When I open an mpg2 file and I begin to encode, the number of total frames is wrong. It says 1948 total frames but I know my file has 1960 frames... Why?

Well possibly your Mpeg2 file ends with an incomplete GOP so Tmpgenc is Cutting it off...Try setting the Beginning and end points of your file useing the "Source Range" and see if it reads all of the frames then....When I have a Mpeg2 source file that I need to encode I find the Best method is to use DVD2AVI and make a d2v Project file and load that into Tmpgenc to encode, it is faster this way and you don"t get problems like you are haveing....Cheers

I have an MPEG1 video file that Nero will accept as valid for making a VCD, however the file is too large to fit on a single CD. I tried cutting it into two parts using Merge & Cut, but the files output by TMPGEnc cause Nero to issue an error "Stream encoding which is invalid for a [Super] Video CD".

I would expect Merge and Cut to produce output file(s) having the same characteristics as the input(s), but this doesn't seem to be the case. Am I doing something wrong, or is this a bug in TMPGEnc?

Your Problem isn"t Tmpgenc but the way you edited the file...When you edit the file you have to make sure that the Stream setting is set to the correct Format..Since you are editing a VCD then you should have the stream setting set to "Mpeg-1 Video-CD" or "Mpeg-1 Vodeo-CD(Non-Standard)" if you just leave it at the default setting of "Mpeg-1" then it will not output a VCD file but an Mpeg-1 file and there is a Differance of which you are learning now...All you have to do is Re-edit the files with the correct setting....

Anyone knows why when encoding mpg2 with Tmpgenc, it chops off last few seconds at the end of the file?

If you used the Source range to choose the beginning and end point of the file then it shouldn"t do that....

I am new to DVD. I've encoded some VCD's using tmpgenc in the past with success, but in anticipation of my DVD burner I wanted to convert a couple AVI's (DivX) to burn to DVD. Here's my question, problem. When I load a default DVD template in TMPG it tells me I can fit 120-165min worth of video depending on the audio and video encoding I choose (CBR, PCM, etc, etc). That would be great because my AVI's are each about 50min each (qty. 3). So I choose 2Pass VBR, MpegII audio and load the AVI and choose all my settings and at the very end it reports just one AVI takes up 77% of the DVD (about 3.6gb). The problem is, it's telling me I can only fit about 65 minutes onto a DVD. I know I can manually limit the video bitrate and fit more, but what I don't understand is why the TMPG template doesn't do this by default? Why does it allude I can fit 2-3 hours of video onto DVD but than tell me I can only fit 1 hour? I guess more than anything, I'm confused as to why this isn't more user friendly, if it says using this method will allow 120 minutes of video when I select that it should allow 120 minutes of video. Any thoughts?

You seem to be bit confused.
Because you are using a VBR method of encoding TMPG will simply use the highest bitrate it can (while keeping within the limits) to maintain a high quality picture. At the moment your bitrate will be somewhere around 8000 kb/s.

So no matter what length of source you load it will always use up most of the disk. If you had a longer source then TMPG would automatically reduce the bitrate to accomodate the longer file.

What you need to do is number the 3 AVI's in sequence then load them and TMPG will then join all three toghether and treat them as one file and adjust the bitrate accordingly to fit it on to the DVD the bitrate will then go down to something around 4500 kb/s
You may need to go into the enviroment settings first to enable sequencial file opening.

Ok, thanks for the clarification, that makes much more sense. I understand why it does that from one perspective, but it's very confusing when you're trying to cram something like home movies or TV episodes onto one disc because there is nothing that indicates it's trying to fit each file perfectly onto one disc. I'm not sure your suggestion will work in this case though. One AVI is in AC3 the other two aren't (it's not one movie, they're all seperate videos). I'm going to try that AC3ACM tonight when I get home and see I can get it work, otherwise I guess I'll have figure out the appropriate bitrate and encode each individually.

Ok, thanks for the clarification, that makes much more sense. I understand why it does that from one perspective, but it's very confusing when you're trying to cram something like home movies or TV episodes onto one disc because there is nothing that indicates it's trying to fit each file perfectly onto one disc. I'm not sure your suggestion will work in this case though. One AVI is in AC3 the other two aren't (it's not one movie, they're all seperate videos). I'm going to try that AC3ACM tonight when I get home and see I can get it work, otherwise I guess I'll have figure out the appropriate bitrate and encode each individually.

