Hi,
I am a newbie, so please excuse my question if it has
already addressed :)

When I use the MPG files from TMPGEnc and authored it by
Ulead Movie Factory to DVD, I cannot seem to fast forward
the DVD. Is it something wrong with parameter I set with
TMPGEnc or is this a function of the authoring Software?

Thank you for your help

Sonny

I think you need to put in chapters when authoring to get it to skip forward properly, or it could be the author ware or even your dvd player, I usually put quite a few chapters in so I can skip all over the movie if I need to....

What make of player do you own. Make sure you include a sequence header before every GOP when you encode.

ASHY

Minion,
I don't mean skip to the next chapter, I mean fast forwarding 2x, 8x, etc.
I can do it in the PC player, but not on the home DVD player. When I capture
direct Mpeg then I can do it, but I could not do it with any file that TMPGE encodes.

Ashy,
My home player is Panasonic RP56, and if you're talking about Input Sequence
Header then it is set to 1.

Sonny

Don't know about software DVD players, but hardware players use the IFO files for info on the VOBs. I have the same problem when I back up a DVD onto two DVD-Rs using IFOEdit, I completely lose the ability to navigate on the second DVD.

When you author your DVDs, as minion suggests, try putting in a few evenly-spaced chapters; this way you should be able to both fast-forward and rewind, and also quickly navigate.

Griff

After working through some of the 'encoding time' issues, I finally got to see the fruits of my labor. It was a SVCD of a DVD rip using 2 Pass and very high quality settings. I also did some testing with a short clip using 2 pass and CQ along with the different settings.

The picture quality is amazing. That is until motion is introduced and the quality becomes horrible. For me, it's almost unwatchable. Is there anything I can do to improve the blurred motion? Is VCD similar in that regard? If so, I may just keep it PC only and just make DViX files.

Thanks for any input on the topic.

Russ M.

That motion blurryness is probably caused from "interlace lines".If your source is interlaced you should use the de-interlace filter there are a whole list of different interlace filters in the de-interlace settings so you just move the slider untill you get to a scene where it looks bad then go through the filters untill you find the one that works best.You don"t get this issue with vcd/mpeg1 because mpeg1 is progressive, if you are useing 23.97fps ntsc film then that is progressive also.....

Is there a way to take out the blockiness or at least decrease it after I convert an AVI file to an MPEG1. It's most noticeable when I play the VCD's on TV.

I've been reading through the posted messages in this BBS, but everybody seems to have different opinions in going about the problem.

The best way to reduce the "blockyness" or "macro blocks" is to raise the bitrate,raiseing the bitrate solves a lot of quality issues but your mpeg file will be larger so you will get less minutes on each cd-r but if you use a "CQ" encodeing method this will reduce file size,but if you want good quality vcd"s I wouldn"t put more than 50-60 minutes on each cd-r.....

I have found that using 2 pass VBR with
min 1150
av 2000
max 2300

gives you around 45 mins per 700 meg CD

I suspect the "blockiness" you are refering to, is caused by your tv resizing the picture. There's not much you can do here , whatever the bitrate, VCDs are a quarter of the resolution of DVD's (which are displayed at your tv's native resolution) and whilst they are supposedly around the same resolution of VHS, I would prefer to watch a VHS movie than one on VCD any day.

If your DVD player can play SVCD, you sould try this method. VCD's take a lot more space (since they're about 2/3 the resolution of DVD) but then cd-r's are still a lot cheaper than dvd-r's.

Griff

You can create SVCD's or if your DVD player wont play them (like mine) you can create XVCD's - non standard VCD's

The XVCD's I create have the same res , virtually the same bitrate as SVCD's . Quality is great

Mind you ..I only ever convert from DVD rips

I have installed the new version and am now having problems with frame serving from vdub (I have done is succeffully several times prior to upgrading). I get the normal newbie problem "file unsupported". I have adjusted the vfapi environment setting, raising it as high as 4 and still unsupported file or cannot open. Has anything changed in the process or the program. Also, what is the new feature which allows you to save the audio and video as different files? (The new version does seem to be more stable)

Just curious,
Moviebuff

Did you raise the 'AVI VFW reader' and lower the rest.
If that doesn't help try uninstalling the Virtualdub frameserving client then re-installing it.

ASHY

I am getting audio sync (gradual) problems after I encode with tmpgenc.
start of encoded video/audio is in sync...

I am using tooLame, scmpx as pluggins in tmpgenc.
audio quality is much better now, after adding tooLame and scmpx.
but audio sync problem still exists.

I am encoding a NTSC - DV-avi to PAL- VCD mpeg.
Sometime back I saw a message here saying NTSC to PAL conversion
is causing this sync problem.

I am making vcds to send to a PAL country. So I have to convert
to PAL. Now I guess the problem may be with frame rate conversion
for video in TMPGEnc (NTSC 29.97, PAL 25?), video is becoming a bit
shorter.

If anyone can reply with details on how to fix this....

This can be verry tricky to do especially if you are converting 29.9fps to 25fps, it would be aesier to do a "23.97fps to 25" conversion, if you could render your dv files to 23.9fps instead of 29.9fps it would make it easier cuz 29.9fps is interlaced frames and 23.9fps is progressive and so is 25fps,But instead of writeing out some long manual for doing ntsc to pal conversions go to "www.vcdhelp.com" and there is a manual there for doing ntsc to pal conversions......

