Find the Best Compression Rate for AVI

[Chazie]

I am trying out the Workshop 1.2. I edit with premiere 6.5
I take the finished Avi into workshop and the challenged is finding the right compression options.
The finished DVD Audio is unbalanced. The results are the voice audio is lower the music audio is louder and the over all background sounds are magnified.
I have experimented with the customize options along with the presets. But have not found the right combination..
Any Help would be greatly appreciated.

Chazie

[skier-hughes]

Not with you at all with this one.

Is your problem just with the audio?

If so, does it play ok in the avi?

I've never had any trouble with WS encoding a good avi and making the audio play as you say????

[Chazie]

The problem is noticeable with the Audio. The video looks good but appears to be slightly degraded.
The Avi file plays great before the compression.
What compression combination are you using??
So you export out of premiere and drop your avi file into WS?
Chazie

[Devil]

IMHO, what you describe is not possible under normal conditions. When you render your AVI, all your audio tracks in your editor are merged into a single audio determined by your codec settings (in most cases 2.0 stereo). You don't give any details which codec you use but, if it is DV, the norm is 2.0 with a 16 bit 48 kHz sampling rate (optionally, 12 bit 32 kHz 2 x 2.0). During encoding, there is NO way that this could be disintegrated into changing the respective volumes of different parts of the audio. I suggest that you may have subjective responses because of the playback quality on a TV is different from a computer. I presume you are encoding the audio with AC-3 2.0 at 192 kbit/s?

[skier-hughes]

I go from timeline Prem 6.5 to mpeg2 using canopus procoder. Settings depend on the length of video.
I import this into WS, don't re-encode the mpeg's and encode the audio using ac-3, then adjust the bitrate sometimes depending again on length of video. Most often 192-256kbps.
I'm with Devil. I use a tv to monitor my output from premiere, rather than my pc speakers, even though I have 6.1 sound. I expect it's a question of audio not quite adjusted properly.
If you don't have a way of previewing on a tv, export the avi to a minidv tape adn play this through the tv to see how it sounds.

[Chazie]

Thank you so much for responding.

Please forgive me for the lack of knowledge and experience.
That’s why I’m seeing help from you experts.
I use a TV monitor for viewing playbacks. I export the timeline using pinnacle AVI DV settings with uncompressed audio 16 bit-stereo 48kHz
I have used the ac-3 settings in addition to the other options. However I still get the same results. It appears that I am re-encoding an already encoding video and sounds like I need to be exporting the timeline differently. What is the benefit of using Canopus over DV and Why?

Continued thanks:-)

Chazie

[skier-hughes]

You'd need a canopus storm card to do what I'm doing.

To do what you are saying is happening with your sound, ie, you make you avi and then make a mpeg2 and then the audio is wrong, is like saying;

Here are the ingredients for a cake.
I mix them together - making the avi -
I then bake the cake - encoding to mpeg.

There should be no way that the egg is available to you in the cake seperately from the flour and butter and sugar.