Blu-ray to DVD conversion - MacPro

[crjackson]

No luck with subtitles still, VLC says they're there, but they don't work. Either way, I'm still pretty happy. The transcoding on DVDStyler is out of this world so far. I'm going to continue using it, and I may try to contact the developer for assistance. I think it's supposed to work based on the settings available but it's either broken, or I'm still not using it correctly. I'll definitely make a healthy donation to this project after I've had good results with a few more movies. I think this one is going to be my final answer.

[crjackson]

Okay, now here's something I find strange. The final product burned to DVD plays choppy on my computer regardless of weather or not it's in the Superdrive or the Bluray drive. If I put the same DVD in my set top player, it's smooth as silk. The video quality produced by MakeMKV + DVDStyler is most impressive on my TV. Very happy with the result, and yes, it's a HiDef TV with a large screen. The DVD playback on the converted move looks fantastic.

But why would it be choppy on my computer's optical drives? They haven't done this before.

[phase52001]

@crjackson

a lot of activity overnight. i'm on the other side of the planet so I've only just gotten up.

a couple of final thoughts, as you seem to be getting plenty of help.

MakeMKV will include subtitles etc when you rip. You can choose the audio and subtitle tracks you want of course.

In Handbrake when you recode the large MKV file as an MKV file are you selecting the audio, subtitle and chapters tracks?
In audio you can select the audio format you want, AAC is the default, and you can repeat the same audio track in as many formats as you like. And you can have as many different audio tracks as you originally ripped.
You need to select subtitles to choose the ones you ripped, and decide if you want soft or hard. Otherwise, no subtitles.
Chapters will show the chapters if they ripped. (Or you can use MKVChapterizer in windows to add chapters to any MKV file).

Bluray -> MakeMKV -> Hard Drive -> Handbrake -> DVD. Works fine for me. And for friends to whom I've loaned disc's.

And yes, it may be your Bluray player as someone mention. Can you access another Bluray player to test this?

Good luck.

[Cornucopia]

Remember, at least according to that tutorial, DVDStyler uses raw, external SRT (text)-based subs as its source, NOT subs that are already muxed into an MKV.
If you've already muxed them in, use MKVCleaver or similar to get a raw, external copy. If they still don't happen to be SRT format, use a subs editor app to convert them to SRT prior to inputting to DVDStyler.

Good luck,
Scott

[crjackson]

Remember, at least according to that tutorial, DVDStyler uses raw, external SRT (text)-based subs as its source, NOT subs that are already muxed into an MKV.
If you've already muxed them in, use MKVCleaver or similar to get a raw, external copy. If they still don't happen to be SRT format, use a subs editor app to convert them to SRT prior to inputting to DVDStyler.

Good luck,
Scott

Okay, I'll have to work on that later tonight or tomorrow. Momma says I'm done for the day. Thanks for the information. Any ideas why the choppy playback on my computer optical drives?

[rumplestiltskin]

MP4Tools also will extract "srt" subtitles from MP4 and MKV files. If you need "srt" subtitles otherwise, many are available from subscene.com, divxsubtitles.net and many other places.

[crjackson]

MP4Tools also will extract "srt" subtitles from MP4 and MKV files. If you need "srt" subtitles otherwise, many are available from subscene.com, divxsubtitles.net and many other places.

Thanks, I'll work on that tomorrow.

[crjackson]

Downloading the srt files is looking better and better. I installed the MP4 tools and tried to extract the srt's from an MKV file, but all the extraction buttons (go button) is grayed out and I can't seem to kickstart it. It seems to read the MKV and I would expect that it could extract it but it won't start. What am I doing wrong?

[rumplestiltskin]

I've seen this occasionally. Use the "MP4" tab and click the "mux" button for the subtitles. Also check one video and one audio track. When you then click the "Convert" button, the app will prepare for the conversion by -first- extracting the subs as SRT files, then it will continue. Once you see the SRT files appear in the directory where the conversion is taking place, cancel the rest of the conversion and "keep" all files. You can toss everything the app produced except, of course, for the desired SRT files.

Proceed as you wish from this point forward. Please advise if this helps.

[crjackson]

I've seen this occasionally. Use the "MP4" tab and click the "mux" button for the subtitles. Also check one video and one audio track. When you then click the "Convert" button, the app will prepare for the conversion by -first- extracting the subs as SRT files, then it will continue. Once you see the SRT files appear in the directory where the conversion is taking place, cancel the rest of the conversion and "keep" all files. You can toss everything the app produced except, of course, for the desired SRT files.

Proceed as you wish from this point forward. Please advise if this helps.

Thanks for your help, I must not be using the MP4 tools correctly. I got it to extract the subtitles as you stated, but they are coming out as .sup instead of .srt. I can't find a setting to change it anywhere.

[rumplestiltskin]

The subtitles may -be- ".sup" in which case you'll need another tool as MP4Tools' doesn't convert subtitles from one format to another.

