AVStoDVD Support Thread

[manolito]

Manolito
AVStoDVD now only loads Lav filters.
However I still get the same audio delay.

With the exception of the removal of K lite this is pretty much where I started from I believe.

Well, now the audio and video durations match which they didn't before. Still getting the same audio delay is of course disappointing...

I still think that if a source file plays without issues on various players then AVStoDVD should be able to convert it correctly. MP4 files sometimes do contain meta data which MediaInfo does not interpret correctly. For problematic MP4 files I often had success after repacking them to MKV using MKVToolnix. Worth a try...

[LaurieB]

Just as an update and to thankyou for your help.
I tried recapturing at a different frame rate as per davexnet suggestion but unfortunately results were worse.
So I bought a firewire card and Windows 10 picked it up immediately and installed a driver.
Recapturing with the firewire card and setting both VLC and the subsequently AVStoDVD to defaults gave perfect results with no audio synch problems and much improved colours.

Again thankyou for your suggestions and help.

[basile]

I just had again an issue I had back in 2015 a been trying to use Greek letters in the Menu Editor as Menu Title and Title Labels.
I had an idea: to take the original background image, edit it with a photo editor to write the menu title (and maybe the title labels too) in Greek. After that I would use the new background image with the prewritten Greek words on it as background.

So the question is: can I find somewhere the menu as an image file to use it as template to where the titles should go?

[digicube]

There is a menu editor in the program.

[basile]

I know there is a menu editor in the program. That's what I am using, but unfortunately it doesn't support Greek characters

[digicube]

You can change the background image in the menu editor in edit mode.

[basile]

You can change the background image in the menu editor in edit mode.

I know that!
What I was asking is where to find the generated image so that I know where exactly to write on the background image and then change it from the Menu Editor with my new background image.

Have you even read my original post?

[digicube]

It's in the avstodvd install folder of course.

[steptoe]

I know there is a menu editor in the program. That's what I am using, but unfortunately it doesn't support Greek characters

Serious suggestion, have you installed a Greek font. Not Greek style, but genuine Greek language font

As far as I'm aware, the menu editor uses the built-in fonts. Sometimes with other software not recognising fonts correctly, I've manually installed an alternative font and things run ok after that

I searched for Greek fonts, but you end up with Greek style fonts and not true Greek language fonts. Found these though that might be worth a try

https://fonts.google.com/?subset=greek

[basile]

I do have Greek on my computer, either using utf8, either windows-1253, either iso-8859-7 on other programs.
I did try installing Roboto font, chosing it instead of Arial or Arial Greek, but in the Menu Editor preview it's still the same.
I also checked it generating the dvd iso, but still no luck.

[Rainer77]

Does anyone know if there's a way to force AVStoDVD to allow AC3/DD and (more importantly) MP2 pass-through of STEREO/2.0 at bitrates higher than 256kbps?

I know it CAN be done by using a stand-alone avisynth sript, but ...

I actually like the idea of using a low-complexity audio encoder of my choice (i.e. MP2) at relatively high (320 or even 384 kbps) bit-rates.

This has had me scratching my head for years - not just how to get AVStoDVD to oblige, but why it doesn't allow pass-through of what are otherwise perfectly DVD-compliant audio streams in the first place.

[manolito]

From the AVStoDVD documentation:

(*) Audio DVD compliance in AVStoDVD (tighter than official DVD specifications)


AC3
SampleRate: 48000 Hz
Channels Mode: 1.0, 2.0, 5.0, 5.1
BitRate Mode: CBR
BitRates: 64, 96, 128, 160, 192, 224, 256, 384, 448 kbps


MP2
SampleRate: 48000 Hz
Channels Mode: 1.0, 2.0
BitRate Mode: CBR
BitRates: 64, 96, 128, 160, 192, 224, 256 kbps


DTS
SampleRate: 48000/96000 Hz
Resolution: any
Channels Mode: 2.0, 5.0, 5.1
BitRate Mode: CBR
BitRates: 377.25 - 503.25 kbps for 2.0 ch, 754.5 - 1509.75 kbps for 5.0/5.1 ch

I believe that MrC had reasons to restrict the audio bitrates to somewhat tighter values than the official DVD specs. But since the A2D development seems to be on hold you probably will have to live with the current situation.

[Rainer77]

I believe that MrC had reasons to restrict the audio bitrates to somewhat tighter values than the official DVD specs. But since the A2D development seems to be on hold you probably will have to live with the current situation.

