Number of possible chapter entry points: 1 - WTF?

[DRP]

I've created a VCD compliant MPEG with TMPGEnc and I want to author it to disc with chapters. I know the exact frames where I want all the chapters, but once I load the file into VCDEasy and it analyses it, I get a notice on the chapters tab that says "Number of possible chapter entry points: 1".

Sure enough, I can't add any chapters other than the very first one at 00:00:00.000. What have I done wrong? Why can't I insert any chapters?

[disturbed1]

Perhaps there aren't any mpeg sequence headers. This was an old problem with the Panasonic Mpeg encoder. By the way, chapter points have to be on I frames.

Here's a tool to read in you mpv/m1v video streams and add the sequence headers. https://www.videohelp.com/tools/MPEG_Sequence_Maker

If that doesn't work, revisit your TMPG settings. Make sure the GOP is configured correctly. Maybe try something like the screen shot below.

[DRP]

Thanks for that. I dunno what's going on because I never play around with the GOP or Matricies tabs at all. I don't know what's going on in those tabs, so I don't mess with them. I just leave the default settings alone and never touch them, so I can't understand why there (presumably) aren't any I-frames in the resulting MPEG.

[Midzuki]

DRP wrote:

Thanks for that. I dunno what's going on because I never play around with the GOP or Matricies tabs at all. I don't know what's going on in those tabs, so I don't mess with them.

It's never too late for starting to learn.
As Rynn Jacobs wisely pointed out, "wizards" are stultifying.
Besides, do not forget that many set-top players simply ignore the existence of chapter points
in VCDs and/or SVCDs. Recommended URL:

http://download.videohelp.com/vitualis/

[DRP]

The standard GOP structure I used was the TMPGEnc default of BBIBBPBBPBBPBBPBBP. Is there some reason why this is wrong?

The MPEG I made was MPEG-1 at CBR 1136kbps + MP2 @ 192kbps. 352x288 PAL. VCDEasy says it's fine. The only drama is that I can't add any chapters to it and it won't tell me why not other than "Number of possible chapter entry points: 1"

[disturbed1]

The standard GOP structure I used was the TMPGEnc default of BBIBBPBBPBBPBBPBBP. Is there some reason why this is wrong?

The MPEG I made was MPEG-1 at CBR 1136kbps + MP2 @ 192kbps. 352x288 PAL. VCDEasy says it's fine. The only drama is that I can't add any chapters to it and it won't tell me why not other than "Number of possible chapter entry points: 1"

Did you read my post

Give mpeg sequence maker a try.

Also, make sure you are creating a VCD 2.0 with PBC. VCD 2.0 added more features and PBC stands for Play Back Control.

Standard VCD is 1152kb/s + 224kb/s audio. BUT- Your settings should be ok.

[DRP]

I'm not sure what to do. I've demuxed the file using Womble and then shoved the video into Sequence Maker. It loads okay. Options screen I see has the option for Insert Sequence Header at...

There's nothing in the box but if I tick TIME & MAKE Chapters then click Scan file, it fills the box to the right with a heap of time stamps. Is that what I want? I don't know what I'm doing.

[aedipuss]

your gop structure is wrong and the bitrates wonky. a gop has to start with an I frame and the bitrates need to be 1150 and 224 to be compliant. no I frames starting the gops prevents any chapter points. make sure you use closed gops also for better accuracy of entry points. check your templates as you must have changed and saved it at some point.

[disturbed1]

You could just click on every GOP. This will place a time stamp on every I frame in the mpeg file. An mpg is made up of a GOP - Group Of Pictures. With 3 frame types, I - intra, P - Predicted, B - Bidirectional. I frame contain the most information and are the least compressed. When searching, seeking, cutting, skipping..... this has to be done on an I frame. Since the I frame contains all of the information. Like time stamps. You can only create chapters on I frames because of this. Think of playing a file with a huge GOP (WMV), when you seek in the file, it isn't instant, it takes a second or too for play back to resynchronize, because the player has to find the nearest I frame. (S)VCD and DVD has specs that prevent this from happening on set top players. Could you imagine the displeasure one would have from this experience.

ANYWAY --

Try to select on every GOP, and see what VCDEasy does. Also check your aspect ration. Should be CCIR601 625lines PAL.

As stated above, make sure VCD2.0 is check, and PBC is enabled with VCD Easy. In order for chapters to work on your player, it also has to support VCD 2.0 and PBC functions. VCD 2.0 and PBC have option to use Menus as well. They will not function like DVD Menus. But you can create a still with thumb nails, number each thumb nail (1-12 for example), a user would press the number on the remote to jump to that thumb nail. Motion and navigation are not support.

[disturbed1]

your gop structure is wrong and the bitrates wonky. a gop has to start with an I frame and the bitrates need to be 1150 and 224 to be compliant. no I frames starting the gops prevents any chapter points. make sure you use closed gops also for better accuracy of entry points. check your templates as you must have changed and saved it at some point.

