capturing question with Studio 8

[ktnwin]

I just upgrade STudio 8 to rev 8.5.21, and noticed this version allows capturing in MPEG format !!!
Has anyone try capturing (from DV) to MPEG format in real-time using Studio DV 8 ?
If yes, please share your experience.

[donpedro]

nope... It is ggod idea only if you are not planning to edit. Since I saw your posts before I believe that you know why

[ktnwin]

Of course, I am not planning to edit any MPEG files. Never been able to.
I will give it a shot tonight and see what happens.
Just curious.

[ktnwin]

I gave it a try last night, here is what I found:
1) Studio DV 8 still captures in DV format
2) as soon as I hit STOP CAPTURE, the software shows a message like "converting video to MPEG" !!!
So, it's not really real-time capture.
There are many other truely useful features and bug fixes Pinnacle can add to Studio 8, they simply add a dumb feature, IMHO.

[donpedro]

I will have to try it by myself. That looks prety stupid MPEG capture

[curritch]

ktnwin. I haven't tried to capture in mpg2 format. Those that have, based on Studio8 forum data, find it to be an inferior fixed bit rate product. They recommend, for high quality, that that capture be in avi format and then to encode to mpg2. S8 is supposed to use a single pass VBR approach in that mode and comments are quite positive.
I forget their requirements but real time (or near real time) encoding requires a relatively fast machine.

[ktnwin]

curritch,

I have always believed that real time capture in MPEG2 format (using software only) requires a very decent machine.
Recently I was proven wrong and happily so.

neoDVD can capture and converts to MPEG-1 or MPEG-2 in REAL-TIME (well almost...).

I have encoded/authored to DVD format almost in real time on a T-bird 1.2GHz (Athlon).

I still have to try to capture AVI into DVD format and see how fast this could be done wiht neoDVD. The only trouble with this method is I cannot define the start/end point and chapter points.

Updated: I tried and yes neoDVD captured directly to MPEG-2 and I can still trim the video as well as add menu, chapter points before authoring DVD. The authoring process only take 15 mins for 60 mins of video.

[tmfwy]

Guys, I believe that you can switch to \capture in MPEG real-time under settings.

[ktnwin]

I still don't see how PS8 can capture to MPEG in real time if it took 6X - 8X to encode and author an AVI file. Maybe all it does is to save you 1X (the capture time which is overlapped with the encoding).
For me, MPEG real time capture should be like this:
1) start capture video
2) when capture ends, the MPEG is fully ready (encoded). A short delay is OK but not a 5X to 7X delay.

[donpedro]

I still didn't have time to test this, but here is theory.... Do you edit your mpeg2 capture ? If yes, that I believe it will re-encode mpeg2 file again. Same as when you import mpeg2 into it. Don't take my word on this. It is just a theory.

[donpedro]

I gave it a try last night, here is what I found:
1) Studio DV 8 still captures in DV format
2) as soon as I hit STOP CAPTURE, the software shows a message like "converting video to MPEG" !!!
So, it's not really real-time capture.

I had finaly time to play with this. In Capture format tab they have one option that will determin how it will capture in MPEG.

MPEG capture:
-Use default encoding mode
-Encode in real time
-Encode after capturing

So "Encode in real time" is the option that you should use for real time MPEG capture. But be aware that this will require a lot of resources and you can expect problems if you didn't close all bacround processes.

[dh]

I used to capture in Mpeg2 format (from DV) with v8.4.16 in real time.
Now I often capture in AVI format and convert them to Mpeg2 with TMPEnc because the quality is much better.

[donpedro]

Yes. I believe that it highly possible. I was just very surprised whe he originaly posted that it can't capture into MPEG in real time.

[rayban]

I used to capture in Mpeg2 format (from DV) with v8.4.16 in real time.
Now I often capture in AVI format and convert them to Mpeg2 with TMPEnc because the quality is much better.

Question....TMPEnc is what you use to convert to Mpeg2. Is this the Plus version or the free version? I was wondering if people here needed to buy the PLUS version in order to encode to Mpeg2?

TIA

[donpedro]

Question....TMPEnc is what you use to convert to Mpeg2. Is this the Plus version or the free version? I was wondering if people here needed to buy the PLUS version in order to encode to Mpeg2?

I don't believe that there is free version.... And yes... for MPEG2 you need Plus version.