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  1. Member Yanta's Avatar
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    I know this has been asked before (lots of posts from 2008 and earlier which are redundant because of their age), but...

    I have some MKVs, and some additional scenes I would like to merge into the MKVs.

    The additional scenes are all over the place in specs. Like might be AAC 2.0 audio @ 720p.

    The source generally appears to be 1080p @ 1509kbps for audio

    I'm looking for a program (free preferred, but paid of necessary), that will allow me to convert the additional scenes to match the source, and allow me to cut out scenes from the original, and merge the new scenes into it.

    I've played around with Bigasoft Video Converter, Wondershare Video Editor, Soliveig AVI Trimmer + MKV (as mentioned in a post on these forums).

    They seem to be limited to 448kbps for the audio. Each of the programs lacks one thing that the others don't so together they would do what I need, but alone they just fall short. With the exception of the audio being limited to 448kbps of course.

    I also had a read of Emicsoft's MKV converter, but from what I can on their website, it also will not do what I want.

    Is there such a software that will do this?

    Thanks
    tanya
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    1509kbps sounds like the bitrate of a DTS-HD core. Are you sure that's the actual bitrate of the audio you have or is it possible you have full DTS-MA or HRA in your file? Are you sure the HD elements of the DTS-HD stream have been removed? If not, FLAC may be an option.
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  3. Member Yanta's Avatar
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    Please find attached media info from the file.
    Image Attached Files
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    Your file has DTS-MA, which has a core of regular DTS at a bitrate of 1509 with a surrounding DTS-MA extension to convert it into a lossless codec. Although the DTS Core itself is 1509bps the MA extension has a variable bit-rate, which means it uses whatever bitrate is necessary to create an exact duplication of the source. That would be why the bitrate is listed as Unknown / 1509 (DTS-MA / Core). Therefore, keeping the same bitrate for the audio would be next to impossible, since you don't actually know what that bitrate is. If you intend to keep the audio in a lossless state, then since I doubt you have access to a DTS-MA encoder you'll have to convert the DTS-MA to FLAC and then convert the audio in your other files to flac as well. EAC3To would be your best option there since it can also remix whatever audio you're using to 5.1 channels (speakers) to match the audio currently in the file.

    The video is a bit more difficult. If you re-encode your bits and pieces with the exact same x264 settings listed you might get away with splicing it all together, assuming there are keyframes on the correct frames, otherwise you'll have to use either a smart cutter program or re-encode the entire thing using an NLE or Avisynth/X264.
    Last edited by ndjamena; 27th Sep 2014 at 07:30.
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  5. Hello Yanta. I'm in Melbourne too.

    MeGUI can do what you want, as long as you're happy to re-enode everything (which I'd do, as it'd probably save a lot of grief).

    The idea would be to open each video (the original, and sections you want to insert etc) and get MeGUI to create am Avisynth script to encode each one. You'd need to make sure the output resolution and framerate is the same for each encode you set up. You can add cuts to scripts to encode sections of video that way, then encode them individually and append them together later, or you can combine the scripts and encode them as a single encoding job. MeGUI has an AVS Cutter under the Tools menu which lets you add "cuts" to scripts using a preview.

    If you've not used MeGUI before it might pay to play around with it a bit first (it might have a bit of a learning curve), but you shouldn't have any trouble getting help with using it here.
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  6. Member Yanta's Avatar
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    Originally Posted by ndjamena View Post
    Therefore, keeping the same bitrate for the audio would be next to impossible, since you don't actually know what that bitrate is. If you intend to keep the audio in a lossless state, then since I doubt you have access to a DTS-MA encoder you'll have to convert the DTS-MA to FLAC and then convert the audio in your other files to flac as well.
    Ok, I can live with just using the 640k core.

    I had a play around with TMPgENC's Video Mastering Works and managed to achieve what I wanted. The inserted sections have all been converted from 720p/192khz AAC 2.0 to 1080p 14mbit, 640khz DTS 5.1. Playing at a medium volume, I can tell the difference between the original and the new version, but it's not that bad.

    Originally Posted by ndjamena View Post
    If you re-encode your bits and pieces with the exact same x264 settings listed you might get away with splicing it all together, assuming there are keyframes on the correct frames
    Lol, I'm new at this, I don't really understand keyframes. Time to go and do more reading..
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    The main problem about cutting losslessly is not the container (MKV), but the content. I assume that in your case it is mainly MPEG-4 AVC video (H.264).

    Most modern efficient video encoding techniques try to spare as much size as possible by comparing the content of several video frames among each other, and storing only the differences between them, because many small differences can be compressed much better than very different original values of luminance and chrominance.

    But if you have a lot of differences, you still need at least one original frame now and then, which is independent of other frames, so that the decoder can start decoding from here, and all following frames can store differences from this previous independent frame (Intra frame, I frame). If you cut anywhere, you may possibly get a piece of video where related frames refer to ... some I frame before the cut. So the decoder won't be able to know how to calculate a difference to ... a frame not available anymore after the cut. The result will be crap video. Cutting is only safe in front of such keyframes (with AVC video, it even has to be a special kind of I frame, where the decoder is reset to defaults: an IDR frame).

    The more sparse such I (or even IDR) frames are, the more efficient the video can be compressed, but the harder it is to find a safe cutting point. In Blu-ray compatible AVC video, they have to be at most 1 or 2 seconds apart (depending on specific attributes), which is not very efficient, but supports rather quick jumping and even fast forward/reverse features. Tighter compressed video archived for PC playback may spread keyframes over about 10 seconds, though.
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  8. Member Yanta's Avatar
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    Originally Posted by LigH.de View Post
    In Blu-ray compatible AVC video, they have to be at most 1 or 2 seconds apart (depending on specific attributes), which is not very efficient, but supports rather quick jumping and even fast forward/reverse features. Tighter compressed video archived for PC playback may spread keyframes over about 10 seconds, though.
    Sorry for not getting back to you sooner. Been out of town.

    Ok, would it be safe to assume that a chapter point is a safe place to cut, since if you skip to a chapter there would probably be a keyframe?

    Size is not an issue. I'm not looking to compress the video. Just get something of reasonable quality with all the extra scenes added.

    I finished my test project, which was just to add several of the deleted scenes into my extended edition bluray, to make and extended-extended cut
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    Originally Posted by Yanta View Post
    Ok, would it be safe to assume that a chapter point is a safe place to cut, since if you skip to a chapter there would probably be a keyframe?
    Probably yes. Most authoring software (I only know some for DVD Video, but for Blu-ray it will most probably be similar) allows chapters points only at GOP starts. Many good encoders are able to force GOP starts at specific frames where chapters should be set, so that the encoding result is perfectly prepared for authoring chapters where desired.
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  10. Member mdalacu's Avatar
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    You can try my dmMediaConverter and if video streams are the same, just reencode all audio streams with the same specs and then merge all of them.
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