>> Take a stroll to this site
>>
>> http://www.videohelp.com/
> 
> I'll do that...

Much confusion ensures...

Between ffmpeg, mencoder, libavcodec, ffdshow and the myriad of 
frontends available, I'm left wondering which way is up. So many bits of 
software, all seperate, yet all interrelated somehow. Really confusing!

Mind you, trying to figure out video codecs is no easier. At least 
Xiph.org gives their codecs *names*. Others seem to think it's 
acceptable to just assign a code number to each standard they issue. The 
result is a seemingly never-ending stream of codes, symbols and TLAs 
that seems almost indecipherable.

Reading Wikipedia we find that MPEG-4 "is just a container format", but 
at the same time "DivX and XviD are different implementations of the 
MPEG-4 codec". And as if that wasn't enough, it seems that DivX and XviD 
are supposedly different, and yet supposedly they're also the same.

I'm *so* glad I don't need to actually comprehend this stuff... After 
all, I'm only trying to edit a DVD, so I only need to worry about MPEG2.

The site did point out something interesting though: Apparently there's 
an altered version of VirtualDub that supposedly comprehends MPEG2. If I 
can persuade it to transcode the stuff to some uncompressed format then 
I'll be able to edit it. I can then recompress it before uploading. 
(Ordinarily I'd try to avoid recompressing, but since the video data is 
pretty suboptimal to begin with... how bad can it be?)

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Invisible <voi### [at] devnull> wrote:
> >   With mencoder you could stream-copy the DVD to an AVI file, which will
> > then most probably be openable in WMM, VirtualDub or whatever.

> Last time I played with mencoder I doubt it to be quite tricky to 
> produce video files that other players would actually play.

  I said that you should stream-copy the DVD, not re-encode it to anything.
Something like:

mencoder dvd:// -o thevideo.avi -ovc copy -oac copy

  The video (and audio) stream will be the original from the DVD, simply
packaged into an avi file. Since the video stream is most probably mpeg2,
most players and editors should handle it just fine.

-- 
                                                          - Warp

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Invisible wrote:
> Recording to disk rather than some complex tape mechanism probably makes 
> the device moderately cheaper to manufacture,

Maybe. Or it may just be that they figured they could sell many more 
write-once mini-dvds than they could cheap rewritable tapes. That's 
where you actually can make your money - everyone else is going to shop 
around for the cheapest camera with the features they want. Few are 
going to look at the price of media.

-- 
Darren New / San Diego, CA, USA (PST)

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Warp wrote:
> Invisible <voi### [at] devnull> wrote:
>>>   With mencoder you could stream-copy the DVD to an AVI file, which will
>>> then most probably be openable in WMM, VirtualDub or whatever.
> 
>> Last time I played with mencoder I doubt it to be quite tricky to 
>> produce video files that other players would actually play.
> 
>   I said that you should stream-copy the DVD, not re-encode it to anything.
> Something like:
> 
> mencoder dvd:// -o thevideo.avi -ovc copy -oac copy

I think you need a -of avi there...

-- 
If you shoot at mimes, should you use a silencer? - Steven Wright


                    /\  /\               /\  /
                   /  \/  \ u e e n     /  \/  a w a z
                       >>>>>>mue### [at] nawazorg<<<<<<
                                   anl

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Darren New wrote:
> Or it may just be that they figured they could sell many more 
> write-once mini-dvds than they could cheap rewritable tapes. That's 
> where you actually can make your money - everyone else is going to shop 
> around for the cheapest camera with the features they want. Few are 
> going to look at the price of media.

Yeah, but that's because 3 blank rewritable DVDs cost me, like, £5, and 
now I'll never need to buy a blank DVD ever again. Doesn't seem like a 
very good profit model to me. ;-)

Post a reply to this message

Orchid XP v8 wrote:

> First: My video camera records to mini-DVDs. It has two recording modes: 
> "video" and "VR". I have several disks full of video, all recorded in VR 
> mode. My mum's DVD player can play them. My dad's DVD player can play 
> them. My grandparents' ancient DVD player can play them. But every 
> *computer* under the Sun solemly swears that the DVDs are completely 
> blank and there is no data to play.
> 
> In a fit of extreme desperation, I consulted the manual. Guess what? The 
> camera has to be plugged into the mains to enable the "finalise disk" 
> option. o_O I mean, yeah, I can see why they're do that, but talk about 
> non-obvious...!
> 
> Anyway, I finalised the disk, and suddenly my PC can read it. Yay!