[crjackson]

The subtitles may -be- ".sup" in which case you'll need another tool as MP4Tools' doesn't convert subtitles from one format to another.

Okay, I thought I was doing it wrong. I think I'll save myself some trouble and just download the subs from the site listed above. If they don't have it then neither will I. The downloaded srt's worked well for one title, but I'm having trouble with another (no doubt due to my inexperience). I'm loving Handbrake though. Really excellent quality in the end, it's amazing how small it can compress the file without losing a lot of quality.

[rumplestiltskin]

Regarding subtitles: Is it a bad thing to have the language you need burned into the video so it always displays?

[crjackson]

Regarding subtitles: Is it a bad thing to have the language you need burned into the video so it always displays?

No, it's fine for me but the wife doesn't like it so much.

[crjackson]

Currently here's what works very well (so far) for me;

1 - Rip movie with MakeMKV (select Only the main title and 1 audio file, NO SUBTITLES)

2 - Download the subtitle .srt file from a website

3 - Launch DVDStyler and delete the blank menu from the story board looking area

4 - Add the ripped MKV file to the DVDStyler project

5 - Right click on the video object in the DVDStyler project and select add

6 - Browse to the .srt file and select it

7 - Double check all settings (no menus, disc size, output directory, etc...)

8 - Click the burn icon, select .iso image instead of device.

9 - Confirm you want to proceed and wait as it transcodes and produces the .iso

10 - Burn the movie to a disc.

NOTE: Burning the iso file directly to Disc is much slower than extracting the Video_TS and Audio_TS folders directly. It seems that Toast extracts the folders on the fly and it really slows the burning process. If I burn the iso directly as an image file, burn speed maxes out at 6x, if I extract the folders manually and burn, I get 16x from my 16x Discs.

This procedure works on some movies and not on others, but so far it's the only way I've been able to get nice looking video and soft subtitles. Sometimes it transcodes and then craps out 80% of the way through at the point where it's trying to mux the subtitles in. I'm still experimenting to see if I can find and correct the cause. I'm wondering if the name of the .srt file must be a specific format or match the video file is some specific way.

[crjackson]

@ Scott

Can you tell by this log file (it's gibberish to me) what when wrong here, and perhaps make an educated guess on what is needed to avoid a failed process.

I used the procedure above which seems to work with some movies but fails with others. Every time I get a failed process, I get the same error. So, I ran the process again without the subtitles and it works perfectly every time. Very decent video results, just no subtitles once again, I can play with VLC and select the subtitle file and it plays them nicely, to bad DVD/BD players don't work that way. Thanks for your help.

[usually_quiet]

Can you tell by this log file (it's gibberish to me) what when wrong here, and perhaps make an educated guess on what is needed to avoid a failed process.

I used the procedure above which seems to work with some movies but fails with others. Every time I get a failed process, I get the same error. So, I ran the process again without the subtitles and it works perfectly every time. Very decent video results, just no subtitles once again, I can play with VLC and select the subtitle file and it plays them nicely, to bad DVD/BD players don't work that way. Thanks for your help.

My guess is that DVDStyler requires srt subtitles using the UTF-8 character set, but the .srt file that you specified is using ANSI instead. Do you have a text editor that can import ANSI text files and export them as UTF-8?

[crjackson]

Can you tell by this log file (it's gibberish to me) what when wrong here, and perhaps make an educated guess on what is needed to avoid a failed process.

I used the procedure above which seems to work with some movies but fails with others. Every time I get a failed process, I get the same error. So, I ran the process again without the subtitles and it works perfectly every time. Very decent video results, just no subtitles once again, I can play with VLC and select the subtitle file and it plays them nicely, to bad DVD/BD players don't work that way. Thanks for your help.

My guess is that DVDStyler requires srt subtitles using the UTF-8 character set, but the .srt file that you specified is using ANSI instead. Do you have a text editor that can import ANSI text files and export them as UTF-8?

Yes, I used the OSX text editor and re-saved it as UTF-8. I'll try it with that file and see what happens.

That failed too with a different error. I've download from a couple of different srt files and they are different. I think the one I was using must have been a bad file. I'm trying another one now. It seems that the quality of the srt files depends on the uploader. Ideally I should be able to extract and the proper file from the original. That would probably avoid those particular problems, but so far, I haven't found any software that will either extract an .srt or convert a .sup to one. It would be nice if there were a utility that could inspect the .srt files for proper formatting before trying to mux the thing. It goes through the entire transcoding process and tries to mux the subtitles in as the very last step. If the subtitles are wrong, you just wasted about 1-2 hours waiting for it to fail. I never would have thought that subtitles would be such a PITA.

Okay, so I've tried 3 different subtitle files from different sources. All fail in the same manner but at different lines. I feel pretty beat-up and tired of the whole mess for now. I'm going to make due without subtitles for now, and give it a try later I guess.

[usually_quiet]

Can you tell by this log file (it's gibberish to me) what when wrong here, and perhaps make an educated guess on what is needed to avoid a failed process.