I saw that too. But TMPG HAS to include I frames. I was hoping it was just an incorrect copy and paste. In my version of TMPG (beta 12) you can't set the I frame count to 0, it changes to 1 after you click away.

VCD supports a GOP up to 56 pictures in length. Maybe more? Philips VCD Toolkit will mux and author files with GOPs that long, at least. 1152 is the max allowed bitrate, it can go lower. 224 for the audio is standard, and some authoring applications will reject the files that are not exactly this bitrate. I haven't personally had issues with play back and 128 audio, but it (128) is not standard.

[DRP]

I'm using TMPGEnc v2.524.63.181, I have VCD 2.0 and PBC set in VCDEasy. I also know that my DVD player supports VCD with PBC so no dramas with any of that. I also don't use any templates in TMPGenc. I reconfigure the settings for myself each time but I have never changed around any of the GOP settings or Matricies. I have always just left them as the defaults that TMPGEnc sets itself. There is a STANDARD button for the GOP setting and a DEFAULT setting for the Matrices. I have both set to these.

I know the bitrates are non-standard but I also know it makes no difference to the problem I have nor to the playability on my DVD player, so this is irrelevent.

How can my GOP structure be "wrong" when it's the default that TMPGEnc applies? I have not messed with it ever and I've never loaded other templates or even ever used templates at all.

I'll load the modified Sequence Maker version of the MPEG into VCDEasy and see if that makes a difference. Can't do it just now because of other software issues that need to complete first. Need to restart the computer to clean up some memory leaks first.

[aedipuss]

it's not the default. open tmpgenc. click load at the bottom, navigate to it's template folder and select either the pal or ntsc VCD template. that is how you load the default template. if you just open tmpgenc it loads whatever was used last time and it appears things got changed at some time.

non-standard bitrates make what you encode eVCD or xVCD and should be rejected by vcdeasy if you haven't turned off or relaxed error checking.

[DRP]

Huzzah!! I found the problem! It had nothing to do with sequence headers. I had to check the box marked "Relax the APS constraints for chapter entry points (not advised)" visible only when Expert Mode has been selected. With that done I can finally add chapter points where I want them to be.

Oh and BTW, the default TMPGEnc GOP structure does not change regardless of what included template you load. I have tried all the default standard included templates provided with the program and the GOP is always BBIBBPBBPBBPBBPBBP

[Midzuki]

I had to check the box marked "Relax the APS constraints for chapter entry points (not advised)" visible only when [s:c2daea8418]Expert[/s:c2daea8418] Less-Of-An-Idiot Mode has been selected.

< Thought Of The Day >

There is no such thing as an "advanced user".

< /Thought Of The Day >

[aedipuss]

here's the GOP list from a tmpgenc vcd template

-IBBPBBPBBPBBPBBPBB-

[DRP]

I had to check the box marked "Relax the APS constraints for chapter entry points (not advised)" visible only when [s:3c3f15ed6f]Expert[/s:3c3f15ed6f] Less-Of-An-Idiot Mode has been selected.

< Thought Of The Day >

There is no such thing as an "advanced user".

< /Thought Of The Day >

Here's a thought for the day for you. If I'm the idiot, how come no-one in here could think of this solution and suggest me to try it?

[DRP]

here's the GOP list from a tmpgenc vcd template

-IBBPBBPBBPBBPBBPBB-

You must have modified your templates to get that. The original template files included with TMPGEnc install executable are all time/date stamped 25/10/04 19:08. The PAL VCD one looks like this:

object TMPEGConfigFile
  MPEG.Text = '$$VCD_PAL'
  MPEG.WizardCategoryName = '$$HIDE'
  MPEG.WizardSubFormatName = ''
  MPEG.WizardCaption = ''
  MPEG.WizardDescription = ''
  MPEG.WizardTargetMedia = MPEGConfig_TargetMediaType_Unknown
  MPEG.WizardAutoCalcVideoBitRate = False
  MPEG.WizardAutoChooseList.EnableVideoSize = False
  MPEG.WizardAutoChooseList.VideoSize = <>
  MPEG.WizardAutoChooseList.EnableVideoGOP = False
  MPEG.WizardAutoChooseList.VideoGOP = <>
  MPEG.OutputStreamType = MPEG_OutputStreamType_System_VideoAudio
  MPEG.OutputStreamType_ReadOnly = True
  MPEG.Video.StreamType = MPEGVideoEncoder_StreamType_MPEG1
  MPEG.Video.StreamType_ReadOnly = True
  MPEG.Video.Width = 352
  MPEG.Video.Width_ReadOnly = True
  MPEG.Video.Height = 288
  MPEG.Video.Height_ReadOnly = True
  MPEG.Video.YUVFormat = 1
  MPEG.Video.YUVFormat_ReadOnly = True
  MPEG.Video.DC_prec = 0
  MPEG.Video.DC_prec_ReadOnly = True
  MPEG.Video.VideoEncodeMode = MPEGVideoEncoder_VideoEncodeMode_Progressive
  MPEG.Video.VideoEncodeMode_ReadOnly = False
  MPEG.Video.FrameRate = 3
  MPEG.Video.FrameRate_ReadOnly = True
  MPEG.Video.AspectRatio = 8
  MPEG.Video.AspectRatio_ReadOnly = True
  MPEG.Video.RateControlMode = MPEGVideoEncoder_RateControlMode_CBR
  MPEG.Video.RateControlMode_ReadOnly = True
  MPEG.Video.MaxBitRate = 0
  MPEG.Video.MaxBitRate_ReadOnly = False
  MPEG.Video.MinBitRate = 0
  MPEG.Video.MinBitRate_ReadOnly = False
  MPEG.Video.CBR_BitRate = 1150000
  MPEG.Video.VBR_MultipassVBRAlgorithm = MPEGVideoEncoder_MultipassVBRAlgorithm_MultipassCQ
  MPEG.Video.VBR_AvgBitRate = 1150000
  MPEG.Video.VBR_MaxBitRate = 1150000
  MPEG.Video.VBR_MinBitRate = 0
  MPEG.Video.VBR_MaxPassCount = 2
  MPEG.Video.VBR_Quality_P = 0
  MPEG.Video.VBR_Quality_B = 20
  MPEG.Video.VBR_EnablePadding = False
  MPEG.Video.MVBR_MaxBitRate = 3000000
  MPEG.Video.MVBR_MinBitRate = 0
  MPEG.Video.MVBR_Quality_P = 0
  MPEG.Video.MVBR_Quality_B = 20
  MPEG.Video.MVBR_EnablePadding = False
  MPEG.Video.AVBR_Quality = 50
  MPEG.Video.AVBR_MaxBitRate = 3000000
  MPEG.Video.AVBR_MinBitRate = 0
  MPEG.Video.AVBR_EnablePadding = False
  MPEG.Video.CQ_Quality = 50
  MPEG.Video.CQ_Quality_P = 0
  MPEG.Video.CQ_Quality_B = 20
  MPEG.Video.CQ_MaxBitRate = 3000000
  MPEG.Video.CQ_MinBitRate = 0
  MPEG.Video.CQ_EnablePadding = False
  MPEG.Video.VBVBufferSize = 40960
  MPEG.Video.VBVBufferSize_ReadOnly = True
  MPEG.Video.GOP_SeqHeaderInterval = 1
  MPEG.Video.GOP_SeqHeaderInterval_ReadOnly = True
  MPEG.Video.GOP_I_FrameCount = 1
  MPEG.Video.GOP_I_FrameCount_ReadOnly = False
  MPEG.Video.GOP_P_FrameCount = 5
  MPEG.Video.GOP_P_FrameCount_ReadOnly = False
  MPEG.Video.GOP_B_FrameCount = 2
  MPEG.Video.GOP_B_FrameCount_ReadOnly = False
  MPEG.Video.GOP_BitStreamForEdit = False
  MPEG.Video.GOP_BitStreamForEdit_ReadOnly = False
  MPEG.Video.GOP_MaxFrameCount = 0
  MPEG.Video.GOP_MaxFrameCount_ReadOnly = False
  MPEG.Video.QuantizeMatrix_Intra_ReadOnly = False
  MPEG.Video.QuantizeMatrix_NonIntra_ReadOnly = False
  MPEG.Video.Profile = 4
  MPEG.Video.Profile_ReadOnly = False
  MPEG.Video.Level = 8
  MPEG.Video.Level_ReadOnly = False
  MPEG.Video.VideoFormat = 1
  MPEG.Video.VideoFormat_ReadOnly = False
  MPEG.Video.MotionSearchSpeed = MPEGVideoEncoder_MotionSearchSpeed_Normal
  MPEG.Video.MotionSearch_AlwaysHalfPel = False
  MPEG.Video.UseFloatDCT = False
  MPEG.Video.QuantizeMode = False
  MPEG.Video.QuantizeModeVal_Intra = 35
  MPEG.Video.QuantizeModeVal_NonIntra = 35
  MPEG.Video.YUVBasicYCbCr = False
  MPEG.Video.QuantizeMatrix_Intra = {
    081013161A1B1D22101016181B1D222513161A1B1D22222616161A1B1D222528
    161A1B1D202328301A1B1D202328303A1A1B1D22262E38451B1D23262E384553}
  MPEG.Video.QuantizeMatrix_NonIntra = {
    1011121314151617111213141516171812131415161718191314151617181A1B
    14151617191A1B1C151617181A1B1C1E1617181A1B1C1E1F1718191B1C1E1F21}
  MPEG.Audio.StreamType = MPEGAudioEncoder_StreamType_MPEG1_Layer2
  MPEG.Audio.StreamType_ReadOnly = True
  MPEG.Audio.SamplingFrequency = 44100
  MPEG.Audio.SamplingFrequency_ReadOnly = True
  MPEG.Audio.ChannelMode = 0
  MPEG.Audio.ChannelMode_ReadOnly = False
  MPEG.Audio.CantUseMono = True
  MPEG.Audio.BitRate = 224000
  MPEG.Audio.BitRate_ReadOnly = True
  MPEG.Audio.CalcCRC = False
  MPEG.Audio.CalcCRC_ReadOnly = False
  MPEG.Audio.OriginalFlag = False
  MPEG.Audio.OriginalFlag_ReadOnly = False
  MPEG.Audio.CopyrightFlag = False
  MPEG.Audio.CopyrightFlag_ReadOnly = False
  MPEG.Audio.PrivateFlag = False
  MPEG.Audio.PrivateFlag_ReadOnly = False
  MPEG.Audio.EmphasisType = 0
  MPEG.Audio.EmphasisType_ReadOnly = False
  MPEG.System.StreamType = MPEGSystemEncoder_StreamType_MPEG1_VideoCD
  MPEG.System.StreamType_ReadOnly = True
  MPEG.System.CommentText = ''
  MPEG.System.EnableCommentText = False
end

