VOB files clipped (to less than 4 seconds) when editing?

[slugwump]

OK, I'm doing something wrong here...please point me in the right direction.....

I recently purchased a Panasonic DMR-EH50 DVR. Nice unit, so far it's worked great and has pretty much exceeded my expectations. Now I'm looking to edit some video on my Mac.

I've burned some recorded DRV clips to a DVD-RW disc, finalized it. The DVD plays fine on my stand-alone DVD player, and on my Mac as a DVD. Now I want to edit the clips, preferably in iMovie.

I've copied the VIDEO_TS folder and enclosed files to my hard drive. For each clip, there are three files: VTS_01_0.BUP, VTS_01_0.IFO, VTS_01_0.VOB, etc. So far, so good.

I can open each .VOB files in QuickTime, but only the first (approx) 3.5 seconds of each clip plays.

I can also import the .VOB files into iMovie HD, and again, only the first 3.5 seconds of each clip imports.

Why are these clips getting, um, clipped to under 4 seconds? How can I get the whole things imported into iMovie HD?

I've also tried running the files trough Toast Titanium 7; dragging the whole VIDEO_TS folder into Toast, selecting one clip and exporting it. Same deal: the resulting quicktime movie it spits out only contains the first 3.5 or so seconds of the clip.

I'm running Mac OS X 10.4.3, iMovie HD 5.0.2, and QuickTime (Pro) 7.0.3, Toast Titanium 7.0, on a dual G4 1 gig Mac with a gig of RAM.

What gives? Any idea how to get more than 4 seconds of video out of these clips?

Thanks for any help/tips/suggestions.

[Frobozz]

To extract the MPEG video from the VIDEO_TS Folder using Toast 7 do the following.
1. Insert the DVD
2. Open Toast and select DVD video in the Video window.
3. Click the Media button in Toast. This enters the Media Browser.
4. Choose DVD with the top button. When the DVD shows up in the lower panel, use the lower button to go down one level to access the Titles or two levels to access any individual chapters.
5. Drag the Title(s) you want to the Toast Video window.

Toast then extracts the MPEGs from the VOBs and saves them to the Roxio Converted Items folder. You might want to change Toast Preferences so that folder doesn't automatically get emptied when you quit Toast.

You now can select the titles in the Video window and click Export to have them converted to DV for import and editing in iMovie.

An option to item 2 above is to place a VIDEO_TS folder that's written to your hard drive onto the desktop. Toast will see this the same as an inserted DVD in the Media Browser.

[slugwump]

OK, upgraded to Toast 7.0.2, and was finally able to get more than 4 seconds out of each clip. Thanks for the tips.

I do notice, however, there's some degradation in the quality. I've tried fiddling with the settings when exporting the clips through Toast (saving in QuickTime format, no compression, best quality), and no matter what, there's still at least some image degradation (any suggestions for better settings to preserve all the quality?).

It looks like the video is getting re-encoded, or re-rendered, or re-somethinged - that is, the image data itself is being massaged, not just how it's organized.

Is there any way to get the .VOB files into iMovie HD without re-interpreting the image data - passing it through something (Toast or another app) that only changes the container, rather than the actual video/image data in each frame? I hope this makes sense...

Thanks again for the help.[/i]

[Frobozz]

iMovie cannot accept an MPEG 2 video so it's not a matter of the container. That's why the MPEGs get converted when exported by Toast. The best setting to use for import to iMovie is DV.

When you say you want to edit the clips, does this mean merely trimming out parts of the video? If so, I recommend getting Capty MPEGEdit EX from http://www.pixela-1.com. It can do frame-accurate cuts from the MPEGs that are extracted by Toast. By keeping the MPEG format you can reauthor an edited DVD without any re-encoding, thereby having no loss in picture quality.

By the way, Toast 7 also can extract MPEGs from DVD-RAM or VR-mode DVDs recorded on your standalone recorder, presuming your Mac's DVD drive can read a DVD-RAM disc. I use unfinalized VR-mode DVD-RWs from my Pioneer standalone recorder with Toast 7.