Best way to make movie file fit on DVD

[Krazykevin]

Hope this is the right forum. I extracted the Survivor Finale off of my tivo by playing it through a winfast capture/TV card onto my computer. It made 6 files that total about 5.5 gigs. I finally got all the files put together in one massive 5.5 gig file. Now I have the mpg file in adobe premiere. My question is how or what is the best way to output the file so I'll know it will be at or under 4.7gig. I thought when I got it off my tivo that it would fit, but it won't. There's got to be a better way than just changing bitrate and quality settings, right? Thanks. I have DVD shrink that compresses dvd files to fit, is there something like that for regular mpgs? Or should I go ahead and make my current file into the dvd file structure then use shrink to make it fit? Thanks for any help..

Kevin

[lordsmurf]

There's got to be a better way than just changing bitrate and quality settings, right?

No. Bitrate is what determines file size. Lower it.

DVD Shrink and other transcoders do the same, but in a more harmful manner, and therefore picture quality is degraded much worse than encoding, especially on homemade stuff.

[Krazykevin]

So, its just trial an error until I get it to fit?

[aguillon]

Go into the tool sections and get the bitrate calculator.

https://www.videohelp.com/calc.htm

This will make your job much easier (no more guesswork). Input the length of your video and the quality of your audio, and you should be more or less set.

Cheers

[Krazykevin]

Whats the best program, or type program to use to do what I mentioned above? When I try to load my files or combined file, Premiere 6.5 trial says that the file is recorded at a non supported rate. Supported rates are 11, 22, 32, 44, 48 etc. When I open my file in Premiere pro 1.5 it lets me put the file on the board, but when I drop into the timeline, at the bottom right of the screen is says "conforming movie". But it takes 5min everytime I do something with the file. If I let it finish and just drop the movie on the timeline and try to export it always hangs up. Other files work, just not this one. I'm using winfast software that came with the card. Can you guys suggest anything?

[Krazykevin]

One last thing. I took the full lenght video and placed it in TMPGenc MPEG editor and made the output file 32k, 192bitrate. I know Premiere supports that, and it still says it can't process it. I just don't get it.

[AlecWest]

Hope this is the right forum. I extracted the Survivor Finale off of my tivo by playing it through a winfast capture/TV card onto my computer.

This advice is slightly after-the-fact but does the software for your capture card allow you to set a specific bitrate? Shrinking files after the fact is a dicey proposition (which I discovered to my chagrin a few months ago) so, if you know the approximate length of a program, it's best to use the VideoHelp bitrate calculator to find the optimum bitrate and preset for it.

If you try any of the shrinkage methods mentioned here and they just don't look right (or have obvious artifacts in tow), you do have one other option ... assuming your capture card has an S-Video input and your DVD player has an S-Video out ... and assuming your capture card software can be set for a specific bitrate. You could burn the six files to 2 DVDs. Then, play back the 2 DVDs through your capture card at the lower bitrate. That way, there's nothing to shrink when you're done. I recently encountered public domain MPEG2 files at an ungodly bitrate of 7800 (major overkill for 40+ year-old B&W film). So, I burned the files to 2 DVDs and played them back through my PVR-150 Hauppauge capture card ... preset to a rate allowing me to save the whole film on one DVD. And between the two, I can't see any difference. What's better, there aren't any artifacts that can crop up in a shrinkage.

[Krazykevin]

I'm trying to update the drivers now. Thanks for all of your input but when I capture video off of my cable tv connection on the card, when I import it into Adobe Premiere it still says audio stream not supported. Its set at MPG 1 layer II 224.