multiple bitrates in DVD

[choirislife923]

ok, heres the deal:

i want to burn everything that happened in my high school's choir department this year onto a DVD-R. the year hasnt ended, but i'm guessing it'll be about 8 hours of video. most of the video is from VHS tapes (my uncle records for me on DV, but i didnt really think much so i just tagged along a VHS tape instead of my PC for direct DV to hdd.), so 352x240 resolution, stereo, 48000hz, 386kbps 5.1 DD [i'm planning on upmixing all of the stuff...mad skillz 8) ].

the question is how much should the bitrate be?

since i'm in a swing choir, there is alot of fast movement and the backdrop of our performances has lights changing colors (you know, think 80s and concerts where there are spotlights with red green blue and yellow rotating colors).

i am thinking about 2 bitrate encodings for my dvd.

for the videos which i have edited (with transitions and the alike), i am thinking about using 4000kbps CQ 85. this should be around 1 hour 20 mins [4 performances throughout the school year, avg of 20 mins per performance].

for the non-edited portion "uncut", i have no clue what bitrate to use. this portion is mainly the other choir groups that i am in but quite frankly dont care as much about, and the other sources that i have accuquired (borrowing the "professional taping" from my friend, my parent's camcorder). again, it will have swing dancing movments (which can go quite fast), and i dont want that to look choppy. i also dont want the video to looking all grainy with mpeg noise as if it was a super-compressed jpeg. i am guessing about 6 hours and 40 mins of this.

another obstacle to throw in:

for the final performance, i think i might as well just tote the PC to my uncle's house for the transcoding to mpeg2 [DV video on PC? bah! too much space]. so that portion would be 720x480.

a dumb question to throw in:

does DVD support mono sound? since my parent's camcorder and the "professional" tape is in mono [yes, mono from pros...eww], i am thinking about saving space by having a mono track instead of stereo for those copies of the performances [a stereo track for mono source...waste of space].

i know that sounds really confusing, so if you have questions, please feel free to ask.

[adam]

Don't use 352x240. Interlacing is not supported at this resolution. Since all of your sources are pure interlaced, it is going to look terrible if you deinterlace. Also at the bitrates you mention you should have no problem at all using 352x480, which does support interlacing. Here is my humble suggestion. Figure out the total runtime of all of your clips and use a bitrate calculator to find out how high an avg bitrate you will get. If this is satisfactory for you then encode in 2-pass VBR at this setting and be done with it. If not, and you want to encode that one group in a lower bitrate so as to free up more bitrate for the more important footage, then simply encode the first batch first. At 352x480 you could maybe get away with as low as 1.6mbits. Just run some tests to find the lowest acceptable amount.

After all these are encoded go back to the bitrate calculator. Use one that lets you add overhead or manually set the size of the disk. Add in the total size of that first group you encoded, and calculate the bitrate to use to fill the remaining space. This way you don't have to guess what bitrate to use, and you are guaranteed to totally fill the disk.

As to your final question, yes mono audio is supported in the DVD standard.

[flaninacupboard]

an important factor, was any of the material shot from a tripod/stand? if so then yes, ~1.5mbps average at 352X480 should be good, but if it's all handheld, then i'd suggest an average of at least 3mbps to avoid massive amounts of blocking.

Don't think it's going to fit nicely on one disc somehow.....

[lordsmurf]

Lots of time will yield crap at this low quality.
Use 2-3 discs, and just buy a multi-disc case to put it in.

[Cornucopia]

For mono sound, yes you can use mp2 or ac3 or pcm, and remember you can set the bitrate to 1/2 of what you would normally use for stereo, and maintain the same relative "quality".

for the other Q's, ditto to what was already said.

Scott

FWIW, to get the best quality, I'd take the time to go back to the original DV masters, if they're still available.

[choirislife923]

FWIW, to get the best quality, I'd take the time to go back to the original DV masters, if they're still available.

i would too except....well...their kinda erased ...

[choirislife923]

an important factor, was any of the material shot from a tripod/stand? if so then yes, ~1.5mbps average at 352X480 should be good, but if it's all handheld, then i'd suggest an average of at least 3mbps to avoid massive amounts of blocking.

Don't think it's going to fit nicely on one disc somehow.....

yea, tripod for pretty much all sources

[geek rock]

if your source is VHS, why not have 2 DVDs of 4 hours each? with a VHS source and 352 x 480 resolution, it should be plenty..

[choirislife923]

if your source is VHS, why not have 2 DVDs of 4 hours each? with a VHS source and 352 x 480 resolution, it should be plenty..

and there is the final concert thing in june, which will be a direct transfer from a digital8 camcorder...