avi to mpeg = quality reduction

[keats7]

Hello all
I posted previously about converting avi to dvd and recieved some much appreaciated help.
I have had a lot of success converting but it seems that after i convert from avi to mpeg the quality of the mpeg movie clip is reduced.
I was expecting the quality of the finnished mpeg to be of equal quality as the original avi file.
thanks for the help guys

[guns1inger]

What is your proocess ?
What tools do you use ?
What is your source ?

If you do it properly then you should get results a least as good as the source, and sometimes better.

[mats.hogberg]

Your expectations are wrong. Every reencode, using a not lossless codec (like mpg) reduces quality. The higher the bitrate used when reencoding, the closer to the source you'll get, but never 100%
As a rule of thumb when doing AVI (DivX/XviD) to mpg for DVD, encoding to a mpg bitrate of 4x AVI bitrate usually make the source material full justice.
Resizing (which is also a common procedure when going AVI ti DVD) can also make the quality worse if not done properly.

/Mats

[keats7]

using a program called all video converter
tried avi to dvd
and avi to mpeg
and avi to mpg
all suffered loss of quality from the original

Looking for sugestions or advice on a program to use

Thanks guys

[mats.hogberg]

Try some mpeg encoder - TMPGEnc, CCE, MainConcept - there are many! Free alternative is QuEnc and HcEnc.
There are lots & lots guides to read if you take a look under CONVERT left, and select AVI to DVD.
For a good (as far as good one click solutions go) oneclickwonder, take a look at divxtodvd.

/Mats

[keats7]

Thanks Buddy
I'll give them a go

[thecoalman]

What is your proocess ?
What tools do you use ?
What is your source ?

You might want to answer the above. Unless your using a really crappy encoder you can expect the final video to be nearly identical in quality if not identical. To see any reduction you need a very high quality video to begin with and even then you practically need a microscopre to see the difference.

You're probably just using too low a bitrate... that's the most common mistake. A little bit more information will get you a better answer.

[keats7]

Yeh thanks for the replys guys
My source is just some video i took from a fuji film S 5500 finepix camera
which is a digital still camera with movie funtion.
It saves clips to AVI
Which i coverted to mpeg using a trial version of all video converter
The resulting mpeg was the one with the loss of quality.

As for tools i was nearly going to use a hammer a few times but managed to restrain myself. thats the only tool i thought of.

[trueman]

I have a S 5000 finepix camera and I hate to say it but your not really starting out with a very good quality avi file to begin with. They are stills cameras that just happen to be able to also record video, albeit not as good as a real video camera.

Here's an avi file from my fuji finepix converted to mpeg, which is about the best quality I can get.

http://www.trumanlive.com/images/blue.mpg

Size is about 3.5 mb

[thecoalman]

My source is just some video i took from a fuji film S 5500 finepix camera
which is a digital still camera with movie funtion.
.

What's the properties of the AVI specifically the framerate and resolution. And what are you going to NTSC or PAL?