Need advise, audio becomes out of sync AFTER joining files

[perceptionist]

I'll try to explain to the best of my ability what is happening here:

I have had this project on the back burner for some time. I have a movie which is broken up into 7 mp4 files and at some point I converted all 7 files into 7 AVI files as part of my trial and error. I still have both sets of files.

It has hardcoded english subtitles (which I wanted for this movie)

All 7 files (both mp4 and AVI) when watched individually have perfect audio/video/subtitle sync. However after joining either set of files using Convert X to DVD to a single DVD movie....the audio that plays when I start the movie is the audio from the 2nd of the 7 segments. I believe the audio is offset by 1 segment (approx 14 min offset) all the way through the resulting DVD.

I tried creating a DVD from the 7 AVIs and also tried this with the 7 mp4s with the same results.

I have G-Spot and compared the info between each set of files, but I am not sure what I would be looking for to determine what the issue is. I have screenshots saved for each of the 7 files for both mp4 and AVI sets if needed.

If a different application is recommended for what I am trying to do, please consider that I am not super adept at manipulating a ton of advanced settings, just looking for minimal to no quality/resolution loss and the time it takes for the process to complete successfully is not a huge issue.

Let me know if any additional info is required to facilitate assistance...

Thanks for any suggestions,

[poisondeathray]

What happens when you join the AVI's first ?

e.g. Vdub , file=> append AVI segment (add each), video=> direct stream copy, audio => direct stream copy, file=> save as AVI

[perceptionist]

Trying that now, will report back when done.

[perceptionist]

After opening VDub, I first selected: file=> open video file

Because initially "append AVI segment" was greyed out until after opening the first video segment. Upon opening the first segment I got the following:

[perceptionist]

Should I ignore this and continue or do I need to take a different approach?

[poisondeathray]

I don't know, you can try it and see if it works or try appending in avidemux instead

From your description, it sounds like convertxtodvd is just mixing up the audio track order. So you could try something else like avs2dvd instead to make the DVD

Was the original 7 MP4 videos, and you hardcoded the subs into 7 AVI videos ?

A more foolproof way would be to do all that in avisynth (joining and hardsubbing), but there is a learning curve

[perceptionist]

After opening the first AVI segment, the "Append AVI segment" was no longer greyed out. So I ignored the initial error and tried to Append AVI segment but then got this:

[perceptionist]

I don't know, you can try it and see if it works or try appending in avidemux instead

From your description, it sounds like convertxtodvd is just mixing up the audio track order. So you could try something else like avs2dvd instead to make the DVD

Was the original 7 MP4 videos, and you hardcoded the subs into 7 AVI videos ?

A more foolproof way would be to do all that in avisynth (joining and hardsubbing), but there is a learning curve

I initially downloaded the 7 segments from youtube which got me the mp4 files. It is a hard to find obscure movie and I was happy to find a version with eng subs already in it.

When the audio sync in the DVD creation failed, I then converted all of them to AVI and tried again with same result.

Will attempt avs2dvd now and report back soon.

[hello_hello]

Should I ignore this and continue or do I need to take a different approach?

Ignore it.

After opening the first AVI segment, the "Append AVI segment" was no longer greyed out. So I ignored the initial error and tried to Append AVI segment but then got this:

Did you ignore the warning?

An alternative might be try try appending the MP4s together with MyMP4BoxGUI

[perceptionist]

Should I ignore this and continue or do I need to take a different approach?

Ignore it.

After opening the first AVI segment, the "Append AVI segment" was no longer greyed out. So I ignored the initial error and tried to Append AVI segment but then got this:

Did you ignore the warning?

An alternative might be try try appending the MP4s together with MyMP4BoxGUI

Also tried joining the AVIs with avijoiner but upon executing the process failed right away.

Attempting AVS2DVD and then will try appending the MP4s together with MyMP4BoxGUI.


Oh and after opening the first segment in VDub, it will not allow me to append any more files.... it lets me attempt to append, but will not move past that error.

[perceptionist]

Ok here's where I'm at so far:

Using AVS2DVD everything seemed to be going fine although it had an issue with one of the characters in the title which I ignored and the process appeared to continue.

