Need TMPGEnc expert!

[Benchie]

Hiya -

TMPGEnc is a great program (if impossible to pronounce), but I'm having two distinct problems with it. This is verion 12f.

1. Let's say I have a 1.2G VCD movie and I want to snip it in half using MPEG Tools. I open MPEG Tools, load the movie into "Merge & Cut", run the little bar out to a certain spot, hit OK and run it.

The problem is that the audio will cut off at exactly the point I selected, but the video will continue playing for another four or five seconds. Very annoying, if not downright unprofessional.

The only way I've figured out to fix this is to:

a. Demultiplex the finished part with MPEG Tools.
b. Load it into AVI2MPG2 from the BBMPG tool kit.
c. If the size of the file is, say, 652,482K, I'll set the "Size" in AVI2MPG2 to "652" (megs) and it usually chops off just the extra video part. Talk about the long way around!

So that's my first problem. I thought maybe it wanted to be cut off at a certain "even seconds", like 29:35:00, but same deal. I also tried the "Correct" button to no avail.


The following may be more of a VCD_Gear problem, than a TMPGEnc problem, but here goes:

2. I snipped out a few clips from a VCD movie and set them to some friends. One of them couldn't play them, got some kind of error. He ran it through VCD_Gear and it played just fine. I, too, have run VCD_Gear to fix the occasional movie that wouldn't play.

So this time I took a clip from a VHS tape using the SVHS Out and my ATI 128 card. I then rendered it with TMPGEnc, increasing the audio a bit and using the Sharpen feature.
Then I figured I'd be smart and pre-run it through VCD_Gear, just to be on the safe side. I ran the file through it.

The result was a blank 30K file.

I've now done this using a number of different rendering modes in TMPGEnc, different capture sizes, etc, and VCD_Gear continues to wipe everything out. Is it just because the original source was VHS and VCD_Gear just can't handle it, or the 1:1 aspect ration it requires? What's odd is that I'm turning it into an SVCD movie by rendering it with TMPGEnc (using the KalEl templates), so you'd think VCD_Gear would recognize it as such.

The first problem is my main one, though, so if you have a workaround, it would be appreciated.

T'anks,
Benchie

[aldus4]

Can only reply to your TMPGEnc problem (I think one pronounces it Tee-Emm-Peg-Enc ???)

When precise cutting is used with the I<< and >>I I too have encountered the same problem as you. I think this has to do with the GOP's. TMPGEnc only cuts at certain ones (haven't quite figured out which of the three though), and uses the most closest after selecting your cutting point.

What I do these days is move the slider, just infront of where I want to cut, let it play normally and then, when the cutting point arrives, press on the "stop" button and mark it.

Try it out - if you're good at PC Games it helps <grin>

[FUNIL99]

Well, when I make the VCD files I use the Virtuadub and them frameserve to TMPGEnc; the solution for this problem was marking the time you wish the cut as the "end mark", and when frameserve to TMPGenc the video was always correct; then I return to Virtuadub and mark the rest of the video then frameserve again to TMPGEnc and makes another file ( part 2 ) .
If someone have an better solution, please help all of us !!!

Funil99

[vitualis]

I'm curious to know who you people are creating your MPEGs (which encoder?). I've created and cut literally hundreds of MPEG-1 files with TMPGEnc (12a only though) and all have been near frame perfect and never have I had a problem with A/V sync issues.

I generally encode my MPEGs with the Panasonic MPEG Encoder v2.51.

Regards.

[aldus4]

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On 2001-07-09 20:50:05, vitualis wrote:
I'm curious to know who you people are creating your MPEGs (which encoder)
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Standard SVCD template captures using the Dazzle DVC II

[Benchie]

> I've created and cut literally hundreds of MPEG-1 files with TMPGEnc (12a only though) and all have been near frame perfect and never have I had a problem with A/V sync issues.

I should have pointed out that it only happens with seriously large files, 600 megs+. I've cut lots of 5-100 meg files without any problem, it's just the biggies that run past their end time, and just the video portion. The audio cuts off at precisely the point I told it to. The A/V sync up to that point is fine.

And damn. I had assumed this was an old, old TMPGEnc problem and there'd either be an answer or there wouldn't. I'll try writing their Web site and will let the group know what they say.

> I generally encode my MPEGs with the Panasonic MPEG Encoder v2.51.

That just does MPEG1, correct? I'm generally interested in MPEG2/SVCD, but I'd certainly like to try something beside TMPGEnc. Any thoughts on MPEG1 vs MPEG2?

Regards,
Benchie

[vitualis]

Okay. TMPGEnc has been know to be a poor MPEG-2 cutter, but is generally okay at MPEG-1 cutting. I've gotten the sense over the time I've been with this forum that some PARTICULAR MPEG-1 files are not cut well with TMPGEnc. This is what I'm trying to suss out.

I know from experience that MPEG-1 files (VCD compliant) encoded with the Panasonic MPEG Encoder cut just fine. Obviously, MPEG-1 files encoded with TMPGEnc itself (VCD compliant) cut fine too. I'm interested to know which encoders lead to poor cutting with TMPGEnc.

BTW, I've cut MPEGs over 1.5GB in size (over 3 hours) into three parts without problem with TMPGEnc.

Regards.