Ok, thanks for the clarification, that makes much more sense. I understand why it does that from one perspective, but it's very confusing when you're trying to cram something like home movies or TV episodes onto one disc because there is nothing that indicates it's trying to fit each file perfectly onto one disc. I'm not sure your suggestion will work in this case though. One AVI is in AC3 the other two aren't (it's not one movie, they're all seperate videos). I'm going to try that AC3ACM tonight when I get home and see I can get it work, otherwise I guess I'll have figure out the appropriate bitrate and encode each individually.

If you have an AVI with AC3 audio you should simple Just extract the AC3 as an ac3 audio file and use that as the audio in your DVD cuz AC3 is the best Format for DVD"s...You can extract the audio to AC3 useing Virtual Dub and AC3-Fix or BeSplit, if you need further instructions Post back....

Any bitrate calculator will tell you what bitrate you need to set for a 150 min movie. In this case the average bitrate would be 3850 kb/s.

I was wondering if I am using 80-minute with 750MB CD-Rs, can I fit 3 30-minute episodes on there with quality at 70? The first file is only about 230MB. So if I have 3 of those, it would only come out to 690MB. Will it fit on a CD-R? :( It is really important that I fit 3 to every CD-R or I will waste so much discs! I would even sacrifice the video quality!

You've got me confused here.
>I was wondering if I am using 80-minute with 750MB CD-Rs

80 minute CDR's are 800mb not 750mb.

>The first file is only about 230MB

Is this an MPEG we are talking about? If so and all three are the same size then 690mb will easily fit a 74 min or 80 min CDR no problem.

Sorry, guess I got mixxed up. So even if all 3 movies added up are over 80 minutes but is under 800MB, it can still fit on the CD-R?

(Actually, my CD-Rs are 80 minutes and 700MB. With overburning selected, I can burn up to 813MB)

OK, an easy one. Why, even with the purchase of the TMPGEnc DVD authoring software can I...

1) Compress an avi file to an MPEG2 file, but...
2) Not be able to view it with even the latest version of Windows Media Player?

Further, I downloaded the Elecard MPEG2 decoder and was able to view these files for, you guessed it, 21 days. When, without warning all these files just appeared scrambly. Turns out, you have to contact the company for a license, which is fine...

But, does it really answer the question of why the heck did I just buy something that would write movie files that I can't watch? If the ENcoder is in the TMPGEnc DVD software why isn't the DEcoder? I feel like I'm taking crazy pills here.

For a MPEG2-Playback-Decoder, any Company has to pay License-Fees. That's why most(!) DVD-Authoring-Programs don't come with such a Filter/Decoder. Only the expensive one's do include a Decoder.

For Playback MPEG2, you need a Software-DVD-Player. You can try Media Player Clasic from Sourceforge. It includes a simple Playback-Decoder.
Media Player from Microsoft don't come with a Decoder. Microsoft don't want to pay the License-Fee.

Thanks! Still seems a little funny to me that authoring software doesn't make their own decoder and bundle that in with their software. It's kind of like not being able to purchase a car with power locks.

I am capturing movies from my mini-DV cam directly to Premiere. Until now I've only been editing and sending back to the camera. I would like to take some clips and put them on the web. The quality I got with Cleaner 5 (integrated with Premiere) was horrible...blurry, banding, etc. regardless of the settings I tried. I have just started using TMPGEnc to convert AVI's to Mpeg, with much better results.

1. Is there a way to integrate TMPGEnc into Premiere, like Cleaner 5 is?

2. In the Wizard, can someone give me a few suggested parameters to use for encoding video for the internet? We are talking 20 sec. clips with a lot of motion (motorcycle, mtn. bike). Obviously looking for the best quality and a reasonable file size...say 2mb or less. Playback size can be smaller, does not have to be full screen.

Thanks in advance. I'm new at encoding, but not new at editing.

I think I solved my own problem, at least the first part of it...

I downloaded the plug-in from www.videotools.com and got it integrated with Premiere. They have a nice online tutorial on how to use it with TMPGEnc! (I also discovered that Cleaner 5 EZ that comes with Premiere is total crap, and doesn't support the video server mode...thus there is no way to control any parameters, even bitrate.)

Other than that, I'm just using mpeg1 so far, my file size is 10mb per minute, which I can live with.

If anyone has any other tips or suggestions for configuring videos for the web, PLEASE let me know!

Well If you are Doing Videos for web distribution then you might get Much smaller file sizes and same a lot of Bandwidth if you maybe tried a Different Format like WMV/ASF format...With WMV you could probably get about the same Quality but at a quarter the file size and anyone with a windows based PC could watch the files no problem...Just a Thought and Yes Cleaner5 is Crap...Cheers

Thanks, I'll give that a try!