But then I saw this screen and although it still says "Please Wait"....it has not changed for like 10 minutes. It is the only evidence that this program is even still running (no other interface windows or anything)

[perceptionist]

I left the AVS2DVD running (if it is even running) and now I am attempting to join all 7 MP4 files using MyMP4BoxGUI.

Will report when I have results on that.

[perceptionist]

Ok MP4s are joined with MyMP4BoxGUI.

Resulting file begins with video from 2nd segment accompanied by audio from 1st segment.

[perceptionist]

I never did close AVS2DVD even though it was appearing to hang.... it just now resumed the process so results pending on that program.


UPDATE:

Almost 5 hours later and AVS2DVD is still working. It is on Segment #4 of 7

At least it has not froze, I can see it is still progressing. Hopefully it will be worth the time.

[_MrC_]

Ok here's where I'm at so far:

Using AVS2DVD everything seemed to be going fine although it had an issue with one of the characters in the title which I ignored and the process appeared to continue.

But then I saw this screen and although it still says "Please Wait"....it has not changed for like 10 minutes. It is the only evidence that this program is even still running (no other interface windows or anything)

Better if you don't ignore the warning message about the Extended ASCII characters (Ä). I suggest you to rename the input files using standard ASCII chars and only then add the input files to AVStoDVD.



Bye

[ndjamena]

You could try MKVMerge, the track statistics may tell us something interesting.

[hech54]

I have a movie which is broken up into 7 mp4 files

Right there is where the sync was ruined, possibly for eternity without some MAJOR headaches on your part. Understand that there is no easy, one-button solution to fix this problem.

[ndjamena]

OK, I just took an MKV, extracted the audio track, cut that track in half then merged it with the full length video. After that I appended another MKV file onto the end. MKVMerge added 15 minutes of nothing to the audio track and everything is still in sync. All I need now is an audio encoder that will recognise the absence of audio in the MKV and fill it with silence...

[perceptionist]

You could try MKVMerge, the track statistics may tell us something interesting.

Isn't that only compatible with .MKV files? I'm working with MP4 files.....I also have a set of .AVI files of the same movie.


UPDATE: AVS2DVD finally completed, took forever but thats fine as it got me the best results so far.... but it could be better, I'll explain:

After AVS2DVD was complete I used imgburn to create an image file from files/folders.

Then used that image to burn a DVD. DVD plays fine with all audio in sync perfectly......BUT.....and this is minor but would be cool if I can fix:

There is no smooth transition between the joined segments, it is very obvious. When playing the DVD it only plays one segment at a time meaning while the movie is playing, there is only like 15 min showing on the time below and when that completes it switches to the next segment.....however I'm impressed that all audio is now perfectly in sync!!

When I initially created a DVD using ConvertX, even though the audio was out of sync.....the DVD played smoothly and all files were joined seamlessly with no visual interruptions....so it must be possible.

Is there a different program I should try to join my files into a DVD?
Or perhaps I needed different settings in AVS2DVD?

I feel like I am getting very close to a solution so for those who have been following along please stick with me on this...

[ndjamena]

How about you give us the mediainfo outputs for the files. If your files don't give us anything worthwhile if remuxed with either MP4Box or MKVMerge they will put info in the files that will tell us each streams exact length and MediaInfo will happily tell us the delay as well.

[perceptionist]

How about you give us the mediainfo outputs for the files.

Ok, under "View" should I just stick with "Basic"?

[perceptionist]

Here are the Mediainfo outputs for all 7 of the MP4 files:

[ndjamena]

No, we need the duration and the delay of each stream. If you can't get MediaInfo to display them as is, you'll need to remux the files with either MP4Box or MKVMerge.

