anything other than crap
That includes legitimate pressed VCDs purchased in Asia