Pretty new to digital video, need help PLEASE

[oOGoldenSunOo]

Hi all, I'm pretty new to digital video and I have some questions. I recently got the Sony DRU-510a dvd burner, it's great. I have a question about encoding, when I encode things to NTSC or PAL, is it possible to put both onto one dvd, like have one episode thats encoded to NTSC and the other PAL (if not, what can I do if I want to keep the episodes together?)? Also I noticed when encoding with PAL it splits it into an mp2 and wav (with tmpg) when you author the dvd, how are you supposed to combine those? ALSO I have old VHS movies that I want to back up on dvd, what can I use to do this? I want something very easy to use, like those usb things, what do you suggest? Also can the usb devices also do minidv's from my digital camcorder? If you could answers these, I'd be extremely grateful, thanks!

[oOGoldenSunOo]

can someone please answer?

[mkelley]

A disk needs to be either NTSC or PAL -- it cannot be both.

You need to read more of the guides (at the left here) to explain the DVD authoring process. This will tell you all you need know about combing (muxing) the elemental streams together -- as a very general rule your authoring program will handle this for you (check out DVDLab for a very low cost, easy to use, but powerful DVD authoring program).

I would not use a USB device for capture -- your best bet is to either get a PCI card and/or firewire external device (I use the firewire Dazzle Hollywood for my analog to digital conversins, but there are lots of others. ATI makes some very nice capture cards). USB devices as a rule don't capture correctly (according to others).

[housepig]

can someone please answer?

don't get itchy and expect an answer right away, especially when you put several involved questions in a single post. this is not tech support, this is a public forum full of other people like you.

my suggestion is to split up the questions you are asking, as many of them are going to generate a lot of varying opinions. (and take up a lot of space...)

[Vejita-sama]

You waited 2.5hrs on a forum and asked a lot of questions that have been asked and answered several times in the guides to left. You might have to wait 24hrs for answers. With that said:

1) Question - why are you encoding to both PAL and NTSC? Do you have a reason (sending copies to friends in Europe and the US). However, yes you can enclode both NTSC and PAL video on one DVD.

2) TMPGenc - MPEG files are made from several streams. These streams, contain - video, audio, subtitles, etc. You can combine all these streams to create a MPEG file. This process is know as multiplexing (or muxing). You can also take a MPEG and strip out all of the streams into seperate files, this process is know as de-multiplexing (or demuxing)

Most DVD authoring software wants elementary streams, instead of a muxed MPEG2 file. So that's the default settings when you use TMPGenc's DVD template. However, if you look in the button right corner (above the load/save/edit buttons) you can choose to output video only, audio only, or both.

When it comes to authoring DVDs you have two basic elementary streams:

m2v - mpeg2 video (and only video)
PCM or ac3 - audio (and only audio).

PCM is basically uncompressed wav audio files. The thing about PCM audio is that since it's uncompressed the files are huge. So most people encode/compress the audio to ac3. For example, a 150MB PCM file can be converted to a 5MB ac3 file. This frees up more space on the DVD, which in turns allows you to either put more video per disc, or increase the bitrate of the video.

3) Author - (see the guides to the left). The process of taking your elementary streams (or the whole MPEG2, depends on the software) and generating all of the VOB/IFO files, menus, chapter points, etc. is know as authoring.

There are several authoring programs. The authoring program will mux the elementary streams (m2v, ac3, PCM, subs, etc) into VOB files, and generate a 'VIDEO_TS' folder that you can burn to a DVDR.

4) VHS Capture - look to the left under capture. Two basic options. First you can capture you video uncompressed (or with a 'lostless' codec like huffyuv), edit as necessary, then use TMPGenc (or similar program) to encode the video to MPEG2, author and burn. Second choice is to capture directly to MPEG2. Editing MPEG files is a pain in the a&&, but capturing directly to MPEG2 saves a lot of time and HD space.

Since you ask about doing this as easily as possible, I'd recommend looking at the AverDVD EZMaker. This is card/software bundle that goes for $50 at compusa and about $20-30 mail order. It comes with a bt878 capture card (very basic but does the job) and neoDVD standard software.

neoDVD will allow you to capture to MPEG2 at what they call high, medium, or low quaility (720x480, 352x480 and 352x240). You can't change the bitrate or settings, but medium captures for most VHS backups are fine. IIRC the video bitrate is set at ~3500kbit/s.

neoDVD will also allow you to author the capture video (or any MPEG2 files for that matter, but I don't think it supports ac3 audio). This package is used by a lot of people here, look to the left under capture cards for a few reviews. You don't have to use the encluded software, there are several other programs (including some very nice freeware ones) to choice from.

5) I'm not sure what 'miniDV' is? DV now means either 'digitial video' or a specific capture codec (DV codec). You can capture to any codec you have installed on your system. So my first feeling is yes, but we need more info.

Ok, hope that helps clear things up some. Although there are a lot of guides and faqs here (and at http://www.doom9.org another great/helpful site) if you look around a bit you’ll find most of what you need. I’m not ‘attacking’ you are anything. Just some additional advise for future posts:

Titles like ‘please help me’ or ‘I can’t get it to work’ tend not to be answered/looked at as much as ‘Problem encoding MPEG2 in TMPGenc’ or ‘I can’t get neoDVD to capture at 720x480’ etc. That is be specific. And I know that’s hard when you’re new

Wait a bit longer for answers. Sorry if I sound like ‘the forum police’ or something that’s not my intention. If you have any other questions please post them, we’re all glad to help. Luck with your projects.

[oOGoldenSunOo]

geez sorry......i did post my first one 2 and a half hours ago....thanks for your tips

[oOGoldenSunOo]

Ok thank, I have looked at the guides on the right, but I can't find an answer to this question, If I have a clip thats 25 bitrate , can I still use TMPGenc to turn it into NTSC? or do i HAVE to make it to PAL. If not....is there anyway to make it NTSC?

[andkiich]

Another thing to remember as well, is that you can't mix resolutions either your project will have to be either full or half D1.

[housepig]

If I have a clip thats 25 bitrate , can I still use TMPGenc to turn it into NTSC? or do i HAVE to make it to PAL. If not....is there anyway to make it NTSC?

look under the Convert section, there's a guide to going from PAL to NTSC with TMPGenc.

There's another guide on the same page to go the other way, from NTSC to PAL.

[txpharoah]

Some authoring applications will let you mix-n-match resolutions and bitrates and MPEG1/MPEG2, and other won't.

You cannot mix PAL and NTSC on the same disc. You've got to pick one.

[rodrigo]

Dear All,
I have an Japanase AVI film which is in original language, I tried to insert the english subtitles and after the encode processe is finished with TMPGncode together with VOBSUB I get subtitles but allright but NO SOUND. I have done other subtitling without any trouble using the same technique and everything work fine but not in this instance. I use the DVD/Pal template that comes with TMPGncode and the selection VIDEO+SOUND is selected on the right hand side section.
Could someone please give me some hints as what could be wrong? I have looked at the guides but I have not been able to pinpoint the problem
kind regards,

Rodrigo

[richdvd]

If I have a clip thats 25 bitrate , can I still use TMPGenc to turn it into NTSC? or do i HAVE to make it to PAL. If not....is there anyway to make it NTSC?

look under the Convert section, there's a guide to going from PAL to NTSC with TMPGenc.

There's another guide on the same page to go the other way, from NTSC to PAL.

Be prepared for the next thread "Having trouble with conversion NEED HELP PLEASE"

[Cobra]

Start a new thread if you have a question.