Video
ID                                       : 1
Format                                   : AVC
Format/Info                              : Advanced Video Codec
Format profile                           : High@L3.1
Format settings, CABAC                   : Yes
Format settings, ReFrames                : 10 frames
Codec ID                                 : avc1
Codec ID/Info                            : Advanced Video Coding
Duration                                 : 22mn 10s
Bit rate                                 : 1 159 Kbps
Maximum bit rate                         : 8 466 Kbps
Width                                    : 768 pixels
Height                                   : 576 pixels
Display aspect ratio                     : 4:3
Frame rate mode                          : Constant
Frame rate                               : 25.000 fps
Color space                              : YUV
Chroma subsampling                       : 4:2:0
Bit depth                                : 8 bits
Scan type                                : Progressive
Bits/(Pixel*Frame)                       : 0.105
Stream size                              : 184 MiB (88%)
Title                                    : AVC/H.264/MPEG4 Part 10 (25 fps)
Writing library                          : x264 core 142 r2409 d6b4e63
Encoding settings                        : cabac=1 / ref=10 / deblock=1:-1:-1 / analyse=0x3:0x133 / me=umh / subme=10 / psy=1 / psy_rd=1.00:0.15 / mixed_ref=1 / me_range=24 / chroma_me=0 / trellis=2 / 8x8dct=1 / cqm=0 / deadzone=21,11 / fast_pskip=1 / chroma_qp_offset=-3 / threads=12 / lookahead_threads=2 / sliced_threads=0 / nr=0 / decimate=1 / interlaced=0 / bluray_compat=0 / constrained_intra=0 / bframes=8 / b_pyramid=2 / b_adapt=2 / b_bias=0 / direct=3 / weightb=1 / open_gop=0 / weightp=2 / keyint=250 / keyint_min=25 / scenecut=40 / intra_refresh=0 / rc_lookahead=250 / rc=crf / mbtree=1 / crf=22.0 / qcomp=0.60 / qpmin=0 / qpmax=69 / qpstep=4 / ip_ratio=1.40 / aq=2:1.10
Language                                 : English
Encoded date                             : UTC 2014-04-25 00:15:43
Tagged date                              : UTC 2014-04-25 00:15:57

Audio
ID                                       : 2
Format                                   : AAC
Format/Info                              : Advanced Audio Codec
Format profile                           : LC
Codec ID                                 : 40
Duration                                 : 22mn 9s
Bit rate mode                            : Variable
Bit rate                                 : 159 Kbps
Maximum bit rate                         : 171 Kbps
Channel(s)                               : 2 channels
Channel positions                        : Front: L R
Sampling rate                            : 48.0 KHz
Compression mode                         : Lossy
Stream size                              : 25.3 MiB (12%)
Title                                    : English AAC(2.0)
Language                                 : English
Encoded date                             : UTC 2014-04-23 00:54:40
Tagged date                              : UTC 2014-04-25 00:15:57

MediaInfo doesn't seem to do MP4 delays, so temporarily muxing the files into MKVs using a recent version of MKVMerge would give us the most information.

[perceptionist]

Ok, the link to MKVMerge takes me to MKVToolnix.

Going ahead with that, let me know if this is not correct.

[perceptionist]

So just to be sure, I add all the files and then "Muxing --> Start Muxing (run mkvmerge)"

After this is done, I'll open the resulting files in MediaInfo and post the logs here...

Correct me if any of these steps are wrong.... starting now

Will post when ready

[poisondeathray]

mkvtoolnix is the GUI for mkvmerge

Make sure you use the "append" button, not the "add" button

[ndjamena]

Actually, I was hoping he'd mux each of the seven little files individually so we can see what they're made of. We either have to do some trimming of the audio, or we need to fill in some silence. FIRST. Then we'll have a better idea of what may work.

[perceptionist]

mkvtoolnix is the GUI for mkvmerge

Make sure you use the "append" button, not the "add" button

Ah ok.... I used the Add button then went out on an errand.... returned and read this...

So I removed all files in mkvmerge, now the append button is inactive.... but the add is active. So I added the first file and then the "append" button became active....

So do I add the first file and then append each of the additional files #2 thru #7?

[poisondeathray]

So do I add the first file and then append each of the additional files #2 thru #7?

Yes, but if that doesn't work ndjamena was looking for other information as well when you mux them individually ^

[perceptionist]

Ok, added 1st file then appended the rest..... muxing has begun....

Will this produce 1 or 7 resulting files?

Either way, I will open the resulting file(s) in mediainfo and post log(s) here when done.