Sony camcorder DVD ripping

[trc777]

Hi,

I would like to edit the 16:9 recordings from my Sony DVD camcorder, therefore I would like to convert it to mpeg2 files. I have tried several ripping tools, however the resulting files have always a wrong aspect ratio. My suspection is that the dvds the camcorder produces are in non-standard resolution (I have found one reference stating the actual resolution of 490 x 295). Questions:
- is there a way to determine the resolution of the original dvds from the camcorder?
- is there a dvd ripping tool that can manage non-standard resolution inputs?
Thanks in advance.

[yoda313]

Which ripping tools are you using? Standard dvd is 720x480 or 720x576 (ntsc and pal respectively).

Any software player like powerdvd can tell you the resolution of the dvd while you play it.

Try ripping with something like dvd shrink or dvd decrytper. Since these are home made discs you don't have to use the latest ripper to get around encryption - these are unencrypted. You should get a bit for bit copy with nothing touched.

[edDV]

What camcorder model number? Most likely they are already MPeg2 files.

[trc777]

Hi,

thanks for reactions.

The footage in question was taken in 16:9 mode and WinDVD plays it correctly as such. However, when I look into the source properties, it says 720x576 (4:3), which is obviously wrong. But when I capture a static bitmap from it, it has 1024x576, which makes sense - at least it is perfectly 16:9.

So far I have used couple of ripping SWs, including DVD Shrink, but what I need is actually conversion to an editable format, not the ripping from DVD medium to HDD itself.

The camcorder is DCR-DVD405. What it produces is standard DVDs (apparently except fot the picture size), with VIDEO_TS and VOBs.

What I would like to achieve is set of editable files, preferably one for each chapter - like chapter1.mpeg, chapter2.mpeg etc. Mpeg-2 is not a condition, but I wouldn't like to use the quality if not needed.

[guns1inger]

PAL widescreen is 720 x 576. What you don't seem to understand is that video does not have square pixels, so when 16:9 material is played back correctly, the image is wider.

The best format depends on your editing software. There is dedicated, specialist mpeg editing software like videoredo or womble mpeg vcr, that removes the need to re-encode everything for simple edits.

Sony Vegas or Vegas Movie Studio will accept the VOBs from your camcorder directly and allow you to edit them, but will re-encode everything once you are done.

For most other programs, DV is the best format for space/quality compromise, either that, or a lossless format such as lagarith. You can convert your VOBs to DV or lossless using Virtualdubmpeg2. You will also have to install the Panasonic DV codec, or lagarith (or both).

[edDV]

..., when I look into the source properties, it says 720x576 (4:3), which is obviously wrong. But when I capture a static bitmap from it, it has 1024x576, which makes sense - at least it is perfectly 16:9.

720x576 is correct for either 4:3 or 16:9. This is true for all ITU-Rec-601 formats (e.g. DV, DVD MPeg2, ATSC, DVB). This is the main concept you need to understand.

Look at https://www.videohelp.com/dvd for a description of the DVD format. Also see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ITU-R_BT.601 for context.

16:9 DVD MPeg2 differs from 4:3 only in Pixel Aspect Ratio (PAR) indicated by the wide screen flag. A computer DVD player will resample these decoded 720x576 wide pixels into aprroximately 1024x576 square pixels for computer monitor display. "Full Screen" mode will upscale 720x576 to the desktop horizontal resolution.

Progressive TV sets receive 720x576 over digital connections and then upscale to the monitor's native square pixel resolution such as 1366x768 or 1920x1080.

[trc777]

OK, a bit more clear to me now - thank you for explainig, I appreciate your attitude towards a newbie.
What is now less clear is: I have set the camera to 16:9 mode, DAR of the resulting DVD says "4:3" (at least InterVideo WinDVD says so). PowerDVD really plays it in 4:3 (squeezed), but WinDVD somehow figures out that it is 16:9 and plays it correctly. Is there then some other method how the player can determine the correct aspect ratio?

[edDV]

Either the camcorder is not setting the wide flag properly or the player is ignoring the flag. There should be manual override in the player controls to display 16:9 regardless of flag.

As for correcting the flag, that excedes my knowledge. I'll defer to others.

[guns1inger]

ReStream or DVD Patcher can alter the AR flag in the mpeg or VOBs respectively. PGCEdit or IFOAR2WS can alter the AR flag in the IFO files.

[trc777]

Thanks a lot. From the tools mentioned I can definitely assemble a functioning workflow.