I assumed so, it's a pretty well thought out and written program. Still, it is a (to me) a bit of shame because at high bit-rates MP2 stereo is unquestionably superior to AC3, at least using the available encoders. On discs where audio clarity is important but PCM runs the size into dual-layer territory it's an excellent compromise.

I often end up using just using the HCEnc encoder in AVStoDVD and taking the M2V into DVDStyler ..... but the latter's subtitles are pretty ugly if they're needed (only two colours).

[manolito]

Alright, I found a workaround which permits pass-through of 320 kbps MP2 audio in AVStoDVD. Unfortunately it does not work for 384 kbps Mp2 audio. This is the deal:

1. Before you load your source with 320 kbps MP2 audio you need to make sure that "Keep DVD compliant Audio" is checked under "Preferences".
2. Load your source title.
3. Right-click on the title, select "Edit Source Title Info -> Audio Bitrate". Change the audio bitrate from 320 to 256 and click OK.
4. Under "View/Edit Title Settings" make sure that "Audio Direct Stream Copy" is checked. Maybe reduce the video bitrate manually to make room for the larger audio stream.
5. Start your conversion. After the audio demuxing has finished AVStoDVD will pop up a warning that the audio bitrate is incorrect. It offers to use FFmpeg Safe Mode instead. Decline this offer by pressing NO.

That's all. Works for me each and every time. I have no idea which additional safeguard is in place to prohibit this procedure for 384 kbps, but 320 kbps is not too bad already.


Good luck
manolito

[Rainer77]

Alright, I found a workaround which permits pass-through of 320 kbps MP2 audio in AVStoDVD. Unfortunately it does not work for 384 kbps Mp2 audio. This is the deal:

1. Before you load your source with 320 kbps MP2 audio you need to make sure that "Keep DVD compliant Audio" is checked under "Preferences".
2. Load your source title.
3. Right-click on the title, select "Edit Source Title Info -> Audio Bitrate". Change the audio bitrate from 320 to 256 and click OK.
4. Under "View/Edit Title Settings" make sure that "Audio Direct Stream Copy" is checked. Maybe reduce the video bitrate manually to make room for the larger audio stream.
5. Start your conversion. After the audio demuxing has finished AVStoDVD will pop up a warning that the audio bitrate is incorrect. It offers to use FFmpeg Safe Mode instead. Decline this offer by pressing NO.

That's all. Works for me each and every time. I have no idea which additional safeguard is in place to prohibit this procedure for 384 kbps, but 320 kbps is not too bad already.


Good luck
manolito

Above and beyond the call of duty! I'll give it a go and report back.

Rainer.

[Rainer77]

Success! Now all I have to do is compare all the different MP2 encoders to choose from (kidding).

Many thanks Manolito (BTW, you were my favourite character in the series back in the day).

ETA >> works with externally added audio tracks as well.

[manolito]

Are you interested in taking this any further?

I just finished some proof of concept tests to enable 320 and 384 kbps MP2 encodes directly under AVStoDVD. I already have my Wavi_Mod plugin which enables alternative normalization methods, and as a side effect this plugin makes it easy for me to alter the FFmpeg command line settings which A2D creates.

After installing my Wavi_Mod plugin it is possible to override the max MP2 bitrate of A2D and specify 320 and 384 kbps for MP2 audio. No need to use any of the alternative normalization methods, they can be disabled by specifying "mode=0".

Now all I have to do is compare all the different MP2 encoders to choose from (kidding).

This is pretty serious...
FFmpeg has 2 built-in MP2 encoders. There is the native MP2 encoder plus the libtwolame library which is enabled in most FFmpeg binaries. Everyone seems to agree that libtwolame produces better quality than the native MP2 encoder.

AVStoDVD uses the native MP2 encoder exclusively. It is easy to change this in my plugin, but there is one drawback. When the native MP2 encoder is used, AVStoDVD does not complain about an incorrect audio bitrate. This is very nice for unattended conversions. Using libtwolame causes A2D to popup a warning about an incorrect audio bitrate, and the user has to click NO to use the higher audio bitrate. If an unattended conversion is important, you can only use a "Clicker" app which can answer popup windows automatically. I do this all the time, my favorite tool is ClickOFF by Johannes Hübner, but there are many others.

Since I assume that the highest encoding quality is more important to you than the convenience of unattended conversions I will probably update my Wavi_Mod plugin to use libtwolame unconditionally. Should be ready in a few hours. Let me know what you think...


Cheers
manolito


//EDIT//
Careful, mentioning that you remember Manolito from the Hgh Chaparral series reveals how old you are... No more dating young chicks...

