MPG File Size and/or Timing Help

[GearBeer]

Hi,

I've done some work with recoding video to DVD before and did what I think is a pretty high quality job (complete with repeating menu music and lightscribe labels) but I met my match in a slideshow.

A friend of mine performed an original song at our car club's national show this summer and I've been making a slideshow of images from the show timed to his song. Unfortunately, the maximum file size that can be hosted on our club website is 60 MB and I can't seem to get the video down to that size without sacrificing the timing.

I'm using Nero to do the photo show.
Here's the slideshow with the default settings.

In order to get the file size down below 60 MB I have to change the format from NTSC to PAL and reduce the bit rate (from ~1850 to ~1700). If you compare the end of the first video (where the black car appears) to the end of this video you can see that the timing is quite different.

Is there anything I can do to reduce the file size without sacrificing the timing? There are a couple other file type options in Nero but MPEG-1 seems to produce the smallest file (unless I'm missing something).

Thanks!

[jagabo]

File size = bitrate * running time

Remake the slideshow video with a lower bitrate.

[filmboss80]

What video format is used most as a playback format on the club's site? As jagabo said, you can go with a lower bitrate in MPEG-1 (though DVD format is MPEG-2), or you could go with more compressed formats like flv (which is what YouTube plays) or Xvid. Those will save disc space. Also, a lower frame rate (like 15fps) would make a smaller file size.

Just a side note: If you ever plan to also distribute the video on disc to DVD players in the US, you cannot encode to PAL. Stick with NTSC.

[jagabo]

I don't know about Nero in particular, but with a slideshow like that (no transition effects) and the right MPEG encoder you can go with well less than 2000 kbps and still have good quality. With Xvid you could easily get away with 500 kbps.

[GearBeer]

jagabo,

Unfortunately, with the bitrate minimized in NTSC the file is still too large for hosting from the website.

The "good" bitrate is 1841 kbps. That's the minimum that Nero allows for MPEG. I don't know if it's the reduction in bitrate or the change from NTSC to PAL that is destroying the timing.

filmboss,

I don't think there are any videos currently hosted from the website (except maybe some drag videos in member galleries). I believe flv and Xvid are options, but I didn't use them because they were unfamiliar to me. I'll try recoding it in flv or Xvid tonight.

Thanks for your help guys!

[Gavino]

The "good" bitrate is 1841 kbps. That's the minimum that Nero allows for MPEG. I don't know if it's the reduction in bitrate or the change from NTSC to PAL that is destroying the timing.

PAL has a lower frame rate (25fps) than NTSC (~30fps), so can use a lower bitrate.
Depending on how you set up the slide show and how it was converted from NTSC to PAL, the timing could be affected by the frame rate change.