and most certainly gives you BBIBBPBBPBBPBBPBBP for a GOP structure.

[aedipuss]

right. not a chance, mine are bone stock and copied right off the gop settings page. a 1,5,2 from your config files starts with 1 I frame and gives you IBBPBBPBBPBBPBBPBB. change the GOP_I_FrameCount_ReadOnly = to "true" and do the same for B and P frames. see what tmpgenc says then.

if you don't, good luck working with gops that don't start with an I frame. the last thing you want in any video is a starting frame that references the previous gop.

check the specs-
http://stream.uen.org/medsol/dvd/pages/dvd_format_video4DVDvideo.html

[DRP]

right. not a chance, mine are bone stock and copied right off the gop settings page. a 1,5,2 from your config files starts with 1 I frame and gives you IBBPBBPBBPBBPBBPBB. change the GOP_I_FrameCount_ReadOnly = to "true" and do the same for B and P frames. see what tmpgenc says then.

Did that & it makes no difference. GOP box is still greyed out, unable to be directly edited and still has the same GOP structure in it. The only way to get the GOP structure to start with an I is to check the Closed GOP box, but I don't want a closed GOP structure because it results in a bigger filesize for no gain in picture quality.

if you don't, good luck working with gops that don't start with an I frame. the last thing you want in any video is a starting frame that references the previous gop.

Well, I've been using TMPGEnc with these default settings quite successfully for at least the last 5 years and never had an issue, so I'm pretty sure I don't need to be playing around with these things. I can only suggest that you haven't read above that I'm using TMPGEnc Plus v2.5 and you're using the later TMPGEnc Xpress v4.x instead. I really can't think of any other reason why you keep insisting that what I see on my screen is somehow wrong when I haven't changed anything from the default TMPGEnc install package.

[aedipuss]

because i have been using the standard templates for 2.54 and even installed a brand new 2.59 for you just to check and make sure i was correct. same as disturbed_1 has been. you don't think we're both wrong do you? i've been using tmpgenc for about 7 years.....

you need to understand how I, P, B frames relate. a GOP is a group of pictures made up of I, P, B frames. the only frame that can be displayed by itself is an I frame, B and P are basically referenced changes from I frames. you can make a video with only I frames but you can't make any video with no I frames. B frames can reference frames before it or after it so starting with a B frame is a not a good idea as it can be tied to the previous GOP same as ending with a B frame can tie the GOP to the next one. that's why a closed GOP can't end on a B and starts with an I, so as to make all GOPs independent.

attached is a new clean pal vcd template from 2.54 (2002) for you to try. but i can also supply any from 2.50 to 2.59 if you'd like.


videocd%20(pal).mcf

[DRP]

I don't question the technicalities of GOP structures at all. All I'm saying is that the defaults for TMPGEnc are as I've stated them to be. I have tried everything you've suggested and I never get the result you say I should be getting. I don't know how or what you're doing but what you say is happening on your screen isn't the same thing that happens on mine.

Regardless, I don't use TMPGEnc's templates at all anyway. The only one I've ever used is "unlock" and I've never edited the default GOP structures or Matrices at all. You may very well be right in saying that the default GOP structure in TMPGEnc is "wrong" but for the life of me I can't get it to be what you think it should be. Furthermore, I've never had any problem with the encodes I do using the default TMPGEnc settings as stated so I see little point in trying to find fault where there is none.