//EDIT2//
Done. You can download the updated Wavi_Mod plugin here:
https://files.videohelp.com/u/172211/Manolito_s%20A2D%20Plugins.7z
Make sure to read the PDF manual for installation instructions...

[Rainer77]

Even better. I haven't A/B'd (let alone blind A/B'd) to confirm whether 384 kbps improves on 320, but for the marginal reduction in video bitrate, WTH?

I've actually been using the MP2 encoder in my old copy of Adobe Audition CS6, of which pedigree I know nothing (no info anywhere on the net, for neither it nor Cooledit Pro from whence it came), but it's configurable for joint-stereo / stereo / dual mono (and a few other useful parameters), and I'd be tempted to use dual mono with 384kbps as an option in AVS2DVD. Whatever, I'll definitely be giving the new toy you've provided a go.

BTW, I should have been a little clearer - if the audio is imported as an external stream (as with the Adobe encodes), after doing your tweak no further warnings come up so the encode/compile can be left unattended.

I've heard the BeSweet encoder is good (or even 'best', haha), but haven't played with it yet.

(And yes, I did realise I was giving away my, er, demographic. I guess The HC is shown periodically somewhere on the labyrinth of freeview channels here in the UK (although I don't watch "Live TV" now because I detest the BBC), but I honestly haven't seen an episode since it was on BBC2 for its first run )

[manolito]

To the best of my knowledge MP2 audio encoders are either based on mp2enc or toolame. Hard to know how the FFmpeg encoders fit in there. The internal encoder is just called "mp2", and the other one is "libtwolame" (not toolame). And as usual the FFmpeg docs do not reveal any details.

Whatever, on this FFmpeg web page
https://trac.ffmpeg.org/wiki/Encode/HighQualityAudio
the internal mp2 encoder ranges two notches below the libtwolame encoder in terms of quality. Libtwolame is also way slower than mp2, so it makes sense that it delivers higher quality.

The BeSweet MP2 encoder is mp2enc. Only much later DSPGuru compiled toolame to make it useable under BeSweet. I have a working BeLight installation which lets you choose between the two MP2 encoders, but I never did any quality tests. I believe that CoolEdit and Audition both use mp2enc.

I still could not figure out what makes AVStoDVD trigger this warning popup about incorrect audio bitrate. Looks unpredictable to me. So far when using libtwolame I always get the warning, when I use mp2 I sometimes do and sometimes don't. Strange...

[Rainer77]

This is going to get complicated! I mentioned using Audition CS6 for MP2 encodes, well, something else I often do is pitch-correct 23.98 audio to PAL (Audition uses the excellent Izotope Radius) because I find PAL DVD has quite noticeably better image quality on large flat panel TV's (and I also hate frame-cadence or frame-blend PAL conversion).

So, that necessitates an m2v encode in AVS2DVD. I've found the HCEnc encoder is unbeatable (and the Avisynth tweaks for it in AVS2DVD are all I need), even at high bitrates I find other encoders always have some major drawback, one I find particularly irksome is aliasing/stair-stepping/strobing on things like multiple parallel lines such as venetian blinds. The frame-accurate chaptering (including one for a layer-break if needed) in AVS2DVD is also a boon.

I'm just now converting the excellent Blues Brothers 'extended edition' BRD to PAL DVD, converting the DTS 5.1 to stereo MP2 (I do stereo mixdowns in Audacity, using various levels of attenuation, gain and compression on the individual tracks), and dual-channel, 384kbps MP2 would be awesome.

Will report back ASAP.

[manolito]

I see that you are well equipped with high quality software to do your conversion jobs...

Just a few remarks to remind you that AVStoDVD can do a lot more than what is obvious at first glance.

PAL speedup with audio pitch correction can all be done inside A2D without any external tools. If PAL speedup is ticked under preferences then audio will just get sped up without pitch correction. The relevant line in the AVS script will be:

AssumeFPS("pal_film", sync_audio=true).SSRC(48000)

If you replace this line with the following two lines:

AssumeFPS("pal_film").SSRC(48000) #Or: ResampleAudio(48000)
TimeStretch(tempo = 25.0/(24000.0/1001.0)*100.0)

then pitch will be corrected using TimeStretch which uses the SoundTouch engine. Probably cannot get close to Izotope Radius, but the price is unbeatable.

Tip: Upgrade AviSynth to either version 2.61 Alpha or to AVS+. The TimeStretch versions are newer and much better, they also support 5.1 audio tracks.


