digital video to dvd --Parameters and specs???

[mjhausenflu]

I have a sony dv camcorder and am accumulating full dv quality video (AVI) to make a dvd movie with the edited sequences. I am using pinnacle 7 for this. with all the specs:

720 x 480
1536 kbps
29 frames / sec
audio is PCM

Problem. I am running out of hardrive space (120 GB). I would like to convert all the video to dvd compatibilty with the highest quality. I have TMPenc.

Question:

what is the highest of parameters that the dvd will allow to ensure I have a quality dvd. Is variable or constant bitrate better? If variable, what upper, average, and lower margins ---if constant, what is the highest that will still allow me to play in my component dvd (which is fairly new).

This is a one shot deal because I do not want to loose the original's quality once I convert to MPEG2 and delete the files. Are there any people out there that convert their digital video movies to dvd and have been successful?

Thanks in advance.

Matt

[bugster]

I have used TmpGenc to convert DV to DVD spec. I use 2pass VBR, average bitrate 6000, max 8000, High quality and it all looks pretty good. Make sure your audio is at 48khz sample rate or convert the audio with a different tool as TmpGenc is not very good at this. I can get about 90 mins of video onto one DVD-r with this method. Hope that helps.

[mjhausenflu]

Thank you for the advice.

[Imnaha]

Matt, would you please post your successes or failures of achieving the results you are after. I have started the same project and have not been satisfied with my results. It sounds like we are using the same software/hardware. Eric

[mjhausenflu]

Here's some info I found online:

If I'm encoding with VBR, what is a reasonable minimum and maximum for DVD-R?


Posted: Apr 23 07:30

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i use 3000 and 8500 and am usually very satisfied with the results...



uteotw
Member


Joined: 31 Oct 2000
Posts: 29
Posted: Apr 23 08:38

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Max DVD bitrate is 9800 , so I substract the audio bitrate to find out the max video bitrate.

If I do TV captures I'll encode the audio at 224 , so max video = 9576

If I audio is 448 ac3 then the max video = 9352

When I analyze the encoded video with BitrateViewer I never saw a peak at my maximum bitrate. I think the highest I've ever seen is around 7000.

This works for me with A03 burner and 1.49£ DVD-R.

uteotw



shardison
Member


Joined: 21 Mar 2001
Posts: 61
Posted: Apr 23 13:42

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Try TMPGEnc's CQ mode instead of 2 pass VBR. I use 2000/6000 and the average comes in at about 3500kbs and no artifacts. (Old)2-pass has freaked out my DVD player for some reason. You can fit a lot of nice video on a DVD at 3500kbs.



SLK001
Member


Joined: 24 May 2001
Posts: 121
Posted: Apr 25 06:55

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The DVD standards are as follows:
MAX VIDEO BR = 9.8Mbps
MAX AUDIO BR = 912kbps
MAX STREAM BR = 10.08Mbps

I believe that the minimum video BR is 500kbps.

So, as a practical matter, using 384kbps audio, I set my MAX VIDEO BR to 9.5Mbps and my minimum to 1Mbps. Depending how much data I have, I set my average BR from 3.5Mbps to 5.5Mbps (usually 4.5Mbps).

But, as usual, your mileage may vary.

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Here is what I have found.

I took my DV original files captures with pinnacle 7 and I exported to MPEG2 using a custom set of settings. I used 9mb bitrate and the highest setting for the audio 384. The input file (AVI) was appox 3.79 gb and the output file was 327 mb in mpeg2 format. I used ULEAD dvd workshop to make my vob files and I tested the results with POWERDVD.

The clarity was as good as the original aVI even at full screen viewing. I don't currently have a dvd-r but will soon get one. THe only thing I found was that windows media player had problems with lags playing the mpeg2 file. After it was converted to VOB, power DVD was flawless.

Keep the replies coming