Recently, I reinstalled Win XP Pro on my machine at home due to some problems I was having.

Once everything was reinstalled, I came to convert a couple of files I had.

I currently have a settings file that I use however, along with this, I run the project wizard so that I can specify a file size to find out the bit rate (I don't know if there is an easier method, but I find this works).

Anyway, I have now found that whatever files I open, the length is displayed incorrectly (always way too long) which results in the filesize being about 8Gb for a 2000 bit rate.

Having searched through the forums, I have only really been able to find the answer - it is nothing to do with TMPGenc since it gets the information from the file itself.

I have a file that I had converted (before formating my drive and reinstalling P) and the movie length was being report by TMPGEnc with no problems. Also, if I continously open the project wizard and go through to the end, I am occassionally given the correct info.

I am trying to convert XVID and DIVX movies to MPEG-1 Layer II Audio

Is there something I am doing wrong? I don't think that the problem is with any of the files since they were all okay before the reinstall. Since these files were on a different drive, they have not been effected.

I have also installed FFDShow Codec.

Thanks in advance,
Pie

I don't think that this is a problem anymore.

By chance I noticed a thread that mentioned VFAPI. This rang a few bells from the first time I was setting everything up.

After some extensive huntig, I came across the following prority settings -

DirectShow Multimedia File Reader-----Priority 3
AVI2(OpenDML) File Reader-------------Priority 1
Microsoft MPEG-1 Decoder--------------Priority 0
Wave File Reader----------------------Priority 0
AVI VFW Compatability Reader----------Priority 0
BMP/PPM/TGA/JPG File Reader-----------Priority -2
TMPGEnc Project File Reader 2.59------Priority -2

After I had installed the VFAPI codec I set the prorities as above and then checked one of my AVI files. Low and Behold, the length reported was correct :-)

Hi

I am trying to burn a avi file that was encoded as xvid with ac3 to a dvd to play in a stand alone player... I have used virtualdub to sav the audio as a .wav then renamed to .ac3... then used besweet to convert the ac3 to mp2 and then used tmpgenc to convert the mp2 and video from the avi to an mpg file... used the wizard and selected the dvd pal high quality one... to about 7hrs to do a 1hr movie (part of one) The resulting mpg will play in windvd... i have tried to use tmpgenc dvd author to make the dvd files to burn but when i click the "GO" button the elapsed time gets to about 10secs and then an error comes up "stream writing error" i have searched the net trying to find what this means and as far as i can tell it is something to do with hdd space... I have set the destination and temp folders to a drive with 23gb free space so i don't see how that can be the problem....
I am a newbee to this stuff so if some one could help me with this problem it would be greatly appreciated....

PLEASE HELP ME!!

Stop to put your question in BUG term.
check your HDD, and what file system your Hdd is, FAT or NTFS?

hi, i am trying to open an .avi movie file. But TmpgEnc says blah.avi can not open or is not supported. I know its either divx or xvid, how can i change the enviornment settings to have TMPGEnc recognize it and be able to edit it.

Well if it is a XviD file then you should also have the FFDShow Decoder installed Because it Replaces the XviD codec for Decodeing XviD files Because Tmpgenc doesn"t get allong well with the XviD codec...To change the Enviromental setting is so Simple that it should not even be asked..You just Right click on the VFAPI Plugin you want to Change the Priority of and just change it...To get DivX/XviD files to load you raise the "Direct Show"...

Any chance to import chapters from ascii file?
Like Premiere markers export:

Timeline Marker Data Output on 19-10-03 16:30:27
Position Duration Comment Chapter URL Frame Target
00:00:06:00 00:00:00:01 Chapter one
00:09:17:18 00:00:00:01 Chapter two

Or any other formatted ascii file...
Would be a great time-saver.


Jaap

Reply to myself.. 2nd evening playing with DVD Author.

If "Add chapter at specified timecode" would
accept bulk entry pasted from clipboard, a lot
of entry time would be saved..

00:03:06:07
00:09:17:18
00:16:36:03
00:21:45:24
00:31:09:20
00:43:29:14
00:53:54:20
01:04:47:12
etc..


Jaap

Hi, when i try to load any avi file, it a msg comes up and says "file cannot open, or unsupported"?? can anybody pleez help me??!! thanx

Search the board and you will get your answer a million times over.