I used the procedure above which seems to work with some movies but fails with others. Every time I get a failed process, I get the same error. So, I ran the process again without the subtitles and it works perfectly every time. Very decent video results, just no subtitles once again, I can play with VLC and select the subtitle file and it plays them nicely, to bad DVD/BD players don't work that way. Thanks for your help.

My guess is that DVDStyler requires srt subtitles using the UTF-8 character set, but the .srt file that you specified is using ANSI instead. Do you have a text editor that can import ANSI text files and export them as UTF-8?

Yes, I used the OSX text editor and re-saved it as UTF-8. I'll try it with that file and see what happens.

That failed too with a different error. I've download from a couple of different srt files and they are different. I think the one I was using must have been a bad file. I'm trying another one now. It seems that the quality of the srt files depends on the uploader. Ideally I should be able to extract and the proper file from the original. That would probably avoid those particular problems, but so far, I haven't found any software that will either extract an .srt or convert a .sup to one. It would be nice if there were a utility that could inspect the .srt files for proper formatting before trying to mux the thing. It goes through the entire transcoding process and tries to mux the subtitles in as the very last step. If the subtitles are wrong, you just wasted about 1-2 hours waiting for it to fail. I never would have thought that subtitles would be such a PITA.

Okay, so I've tried 3 different subtitle files from different sources. All fail in the same manner but at different lines. I feel pretty beat-up and tired of the whole mess for now. I'm going to make due without subtitles for now, and give it a try later I guess.

Maybe Jubler could be used to correct the problem files if there are only a few lines with errors.

[crjackson]

Thanks, I'll give Jubler a try after I recoup from my frustration.

[SERBIAN]

MPEG2 Works 5 Advanced .. SD Encoding section, "BR > DVD" preset button for un-protected Blu-Ray disc > DVD conversion or, if you are using ripped MKV as input for DVD MPEG2 encoding "Select file" or "Auto-DVD" preset button .. If you use BR as input, when encoding finishes, you can add subtle(s) with Add Subtitle module /all major subs format are supported/ or, with MKV as input, you can select the subtitle of your choice when you load a file for processing and it will be printed on your MPEG2 video track at the end of encoding .. If you use MKV, or any other input file which does not have the subs within, you have the option to load subtitle file for processing .. Check Tutorials link on M2W5 site for more info..

[crjackson]

MPEG2 Works 5 Advanced .. SD Encoding section, "BR > DVD" preset button for un-protected Blu-Ray disc > DVD conversion or, if you are using ripped MKV as input for DVD MPEG2 encoding "Select file" or "Auto-DVD" preset button .. If you use BR as input, when encoding finishes, you can add subtle(s) with Add Subtitle module /all major subs format are supported/ or, with MKV as input, you can select the subtitle of your choice when you load a file for processing and it will be printed on your MPEG2 video track at the end of encoding .. If you use MKV, or any other input file which does not have the subs within, you have the option to load subtitle file for processing .. Check Tutorials link on M2W5 site for more info..

I'm always happy to see new Mac solutions come onto the market. I'm downloading right now and would be happy to give your product a shot.

[SERBIAN]

MPEG2 Works is around for last 10 years This is a latest ver. released a month ago, completely rewritten though

[crjackson]

MPEG2 Works is around for last 10 years This is a latest ver. released a month ago, completely rewritten though

Okay, I didn't know that, sorry. I have downloaded and installed. I haven't had a chance to take it for a test drive yet. I'll let you know how it goes when I do. Thanks for your help.

[SERBIAN]

Contact me via email if you run onto some troubles or need some help

[crjackson]

I was unable to locate an email address for you.

[SERBIAN]

Email sent..

[crjackson]

Testing....


Sent from my  iPad 3

[Jrny2IL]

Here's how I would do this:
1- Rip with makeMKV
2- Use MKVtools to extract the .sup subtitle
3- Use BD sup2Sub to convert the .sup to idx/sub (bd sup2sub is listed as a windows app, but is a .jar file and runs fine on Mac with java.)
4- Use MKVmerge to add the idx/sub subtitle to your bd rip
5-encode with handbrake, burn the idx/sub into your encode
6-Use your choice of software to make the conversion to DVD

I use steps 1 through 5 to create forced sub mp4 files regularly. never fails.

[crjackson]

Here's how I would do this:
1- Rip with makeMKV
2- Use MKVtools to extract the .sup subtitle
3- Use BD sup2Sub to convert the .sup to idx/sub (bd sup2sub is listed as a windows app, but is a .jar file and runs fine on Mac with java.)
4- Use MKVmerge to add the idx/sub subtitle to your bd rip
5-encode with handbrake, burn the idx/sub into your encode
6-Use your choice of software to make the conversion to DVD

I use steps 1 through 5 to create forced sub mp4 files regularly. never fails.

Okay, thanks for your input. I'll try it your way and see what happens.