Question about way too high bit rate video from digital camera

[jimdagys]

A friend has a Canon digital camera that also takes videos. He took a 4 minute video, but the file size was 400MB. I took a quick look at the Gspot and it said the video was AVI with a very high bit rate and PCM audio.
Question #1) I don't understand why the camera would make a video with such non-standard parameters.
I just wanted to burn the video to a CD and play the AVI in a DVD player.
I tried to use AVIDemux to convert the video to standard parameter AVI, but I got some kind of initialization error from AVIDemux.
Then I tried to use VirtualDubMod, but when I tried to convert the audio to standard rate mp3, (chose Lame mp3) the right window was blank (no mp3 bit rate parameters shown).
Then I tried to use Total Video Converter and convert to standard bit rate AVI (xvid), but I got an error message when I tried to convert.
Then I tried to use TMPGEnc 4 Xpress and convert to a standard bit rate AVI. This worked fine, and I was able to play the resulting video (74MB, see screenshot) fine on a DVD player.
Question #2) Why did AviDemux, VirtualDubMod and Total Video Recorder fail, but TMPGEnc 4 Xpress succeeded to make a useful conversion?

[jagabo]

VirtualDub:

Audio -> Full Processing
Audio -> Conversion... 48 KHz, 16 bit, stereo, high quality
Audio -> Compression... Lame

[jimdagys]

Here is the Gspot for a video taken with this camera.
Also, here is a link to a 3 second video.
Link:
http://rapidshare.com/files/321572027/MVI_0001.avi
Can someone take a look at this and see if you can convert it (using free software) to standard bit rate avi (playable on DVD player) with standard mp3 audio. I could not convert this with the above software (except for TMPGEnc 4Xpress). Avidemux would not allow me to convert the PCM audio to mp3, but I could convert the video to standard xvid. Also, I would still like to know why the default settings on this camera puts out such non standard video (huge files). I thought I could just take a video with the camera and then play it (AVI) on a DVD player, but that is definitely not the case. I know VirtualDub was mentioned for converting, but I already have VirtualDubMod, and I couldn't get that to work. I am reluctant to install too much software unless I have good knowledge that it will work.

[Gavino]

I would still like to know why the default settings on this camera puts out such non standard video (huge files). I thought I could just take a video with the camera and then play it (AVI) on a DVD player, but that is definitely not the case.

There is no such thing as "standard bit rate AVI". AVI is a container which can contain a huge variety of video formats and bitrates.

Your camera creates videos in MJPEG format, which is widely used and is fairly common for videos produced by a 'stills' camera. The high bitrate and lack of inter-frame compression makes it suitable for editing.

DVD players that support AVI files normally limit that support to xvid/DivX content, leading to a common misconception that AVI and xvid are somehow the same thing.

[hech54]

That looks exactly like what my Canon portable produces. I've never had a problem working with them in either AviDemux or VirtualDub. I recently produced a DVD for my relatives overseas with clips from this camera. Never thought of making an Xvid out of it though.

[hech54]

I just did a test clip.....to Xvid with MP3 audio in Avidemux. Worked perfectly.

[jagabo]

VirtualDubMod:

Streams -> Stream List
right click on stream and select: Full Processing
right click on stream and select: Conversion..., 44,100 Hz, 16 bit, high quality
right click on stream and select: Compression..., Lame, 44,100 Hz, 160 kbps, CBR, mono

vdubmod.avi

[jimdagys]

PROBLEM SOLVED Thanks. I never have done that extra step (conversion) in VirtualDubMod. That did the trick. (See screenshot 1) When converting this particular file, if you don't first click "conversion", you end up with a blank mp3 parameter window (see screenshot 2). If you click "conversion" and set the conversion parameters, then you select "compression", "Lame" and then you can select the mp3 parameters (see screenshot 3).

[jagabo]

Lame doesn't like the 8 bit sample precision of the original. It will accept 22050 Hz though.

[edDV]

A friend has a Canon digital camera that also takes videos. He took a 4 minute video, but the file size was 400MB. I took a quick look at the Gspot and it said the video was AVI with a very high bit rate and PCM audio.
Question #1) I don't understand why the camera would make a video with such non-standard parameters.
I just wanted to burn the video to a CD and play the AVI in a DVD player...

That camera like many in its class record video with an MJPEG codec. Some wrap MJPEG in a *.avi wrapper, others use a *.mov Quicktime wrapper. MJPEG is a sequence of JPG stills with no inter-frame compression. You can compress these further by encoding to MPeg2 or MPeg4.

Audio is mono uncompressed 8 bit PCM at low 11KHz sample rate. Some use only 8KHz sample rate. PCM audio can be compressed to much smaller size.

These early generation digital cameras took short cuts with quality in order to fit flash media. The JPG frames are heavily compressed and audio is under-sampled. Some newer generation cameras have hardware h.264 encoders built in. These also use avi or mov wrappers.

[hech54]

These early generation digital cameras took short cuts with quality in order to fit flash media. The JPG frames are heavily compressed and audio is under-sampled.

Mine is a Canon Ixus 90. It is about 6 months old and is still being sold today.

[edDV]

These early generation digital cameras took short cuts with quality in order to fit flash media. The JPG frames are heavily compressed and audio is under-sampled.

Mine is a Canon Ixus 90. It is about 6 months old and is still being sold today.

Yes, many point and shoot models still use MJPEG and PCM for video.

[Gavino]

These early generation digital cameras took short cuts with quality in order to fit flash media. The JPG frames are heavily compressed and audio is under-sampled.

In the OP's case, the video compression is reasonable at ~15mbps (he's complaining the bitrate's too high!), but the audio is certainly poor (8-bit, 11KHz, mono).