Realising that the camera needs to be on mains power before it will 
finalise anything, I was actually able to finalise the VR-mode disks. (I 
had assumed it wouldn't let me finalise them because they're VR-mode, 
which is only allowed for rewritable disks and supposedly isn't 
compatible with DVD players.)

My PC can now read these disks too, although they show up with a 
different file structure, and Windoze doesn't offer to run the DVD 
player program. However, if you manually invoke the DVD software and 
hand it the video file, it plays it without difficulty.

> Now... how in the name of God do you *edit* the thing?! >_<

Apparently Virtual Dub doesn't like MPEG2, but there's a thing called 
"Virtual Dub Mod" which handles it. I downloaded and installed this last 
night, and sure enough it will open and play the video file.

However... the sound is encoded with something called "AC-3", which 
apparently isn't supported. So there's no sound. (Recall that the sound 
is the part I'm most interested in keeping.)

At first I was truly upset about this. But now it occurs to me: I'm only 
trying to *edit* the thing. Virtual Dub Mod can't *decode* the audio, 
but it may well still be able to *copy* it regardless. And since it 
*can* decode the video, I can still see what I'm editing. This might 
actually work...

The slightly clunky alternative is to just cut the physical file into 
pieces and see if it still plays. Various sources claim that the MPEG2 
container format is supposed to survive this, so we'll see... (But 
hopefully I won't need to try this.)

Assuming both of these fail, I guess I'll have to resort to the hated 
mencoder. :-(

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"Invisible" <voi### [at] devnull> wrote in message 
news:4906d2d1$1@news.povray.org...

> Yeah, but that's because 3 blank rewritable DVDs cost me, like, £5, and 
> now I'll never need to buy a blank DVD ever again. Doesn't seem like a 
> very good profit model to me. ;-)

Rewritables don't last forever. I've got 2 that I use for music (for the 
car). Tossed one away just a week ago.

Also, just because you use rewritables doesn't mean everyone does.

Post a reply to this message

>> Yeah, but that's because 3 blank rewritable DVDs cost me, like, £5, 
>> and now I'll never need to buy a blank DVD ever again. Doesn't seem 
>> like a very good profit model to me. ;-)
> 
> Rewritables don't last forever. I've got 2 that I use for music (for the 
> car). Tossed one away just a week ago.

I've heard this, and logically it seems plausible. However, I own a 
CD-RW that I purchased back in 1996 that still works to this day. I have 
no idea how many different Linux distros and music compilations have 
been burned on that sucker. Surely it will wear out eventually, but one 
CD-RW every 15 years or so doesn't strike me as very profitable.

> Also, just because you use rewritables doesn't mean everyone does.

Well, I use CD-Rs because most stereo systems won't handle CD-RWs. But 
the original context here is digital camcorders. Mine supports DVD-RWs, 
and thus there is basically no reason for me to ever buy any more. 
(Unless they really wear out fast...)

Post a reply to this message

"Invisible" <voi### [at] devnull> wrote in message 
news:4906eca1$1@news.povray.org...
> Surely it will wear out eventually, but one CD-RW every 15 years or so 
> doesn't strike me as very profitable.

That's not bad. Mine wore out in about a year. I was wiping and re-burning 
once a week though

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Gail wrote:

> That's not bad. Mine wore out in about a year. I was wiping and 
> re-burning once a week though

Actually, I say I "purchased" it... It was actually the disk that came 
free with the CD burner drive. (This was back in the days when even a 
CD-ROM drive was several hundred £££ due to the newness of it all.)

Having said that, I have never seen any rewritable optical disk wear 
out. I've seen plenty of brand new disks that were not recognised by the 
drive, or wouldn't burn, or failed burning part way through. (This used 
to be extremely common in the early days - it seems to be quite rare 
now.) But I've never seen a disk that used to work eventually stop working.

Actually, wait... I've seen CD-Rs that stopped being readable a few 
years after they were burned. Invariably *cheap* CD-Rs, mind you. I 
still have disks I burned in 1996 that read fine...

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