Question on Recommended Procedure....

[Ron P.]

**Note** I originally posted this in the DVDMF forum as a reply/question regarding the folowing quote, and was asked to post the question here.

While reading a thread in the DVDMF forum I came across DVDDoug's post about editing video:

Posted: Mon Aug 08, 2005 6:17 pm Post subject: Reply with
MPEG files are not meant to be edited. If your capture device allows capture to AVI format, you'll probably have better results. Movie factory will encode it to MPEG / DVD format after editing.

Editing an MPEG with Movie Factory or Video Studio can corrupt it in a way that causes it to get out of sync later when it is re-multiplexed for the DVD. In my case, I believe it was the transitions between MPEGs, or between scenes in an MPEG file that cause corruption. (The same source MPEG stayed in-sync when I make an unedited DVD.)

MPEG capture is also difficult. It requires lots of CPU power. If your capture device does not have it's own hardware MPEG encoder, you may be getting corruption during capture. Again, this corruption won't generally cause sync problems until the file is de-multiplexed & re-multiplexed.

If you must edit MPEGs, you can try a special-purpose MPEG editor, such as Womble MPEG Video Wizard ($120 after trial period). It's only an editor, so you still need a program (i.e. Movie Factory) for DVD authoring.

I haven't had any sync problems since switching to the Womble editor. I still use Ulead DVD Workshop for authoring DVDs.

And like ploggy said, search the forum for "sync" and you'll find lots of suggestions. This problem seems to have several different causes & solutions.

Then in the Sticky located at the top of this forum, in referance to the Recommended Procedures it says:

Digital Video (mini-DV)
Most digital camcorders have a Firewire connector and so can attach directly to a firewire port on the computer.
Capture to Mpeg2 if you have a fast computer (>2.5 GHz, 1GB RAM, disk with > 20 GB of available unfragmented space) because the whole video editing process to DVD burn will be faster and simpler.
If your computer CPU is slower than 2 GHZ, capture to AVI (DV) Type 1 because capturing in Mpeg 2 format puts too great a load on the CPU while capturing video in real-time. DV Type 1 is recommended because users have experienced problems with AVI Type 2.
You can capture directly with Video Studio in the Capture module.

So my question, Is the Recommended procedure not accurate on this? I have read different posts regarding different preferances on editing. But if MPEG is not meant to be edited due to the lossless format then we probably should not attempt to edit MPEG, just DV-AVI, right?

Just noticed this while searching and reading to find possible solutions to my problems, and became a little confused. I have been following the recommended procedure for Capture, Edit and Burn to DVD, using the MPEG2...

When I capture it is from a DV Camcorder, through firewire, using VS9. Recently I have been having a lot of trouble getting a good DVD. They have been terrible, freezing, pixelated and such. I'm still trying to run down the trouble. So far my next step will be to recapture all the video in DV-AVI, edit then render to MPEG2...

Thanks

[heinz-oz]

Any advise given here can only reflect the personal opinion of the author and should not be taken as the absolute law on things. After all, most people here are users like yourself, some more experienced than others. Once you have followed this or any other forum for a while you will know the people posting a bit better and know whom to trust more than others. It comes down to common sense as well.
Having said all that, I want to stress once more that I'm not criticising anyone here. Furthermore, I have not even read the sticky post at the start of this forum because I don't use VS. I use MSP 7.3.
From my own experience with all this, I would say that the instructions given in this sticky are neither wrong nor incorrect. It all depends on what you want to do.
If you want to edit your captured footage, stay clear of mpeg, if you have the room on your hard disk to capture to AVI.
If all you want to do is to burn your captured footage to DVD, no editing, capture to mpeg if your system is fast and powerful enough to handle that. It will save you the conversion step prior to burning.

[Ron P.]