And the other thing you might want to test is using my FFmpeg-VBR plugin for AVStoDVD to enable very high quality FFmpeg encodes. By default A2D only uses FFmpeg for very high bitrate conversions, and it uses only the most basic parameters (only CBR, no B-Frames, bad quantization matrix). A few years ago a Doom9 user named Fishman0919 suggested that FFmpeg with optimized parameters could deliver equal or even better quality compared to HCenc. This led to writing my FFmpeg-VBR plugin for A2D which offers 1-pass and 2-pass VBR encodes using either standard quality, high quality or extra high quality parameters. Plus there are custom quant matrices.

At least at medium or low bitrates this should give HCenc a run for the money...

[digicube]

Job list deletion bug. If you have multiple different jobs in queue, when you delete one of the middle ones, it messes up the job right before it by transferring the contents of the deleted job to the job before it. For example

Job1
Job2
Job3
Job4

If you delete Job3, its' contents will transfer over to Job2. Job2 basically becomes Job3. This doesn't happen if you delete the last job on the list like Job4 in this example.

[setup]

Hi,
does anyone know why the colors of transcoded video files using Hcenc 2pass always come out as dull or washed out?
The saturation always seems significantly off, regardless of the source I use.

I read something on another thread about editing RGB values through Avisynth, but im unsure how to apply such script for use through the AVStoDVD application, or if the method would even be effective.
Any help would be appreciated, thanks.

Edit: I see that disabling the colormatrix feature of avisynth will probably work. But I still cant find any information about how to edit avisynth.

[davexnet]

Hi,
does anyone know why the colors of transcoded video files using Hcenc 2pass always come out as dull or washed out?
The saturation always seems significantly off, regardless of the source I use.

I read something on another thread about editing RGB values through Avisynth, but im unsure how to apply such script for use through the AVStoDVD application, or if the method would even be effective.
Any help would be appreciated, thanks.

Edit: I see that disabling the colormatrix feature of avisynth will probably work. But I still cant find any information about how to edit avisynth.

It's on the Avisynth tab of the title edit screen.
The program uses colormatrix for HD > SD resolution change. This is normal, SD (DVD) is supposed to be rec.601

[manolito]

Oops, davexnet beat me on that...

HD sources are usually are Rec.709 while SD (DVDs) are Rec.601. If the colors are not converted before reencoding then you will end up with washed-out colors.

AVStoDVD does this color conversion automatically as long as the source file is flagged correctly as Rec.709. But many HD sources are not using this colorimetry flag at all, and in such cases AVStoDVD will not apply ColorMatrix. You can check this by loading the source file into MediaInfo and see what video colorimetry is reported.

You can of course add the ColorMatrix command manually in AVStoDVD. Go to the Avisynth tab of the title edit screen and select Colors -> ColorMatrix.

[setup]

Oops, davexnet beat me on that...

HD sources are usually are Rec.709 while SD (DVDs) are Rec.601. If the colors are not converted before reencoding then you will end up with washed-out colors.

AVStoDVD does this color conversion automatically as long as the source file is flagged correctly as Rec.709. But many HD sources are not using this colorimetry flag at all, and in such cases AVStoDVD will not apply ColorMatrix. You can check this by loading the source file into MediaInfo and see what video colorimetry is reported.

You can of course add the ColorMatrix command manually in AVStoDVD. Go to the Avisynth tab of the title edit screen and select Colors -> ColorMatrix.

gosh, thanks
must have made about a dozen dvds with bad color now, haha.
in case anyone is interested on how i find dvds to be relevant in the year 2021, just for anyone who is generally curious about the use of this software, ive got a poor friend who only has a dvd player for his tv, so i burn movies for him. you would be surprised on how common dvd players still are, even in the united states.
anyway, thanks again

[setup]

Oops, davexnet beat me on that...

HD sources are usually are Rec.709 while SD (DVDs) are Rec.601. If the colors are not converted before reencoding then you will end up with washed-out colors.

AVStoDVD does this color conversion automatically as long as the source file is flagged correctly as Rec.709. But many HD sources are not using this colorimetry flag at all, and in such cases AVStoDVD will not apply ColorMatrix. You can check this by loading the source file into MediaInfo and see what video colorimetry is reported.

You can of course add the ColorMatrix command manually in AVStoDVD. Go to the Avisynth tab of the title edit screen and select Colors -> ColorMatrix.

interesting, but how can you quickly check what color profile the source video is using? like through VLC media player or something else which involves minimal effort
thanks

[manolito]

interesting, but how can you quickly check what color profile the source video is using? like through VLC media player or something else which involves minimal effort
thanks

The problem is that you really can't...