I've been converting avi/divx episodes of about 20min each to SVCD (~2050 bitrate) with about 397-400 mbs (2 vids per cd). The problem is that in some divx the final output archive is so big, around 2 gbs.. and needs a bitrate too bad to be made up (around 300). I dont know what happens, is there any form to avoid this? i need those eps in svcd format..

Instead of useing a "CBR" encodeing method use a "CQ" or "VBR-CQ" encodeing method this will give you a much smaller file size while keeping simular or even better quality.In "CQ" mode you can actually use a higher bitrate and end up with a smaller file size than CBR....

Does anyone have or know of a program where I will be able to add a logo to movies that I have already ripped or add the title, Author, copyright info to the video that will be showen as the videos play?

This software is able to do this.
http://www.imaginegraphics.co.uk/products/mpegcarver/mpgecarver.htm

ASHY

It's not at clear how to do this using mpegcarver, ASHY. Maybe it is a limitation of the demo but I can't find reference to it in the docs anywhere either.

This is the info which some players will display when playing, again, clip title, author, copyright, rating, comment...

Anybody know a way to edit these file properties?

At home, my TMPGEnc can read *.vob without problems, but my machine is so slow. I tried the same thing at the office where I really got a power machine, but TMPEGEnc refuses to read that file. I use the newest version at home an in the office. What is the reason and how do I solve the problem?

Alex

It is not advisable to directly open VOBS with TMPG, you WILL get problems. VOBS usually contain many streams and TMPG isn't able to discern between these streams.
It is a better and faster solution to use DVD2AVI to open your VOBS and create a project file which you can load into TMPG. This way you will be able to select the required streams you need only.

ASHY

Hi

After much deliberation I have finally solved my problems with MPEG Tools and Windows XP. I notice that everyone reports this and I would like to add my solution.

I have ascertained that almost all of the errors which have occurred in this area are down to DirectShow. I installed a decent MPEG2 codec last night for Media Player XP compatibility and as soon as I did this I noticed that I get no errors whatsoever. I actually tried the PowerDVD codec for Media Player XP and it all works fine.

I have also noticed other people with similar problems with the other OS's and it all seems to come down to DirectShow and Media Player. This is quite strange as TMPGEnc doesn't seem to need an MPEg2 codec to work. MPEG tools does however!

I hope this helps anyone who might be having similar problems.

I agree with you that most problems are probably due to directshow itself and not TMPG and you are right that the MPEG tools need a decent MPEG2 codec to work correctly with MPEG2 files, but TMPG itself also needs this codec to open such files not just the tools.

I have often suspected that the problems most people have with the tools are simply down to incorrect configuration of their systems. For example installing too many types of one codec can cause havoc with Direct show, by this I mean if you were to install, such as, too many MPEG2 codes this will just confuse Direct show and cause confliction problems as it will try to use all the codecs at the same time and you will end up with problems.

For instance you may have a codec installed for WinDVD and Power DVD together (which is a bad idea in itself) you may have the free DVD filters installed too for media player and then also have the MPEG2 plugin installed for TMPG.

All these codecs utilise Direct show, so it's no wonder ther are problems when this type of system configuration is used.

Also using certain types of other MPEG encoding and editing software can also cause problems with TMPG. I have experienced this myself on occasion. I remember I had a problem with TMPG when I decided to install DVMPEG 6. As soon as I uninstalled DVMPEG everthing was hunky dory again.

My advice to anybody who is constantly experiencing serious problems with TMPG is to check the codecs and the MPEG software they have installed and if in doubt wipe them out and start afresh with a clean system and only install what you need.

ASHY

Ashy might you be so kind as to list the codecs you have installed on your system? I *think* I understand that they will be unique to the software you have installed, but as I look at my own codecs honestly I can't tell what-was-installed-by-what-software and what-is-needed-and-what-is-fluff so would like to look at someone else's list as a starting point.

I don't suppose there is an easy way either to tell if a codec uses DirectShow? I do also have WinDVD and PowerDVD and a couple other players installed and your comment that these two together "are a bad idea" begs the question: how to know? I have several players installed and part of my reason is they each have different useful features, another reason is to see how "compatible" my files are. But this is not good to have so many on one PC?

Some strange happend with my TMPGenc:
I have an avi-file, which is at least 11GB. I encoded 3 times (always little changes in the avi-file). This took at least 5 hours to encode. The output m2v-file was about 3,4GB. Thats all very ok. The quality is very fine!
Last week I wanted to encode another time this file - it took 48 hours and the output file has 81MB (!) and when I want to play it or I move it into the DVD authoring-software, there is no picture information, only black screen...
I always take the same preferences to encode.
I also tried to delete and reinstall TMPGenc, no change...
Does anyone have an idea, what is wrong here??

Christian

Does anyone know if there is planned a german version of TMPGenc in the future?

Christian

After converting of the AVI file to MPEG2, and trying to run the movie using real Magic DVD station under Windows XP, the system crushes.

What may couse that?
Thanks.