problem with kwag's template

[Umen Pich]

Hello guys,

I downloaded a PAL, DVD template from kwag's site. On the site they say it would provide 6 hours of DVD quality ?!?
Do you have experience with that ?

Here is my experience:
Source - from my DV camera - relatively low motion, even more - the scene is relatively dark.
1 minute test example of this material with Kwag's template came ot 4500kbps in average !!!
With this average botrate I don't see how can it be possible to hold 6 hours on a DVD.
Any hints ?

[LanEvo7]

They say UP TO six hours. Meaning it depends on your video source, quality you want, etc.

[vhelp]

@ Umen Pich,

Here is my experience:
Source - from my DV camera - relatively low motion, even more - the scene is relatively dark.
1 minute test example of this material with Kwag's template came ot 4500kbps in average !!!
With this average botrate I don't see how can it be possible to hold 6 hours on a DVD.

Any hints ?

Yeah.. turn on the lights

I'm not familiar w/ PAL dv cams, but I'm sure it is Interlaced.. and you do
know how awful it CAN be, ESPECIALLY in dark scenes/rooms.
The lesser the light source, the harder it is for maintaing low bitrates, because
your source has too much noise.

Also, any shakes, even the slightest, will raise or skyrocket the birates.
Panning is another killer, as well as zooming. I'm still learning how to hold
my cam steady in my hands.. not very easy.

Also, what mode are you shooting at ??
* 4:3
* 16:9

The 4:3 will use too much bitrate. Better for you to shoot in 16:9 and live
w/ the slight saw-tooth it produces. You can encode to 16:9, and possibly
gain some bitrate or quality, whichever works (mathimatically)

Another alternative is the shoot 4:3 (as I am experimenting on this) and then
later on, crop off the top/bottom, 60pixels and encode as 16:9 output.

The above might help you in "future" DV projects

-vhelp

[j1d10t]

I've used KWags full D1 template (for NTSC), and it's been great. I've been encoding in 16x9, 29fps, and I've fit about 4 and a half hours on a DVD with great quality. I upped the max bitrate a little, and the CQ setting (because I'm using 29fps), but I've still fit 4 and a half hours. I'm also using AC3 for audio, rather than PCM.

Also, try useing the noise removal settings in TMPGEnc - they work wonders, even if it looks as if your source is pretty clean. Even the slightest noise can drastically increase your bitrate average.

[Umen Pich]

Yeah.. turn on the lights

Good ! Whenever I can. But that scene was on the street

The lesser the light source, the harder it is for maintaing low bitrates, because your source has too much noise.

that's simply not true. Choose CQ mode in TMPGENC than start the encoding, press Ctrl-L and look what happens. As a general rule dark scenes eat less bandwidth because naturally they lack details.

Also, any shakes, even the slightest, will raise or skyrocket the birates.

I agree.

I'm still learning how to
my cam steady in my hands.. not very easy.

Well, I am learning this "art" two and a half years already.

Also, what mode are you shooting at ??
* 4:3
* 16:9

4:3

The 4:3 will use too much bitrate. Better for you to shoot in 16:9 and live
w/ the slight saw-tooth it produces. You can encode to 16:9, and possibly
gain some bitrate or quality, whichever works (mathimatically)

Correct me if I am wrong but the bitrate must depend only on the number of pixels not the display ratio.

On the other hand - yes, you can have a perception of higher quality when the same number of pixels is shrinked for a narrower part of the screen.

Third - IMHO - it is simply stupid not to use your whole screen. Which means - making 16:9 movies for 4:3 TV as well as 4:3 movies for 16:9 screen.

Whide screen movies are designed to be shown on wide screens. Otherwise the term "wide" sounds ridiculous - if your TV is 4:3 and you watch widescreen movies on it, they are not wider than those with 4:3 ratio
Just their height is lower

[FOO]

Umen
are you asking or telling ?

[Umen Pich]

Umen
are you asking or telling ?

Foo,
initially I was asking.

And the question is -- How is it possible to hold 6 hours with settings which actually produce 2 hours and a half with a source material which has average or less than the average requirements for bandwidth.
It is not noisy, I tryed the noise filter - almost no effect.

Also I tryed kwag's program CQmatic. It proposed a quality factor of
89, when I know from experiments that even 65 is too much for those clips to get about 2500kbps in average.

[flaninacupboard]

then ignore the voodoo-like thing that is CQ. just use 2pass VBR and put in your required value! so that's an average bitrate of 1482kbps, with 224kbps sound to fit six hours. is that even worth encoding...?

[BJ_M]

then ignore the voodoo-like thing that is CQ. just use 2pass VBR and put in your required value! so that's an average bitrate of 1482kbps, with 224kbps sound to fit six hours. is that even worth encoding...?

you get what you pay for !

[lordsmurf]

you get what you pay for !

Don't try to squeeze so much on one disc. Just buy 2 discs at 3 hours each and the quality can then be maintained at half-D1 using decent bitrates in the 3000 range.

[Umen Pich]

then ignore the voodoo-like thing that is CQ. just use 2pass VBR and put in your required value! so that's an average bitrate of 1482kbps, with 224kbps sound to fit six hours. is that even worth encoding...?

You are right. It is voodoo indeed

1482kbps might be OK sometimes (and more than enough for VCD resolutions)

In my case I wanted to put about 4 hours on one DVD (because those 4 hours are from one event and it is good to have them on one disk)
Finally I sacrificed (cut) some material, in order to achieve a better quality. In addition I am always saying (to myself and to others) that a shorter film is always preferable than a longer film
But still it is very difficult to decide which part to cut.
Maybe this is a privilege of talented directors.