The two apps which analyze videos are MediaInfo and FFProbe. But they both can only report how the files are flagged in the MetaData headers. The rule of thumb has always been that SD is Rec.601 and HD is Rec.709. Most players will not even try to analyze such flags, instead they simply look at the resolution and set the colors accordingly.

It really gets complicated if your source is an UHD file with HDR (High Dynamic Resolution). Such files use Rec.2020 as their color profile, and ColorMatrix cannot convert this correctly. Converting HDR to SDR is not trivial, the color conversion is not just a linear function. Instead LUTs (Look Up Tables) are used, plus there are a couple of different conversion modes named after their inventors (Reinhard, Hable and some more).

This does not mean that it cannot be done, if you ever run into such a source just let me know (if you are adventurous enough to install AVS+ and LSMASH).

For your original question, the only way to make sure that your converted colors are correct is to make a test conversion using only a short segment of the source and compare the outcome with the source. Trial and error...

[setup]

interesting, but how can you quickly check what color profile the source video is using? like through VLC media player or something else which involves minimal effort
thanks

The problem is that you really can't...

The two apps which analyze videos are MediaInfo and FFProbe. But they both can only report how the files are flagged in the MetaData headers. The rule of thumb has always been that SD is Rec.601 and HD is Rec.709. Most players will not even try to analyze such flags, instead they simply look at the resolution and set the colors accordingly.

It really gets complicated if your source is an UHD file with HDR (High Dynamic Resolution). Such files use Rec.2020 as their color profile, and ColorMatrix cannot convert this correctly. Converting HDR to SDR is not trivial, the color conversion is not just a linear function. Instead LUTs (Look Up Tables) are used, plus there are a couple of different conversion modes named after their inventors (Reinhard, Hable and some more).

This does not mean that it cannot be done, if you ever run into such a source just let me know (if you are adventurous enough to install AVS+ and LSMASH).

For your original question, the only way to make sure that your converted colors are correct is to make a test conversion using only a short segment of the source and compare the outcome with the source. Trial and error...

yes, what you say makes sense.

but anyway, the problem seems to be something different all together, rather than the type of colors a video file is using.
the dull saturation is still present even if i ensure that avisynth is using colormatrix. maybe its a limitation of the DVD video format itself (mpeg2 i think?) but i hesitate on putting full blame on it.
i really wish this was more simple. this is much more work than i want to do for DVD burning, but the colors do look noticeably different. im using various 264/265 video sources and the color difference is just too much for me to accept... i feel that hcenc 2pass could look better than this

[davexnet]

interesting, but how can you quickly check what color profile the source video is using? like through VLC media player or something else which involves minimal effort
thanks

The problem is that you really can't...

The two apps which analyze videos are MediaInfo and FFProbe. But they both can only report how the files are flagged in the MetaData headers. The rule of thumb has always been that SD is Rec.601 and HD is Rec.709. Most players will not even try to analyze such flags, instead they simply look at the resolution and set the colors accordingly.

It really gets complicated if your source is an UHD file with HDR (High Dynamic Resolution). Such files use Rec.2020 as their color profile, and ColorMatrix cannot convert this correctly. Converting HDR to SDR is not trivial, the color conversion is not just a linear function. Instead LUTs (Look Up Tables) are used, plus there are a couple of different conversion modes named after their inventors (Reinhard, Hable and some more).

This does not mean that it cannot be done, if you ever run into such a source just let me know (if you are adventurous enough to install AVS+ and LSMASH).

For your original question, the only way to make sure that your converted colors are correct is to make a test conversion using only a short segment of the source and compare the outcome with the source. Trial and error...

yes, what you say makes sense.

but anyway, the problem seems to be something different all together, rather than the type of colors a video file is using.
the dull saturation is still present even if i ensure that avisynth is using colormatrix. maybe its a limitation of the DVD video format itself (mpeg2 i think?) but i hesitate on putting full blame on it.
i really wish this was more simple. this is much more work than i want to do for DVD burning, but the colors do look noticeably different. im using various 264/265 video sources and the color difference is just too much for me to accept... i feel that hcenc 2pass could look better than this

This can happen if the source is HDR (as mentioned above by manolito),
because the program does not do the color map necessary for HDR > rec.601 SD conversion
You can open your source in mediainfo, text view, and probably confirm the HDR there, or you post a clip to the forum