Rendering bit rate cuts a project short

[jparnold]

I have encountered a very strange thing.

I have a (large) project which contains 5 smaller projects - I have created a video of a trip in Europe and created separate projects for each country I visited and then created a project (for the entire trip) which only contains each of the projects I created for each country.

Each (country) project fades FROM black at the start and fades TO black at the end using the FADE transition and a BLACK (color) eg video clip - fade transition, black clip.

When I rendered the overall project using VARIABLE 2 PASS MAXIMUM 8000kbps the output file is OK.

When I rendered the overall project using VARIABLE 2 PASS MAXIMUM 7500kbs (lower maximum bit rate) I noted that when the rendered file is played then the last clip from the first project (which fades to black) is cut off about 1 secind from the end and the fade to black is missing. I re rendered the entire project (at max 7500) twice once using LPCM and once using DOLBY and the SAME thing happens.
I wonder why.

[jparnold]

STOP
I have just noticed that the problem isn't connected with rendering!

The problem is with the overall project.
I don't know why the original rendered file is ok BUT when I just loaded the entire project (containing the smaller projects) I noticed that when I played the entire project (without rendering) the SAME problem exists - the last clip from the first project is cut short and no fade occurs.
I wonder why?

Now I know that I could render each project to separate rendered files and then add those files when creating a DVD (file/s) but I would then need a menu as the final DVD will also contain ANOTHER rendered file and I DO want a menu to be able to select between 'movie' A and B. A bit confused then look at the following break down of what I have and what I am trying to do
Movie A}I want these on my DVD menu
Movie B}so that I can select either movie

Movie B contains videos of a few countries visited in Europe - I do NOT want a menu for each separate country

I have read previous posts for creating similar movies and read that creating a project containing smaller projects is one way of doing this.

This begs another question for those who know. When using (small) projects within another project is is better to add the fade transitions (between) each smaller project WITHIN the overall project eg
small project - fade transition - black clip - fade transition - second small project
or shouldn't it matter.

[sjj1805]

Not completely sure we are singing from the same song sheet but if you want to do what I think it is you want to do - I would do it like this.

Let us say you have visited 5 countries and want a video for each country and that you want to place all 5 onto one DVD with a menu that enables you to select (a) an individual country. (b) the entire vacation.

1. Edit and render to a video file all the footage relating to the first Country - We will call this France.
2. Edit and render to a video file all the footage relating to the Second Country - We will call this Spain.
3. Continue until all 5 countries have been edited and you have a separate MPEG2 file for each. Example:
France.mpg
Spain.mpg
Germany.mpg
Greece.mpg
Italy.mpg

4. Start a new empty project and go directly to the [share] tab and select
[Create Video].
5. Import all 5 of the above videos.
6. If/Where required - create chapters for any or all of the 5 videos.
7. Go to the DVD Menu Screen.
Select a suitable menu (style) - this will be a root menu and will include a "Play All" button so you can watch all 5 videos in sequence. The menu will also contain 5 Thumbnails - one for each country. If a "Country" has no 'chapters' then pressing that particular thumbnail will play that particular video. If a Country has 'Chapters' then pressing that particular thumbnail will bring up a chapter menu for that particular country.
Edit any text - such as the Title, the writing below the thumbnails etc.
Select suitable background music and any other fine tuning you desire.
8. For any countries that have chapters, select the chapter menu from the drop down list below the Root Menu creation screen. Choose a suitable menu (style) for the chapter menu.
Edit any text - such as the Title, the writing below the thumbnails etc.
Select suitable background music and any other fine tuning you desire.
9. Test the "DVD" using the preview option.
When you are happy with your work - burn the DVD. Here I prefer to burn to a hard drive folder so that I can test/check it again with a software DVD player such as WinDVD / PowerDVD etc.

[jparnold]

Thanks Steve,

I understand what you have described but this is what I did -

France.vsp (project only - fully edited)
Spain.vsp
Germany.vsp
Greece.vsp
Italy.vsp

'Europe' project containing ONLY each of the above projects.
Render the Europe project - giving ONE ONLY MPEG file of the entire project.

The problem I have is that even though France (project) finishes with a fade to a black 'clip, he last 1 -2 seconds disappear ie. fraction of a second of the last clip not shown and fad to black clip is not shown when viewed with the Europe project.

Am I overtaxing VS by creating a project containg nothing more than 5 (smaller) projects?
THis problem doesn't seem to occur between Spain and Germany etc. I wonder if it's a timing 'thing'. I compare the full length of each 'country' projects and then experiment with changing the length of the France project to see if there is any difference.

OR maybe I will do as you suggested (render to 5 separate mpg files and load those rendered files into an overall (Europe) project BUT won't this result in double rendering (won't rendering 'Europe' cause the France etc being re-rendered with resulting loss of quality?)

One thing I am trying to avoid and that is having a menu to enable selecting each country as the final DVD will also contain a different video (SOUTH WEST ENGLAND) eg

SOUTH WEST ENGLAND
EUROPE (contains France etc)

These are the only two selections I want on the DVD. I don't want to go to a submenu (displaying France etc) when EUROPE is selected. Is there another way to do this?

[sjj1805]

To avoid double rendering.
1. When creating those initial MPG files make sure that they are a DVD compliant MPEG2 format. You need to work out in advance what the combined duration of all 5 videos will be and allow an overhead for the actual DVD Menu Structure itself.
What Bit Rate Settings etc Should I use?
2. When you import the video files into the [Share] [Create Disc] stage then make sure that you select the option "Do not convert DVD compliant files"

Whilst there is nothing technically wrong with importing VSP files into the
[Share] [Create Disc] stage - there is nothing to be gained by doing so.
If you follow my Suggested work flow for Video Creation then the time taken to create those 5 video files is deducted from the time taken to do it 'the other way.'

You do not need one video of Europe as a whole - perhaps split into 5 chapters - one chapter for each country. By creating the 5 separate and smaller videos - the effect of using the 'Play all' button provides you with "Europe as a whole." This then leaves you free to split up the 5 smaller videos into chapters, which would be more cumbersome to achieve doing it the other way.

[jparnold]

EUREKA!
I have overcome the problem (of the end of a project being cut off).

Firstly I started a NEW project and imported the first small project (in the example used by Steve FRANCE) and NOTHING else. I checked the end and noted that the last one or two seconds were missing. So the problem was something to do with the smaller (France) project. I reloaded the (France) project and noticed everything was as expected (last clip faded to black correctly).
Then why is it missing when selecting the thumbnail for the project? I have NO IDEA!.

Anyway I deleted the thumbnail for that project (from my video 'library') and reloaded it into the library.
EVERY thing now is CORRECT!

All I can think of is that I had made some small change to the (France) project (after it had been added to the overall Europe project) which changed the length and although VS told me that it could not find it (when loading the overall Europe project) and I RELINKED it somehow VS 'remembered' the original length and therefore the last one or two seconds disappeared.

Any thoughts Steve?

I am happy again.[/code]

[sjj1805]

Glad you got it working the way you wanted.
Computers don't you just love them. People used to say computers don't make mistakes

computer error leads to $23 quadrillion overdraft

By the way - has anyone yet found the "Any" key?

[jparnold]

I'm still trying to find the 'click here' button as well as the 'boss' key for those awkward moments.