[aldus4]

@vitualis

Looking through the forum I came across a few people who have reported, like myself, that captures from a VCR then cut in TMPGEnc often lead to slight A/V sync problems. Whereas captures from TV,DVD,Satellite didn't. Is there any logic behind this?
For example when using the software that comes with the DVC II, if one captures from VCR one should set the Video Input source to "VCR". In the Dazzle forum we tried to find out the difference in this setting and only came to the conclusion that other filters were possibly being used (no one noticed a visual difference if capturing VCR with the DVD, TV etc. settings)

[vitualis]

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On 2001-07-10 06:14:50, aldus4 wrote:
Looking through the forum I came across a few people who have reported, like myself, that captures from a VCR then cut in TMPGEnc often lead to slight A/V sync problems. Whereas captures from TV,DVD,Satellite didn't. Is there any logic behind this?
For example when using the software that comes with the DVC II, if one captures from VCR one should set the Video Input source to "VCR". In the Dazzle forum we tried to find out the difference in this setting and only came to the conclusion that other filters were possibly being used (no one noticed a visual difference if capturing VCR with the DVD, TV etc. settings)
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Thanks for the info aldus4. That was very informative.

Perhaps, but there may be more to this though... It may be because of the actual encoder involved... i.e., a hardware encoder. I have captured MJPEG AVI with my TV capture card and encoded it to MPEG with a software encoder (Panasonic and TMPGEnc). These cut fine as well.

Speculation: Perhaps, a MPEG stream error of some sort is created when a hardware MPEG encoder has to deal with a dropped frame??? This could explain the TV vs. satellite/DVD capture.

Regards.

[adam]

Vitualis, If I'm correct you encode in pal right? From what I've heard TMPGenc seems to be more frame accurate with pal clips than ntsc. I know from my experience that no version has been even close to frame accurate while cutting ntsc mpeg1 clips. I've never encountered sync problems with mpeg1 but still the cutting bites, I never use TMPGenc for cutting.

And of course mpeg2 cutting is really out of the question for TMPGenc in my opinion. To anyone who doesnt do so already, you got to use bbmpeg for cutting mpeg2. It will solve all your problems.

[digvid]

In the past, I have created huge video files (2 GB or more) and then cut them into approx. 600 MB segments using TMPGEnc (all versions). With both VCD and SVCD, the audio would quite at the cutting point I selected, but the video would continue on for about 30 seconds. Very annoying! Then I found that if I took the 600 MB file, demuxed it (with any software--TMPGEnc, bbMPEG, etc.) and remuxed it, the problem would be fixed completely. The video would then end exactly at the point the audio did. I haven't tried this with PAL video, but I assume it works the same as NTSC.

- digvid

[vitualis]

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On 2001-07-10 06:49:17, adam wrote:
Vitualis, If I'm correct you encode in pal right? From what I've heard TMPGenc seems to be more frame accurate with pal clips than ntsc. I know from my experience that no version has been even close to frame accurate while cutting ntsc mpeg1 clips. I've never encountered sync problems with mpeg1 but still the cutting bites, I never use TMPGenc for cutting.</BLOCKQUOTE></FONT></TD></TR><TR><TD><HR size=1 color=black></TD></TR></TABLE>

That's right, I do usually encode in PAL. This does make things easier as I know exactly what time code represents which frame (each frame is exactly 0.04 seconds long).

I have cut a handfull of NTSC clips though and they turned out fine... I usually cut at a scene change so perhaps problems simply didn't arise for me on those NTSC clips that I had to cut.

Regards.

[Benchie]

Back to Michael -

> I'm interested to know which encoders lead to poor cutting with TMPGEnc.

In this case, no encoder at all. I ripped them with SmartRipper from DVD.

Then I used DVD2AVI to split the VOB files, then into TMPGEnc for the rendering. That done, it was into MPEG Tools for the cutting, and that's when I ran into the problem. I've now done this a number of times and the same problem occurs every time.

Then I captured a 1-hour movie from VHS the other night, tossed the file into MPEG Tools, cut it in half, and no A/V problem at all. Both audio and video snipped off right at the precise second. So perhaps the problem is with DVD2AVI? Maybe there's something slightly wrong with the two streams it splits from the VOB files? This is using the "Forced FILM" on, so maybe I'll try it off next time.

Now back to Adam with the interesting BBMPG problem I ran into...

Benchie

[Benchie]

Back to Adam:

> And of course mpeg2 cutting is really out of the question for TMPGenc in my opinion. To anyone who doesnt do so already, you got to use bbmpeg for cutting mpeg2.

I confess, I hadn't really given AVI2MPG2 a fair shake. Using the tutorial from http://www.dvdripguides.com, I had just used it for cutting large MPEGs with the "size" feature. Then I tried the MPEG Tools from TMPGEnc and figured it was the better program -- except for the A/V problem at the end.

So last night, on your advice, I gave it another look-see. This time I loaded a large MPEG into it, set the start and end times, and snipped out a piece.

You just wouldn't believe what the audio sounded like.

It's completely impossible to describe. It's kinda like if you designed a filter to make the audio sound like it was coming through a tin can, but the filter was broken. Not "tinny", more like "twangy". Very strange. I tried every option in the Audio settings but no dif. I tried it with two large MPEGs I'd captured from SVHS.

It's just one problem after another, isn't it?

Benchie

[vitualis]

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On 2001-07-11 12:20:32, Benchie wrote:
Back to Michael -

> I'm interested to know which encoders lead to poor cutting with TMPGEnc.

In this case, no encoder at all. I ripped them with SmartRipper from DVD.

Then I used DVD2AVI to split the VOB files, then into TMPGEnc for the rendering. That done, it was into MPEG Tools for the cutting, and that's when I ran into the problem. I've now done this a number of times and the same problem occurs every time.

Then I captured a 1-hour movie from VHS the other night, tossed the file into MPEG Tools, cut it in half, and no A/V problem at all. Both audio and video snipped off right at the precise second. So perhaps the problem is with DVD2AVI? Maybe there's something slightly wrong with the two streams it splits from the VOB files? This is using the "Forced FILM" on, so maybe I'll try it off next time.

Now back to Adam with the interesting BBMPG problem I ran into...

Benchie


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You did use an MPEG encoder... TMPGEnc in fact.

Regards.