Hi heinz-oz,

Thanks for your reply

I hope that my post was not taken as critical. I just became confused after following the sticky, and then experiencing trouble with rendered video (freezing frames, pixelating) I was searching for possible solutions. I've noticed that the problems only occur when trying to put 4gb of video on one disk. I've tried lowering the VBR to 6000, which didn't help much. However if I put less then 4gb with the VBR set to 7 or 8000 max then the freezing and pixelating goes away. This is all with editing MPEG. Also this is captured home movies from my DV camcorder.
Then I still have problems with DVDMF chapter points, which I've posted in that forum...Oh well maybe by Christmas I'll be able to burn this DVD..

[maddrummer3301]

The sticky says if your having trouble going directly to mpeg2 then
use dv.avi and convert to mpeg2. This way the mpeg2 is a full stream.
Rendering avi to mpeg2 can take awhile. Do the conversion before you
go out somewhere's or let it run during the night if you have only one
computer system.

Direct to Mpeg from DV is very cpu intensive. If you drop any frames
can cause problems. Have you ever tried to capture without any
editing so each capture is a separate menu item? Just a test disk maybe
using a DVD+RW or chalking a dvd-r up for experience. If that method
gives you trouble I would look at your hardware setup. Does the dvd
play good in the computer and not on a stand-alone player?

Mpeg editing has come along way with new hardware chips and fast
processors. That was hard to do on a PII or PIII 300Mhz machine.

It depends what your goal is, if your making a 1 hour video with 7 tracks
of videos applying overlays, color correction, color filters, cropping,
titles, multiple audio tracks your forced to use DV Type 2.
Doing that with mpeg material takes longer because every track needs
to be un-compressed and re-compressed. Also a powerful cpu and a good
deal of memory.
You can also reuse the dv material because of it's format.

It really depends on what your doing and your final project goal.

Buy a dvd recorder with firewire in, they are a great addition to your video
editing machine.

I think the sticky post is an excellent way to start off. That's what the author's intentions were. Someone new and starting off with VS versions.
(Very important tips in that sticky post)

The only thing I would comment on is whether users actually need to
install the "Latest Burner Patch". I think many users install the patch
like it's a windows update. The burner patch is only if your having
problems and they warn you to backup the dvd folder first.

It's not a program update and affects all the ulead products on your machine.

Hope this helps,

MD

[sjj1805]

I agree with DVDDougs comments about editing AVI's and MPEGs.
I never have OOS problems with stuff captured from my camcorder
These files are AVI's. I can edit to my hearts content and put in as many cuts, joins and transitions as I wish.

Alas stuff captured from my TV card as MPEGs does sometimes suffer OOS problems if I insert transitions. For MPEGs I use Womble (mentioned by DVDDoug) followed by DVD Workshop.

I have a rather powerful system AMD Athlon XP 2400+
1GB RAM and a massive 400GB Hard drive Space split over 3 physical hard drives.

[jchunter]

Videoman,
The Recommended Procedure simply indicates that users have a CHOICE when capturing and editing video. It briefly mentions some of the trade-offs when working in AVI or Mpeg2. There are advocates of both methods but the Recommended Procedure does not favor either method.

John

BTW, My own experience has been positive with Mpeg2. I keep the video bitrate high (8Mbps), have successively edited and rerendered (8-10 times) video of a resolution chart without visible degredation. Other users have noticed compresson artifacts that appear when the bitrate is below 6Mbps. I have also captured video of a res chart with in AVI (type 1) and Mpeg2 and cannot see a measurable difference. I plan to redo these tests with VS9 when I get some time.

[dongle]

I have been creating vidoe for years but as I don't read forums much I have missed out on all the jargon - it could take me a long time to catch up.

What is the difference beween authoring and editing please.

I have been trying Womble and it looks good but is it any different to VS8 or VS9 for authorediting

[Liamo]

as far as I'm concerned editing is the editing of the raw video - the cutting, pasting, adding sound etc.
Authoring is DVD Authoring - making dvd menus etc and putting it all on DVD!