Making Small Videos

[rklapp]

I have a 5 minute DVD video that I wish to convert to a file < 7 Mb and can be played using standard Windows because my client cannot install codecs (DivX, Xvid, etc.). I tried several shareware programs with little success including FlaskMPEG and VirtualDub. I believe an MPG file will work best, and I used VOB2MPG to create a 300 Mb file. Now I need to reduce the size and quality to shrink the file size. What do you suggest I use? Thanks.

[laspis59]

Have you tried SUPER?

You could convert to WMV.

[Soopafresh]

http://mulder.brhack.net/public/downloads/InstantPlayer.2006-10-12.exe

The above app will wrap any popular video file format with it's own player - no codecs needed. All you do is double click on the EXE file the app creates.

[Scorpion King]

5 minutes of video that is 7MB is a bitrate of about 184Kbps minus the audio.

@ 184Kbps minus audio the quality is going to be pretty low.

I hope I calculated this wrong......

Good luck.

[zoobie]

I may be mistaken but I think your client will still need the mpeg codec installed
I'd suggest dragging it thru wmm, selecting <7mb, and make a compatible windows video (.wmv)

[laspis59]

5 minutes of video that is 7MB is a bitrate of about 184Kbps minus the audio.

@ 184Kbps minus audio the quality is going to be pretty low.

I hope I calculated this wrong......

Good luck.

Especially for crappy Windows Media Video.

[rklapp]

Super worked well. I created a 6.8 Mb WMV file. Now I need to cut the first and last 30 seconds.

Quality doesn't matter as long as they recieve the message.

Thanks all.

[Scorpion King]

Quality doesn't matter as long as they recieve the message.

You could put up a still shot and play audio ---maybe--- with that 184Kbps, but I don't think you're going to get much of a presentation with these numbers.

Your 30MB file looks like 731Kbps MPEG-1 video and 96Kbps audio.

If you use the KVCD-ULBR-352x240-_NTSCFilm_-PLUS_360min.mcf preset with Tmpgenc Encoder then maybe it might look ok. The filesize for 5 minutes would look like 9MB (give or take a little) using those settings. You could lower the audio to say 96Kbps mono 32,000Hz and save a little more space.

If you use some MPEG-4 codec and was willing to up the filesize a little above that 7MB number, then you can get a great looking video, but it won't play without installing the necessary decoder. Probably not a good idea for someone else's computer.

The KVCD mpeg-1 file would (should) play as is.

Good luck.

[Scorpion King]

you edited your last post on me now mine makes no sense.

Glad you got it.

[rklapp]

Yes, sorry about that.

How's the best way to edit out the beginning and the end of the video for mpg or wmv? Virtual Dub didn't work.

[hech54]

For mpeg try Mpeg-VCR or Virtualdub mpeg.
I do all my editing in virtual dub first(after demuxing the video and audio and changing the audio to .wav)...export as an uncompressed .avi file then convert with something like Super or Riva FLV Encoder.
There is most likely a better/easier way but this has worked for me so I stick to it for now.

[laspis59]

I agree with hech54.I would have edited the MPG file first using Womble MPEG Video Wizard DVD,VideoReDo or VirtualDub MPEG-2,the latter tool being freeware and then exported it either in Direct Stream mode with VD MPEG-2 or used the huffyuv codec (Lossless).
Then I would have used SUPER to convert to WMV.This way is easier for me.

You can try editing the WMV in VirtualDub MPEG2 and after cutting,export in Direct Stream Mode or even easier use Steeper for the last step of your task. .

[fLYtRap]

5 minutes of video that is 7MB is a bitrate of about 184Kbps minus the audio.

@ 184Kbps minus audio the quality is going to be pretty low.

I hope I calculated this wrong......

Good luck.

Especially for crappy Windows Media Video.

Dou you mean WINDOWS MEDIA PLAYER? Whats wrong with that, I'm using all the time with no problems at all. I was using DIVX Player for sometime but it is freezing quite offten.

[laspis59]

5 minutes of video that is 7MB is a bitrate of about 184Kbps minus the audio.

@ 184Kbps minus audio the quality is going to be pretty low.

I hope I calculated this wrong......

Good luck.

Especially for crappy Windows Media Video.

Dou you mean WINDOWS MEDIA PLAYER? Whats wrong with that, I'm using all the time with no problems at all. I was using DIVX Player for sometime but it is freezing quite offten.

No not Windows Media Player but the format .wmv (Windows Media Video) is bad IMO.Anyway Media Player Classic is the best IMHO.