Digital Video To Vcd

[bonsaimax]

HI! Is it possible to copy DV's to VCD without losing picture quality? I've been using ULEAD 7 to capture my videos from my video cam onto my PC, and NERO to burn them into CD's. I also have been using a cheap capture card bought from Pantip. Could this be the culprit? Tinkering with the settings didn't seem to solve the problem. I still get hazy and even blurred images once viewed on the CD.

Does anyone know of any video editing program suitable for amateurs like me? ULEAD isn't that user friendly. Just the very basic stuff would suffice.

Thanks!

[terdsak_12]

I had similar problems, also thought it was the cheap-sih capture card, anyway flogged my camera cos I couldnt' find a use for it.

Try the windows movie maker program free with XP, some people swear by it.

[francois]

hi'

or take a look at nero vision (version2) that comes with nero version6, it does make a good job, otherway look at pinnacle programs, some nice stuffs

francois

[monty]

Hi,

You'll never be able to convert DV to vcd without losing quality!

The DV format has a bitrate of 25Mbps, or 3.1MBps...

This means you would need 180 MB of space for every minute of video!!!

To put video on a VCD we use a very high compression (MPEG1 for VCD or MPEG2 for SVCD) to bring this amount of data down so we can store it on a cd!

MPEG1 uses a bitrate of a little over 1Mbps (25 times less!!!) so we end up being able to put around 90 minutes of video on a disc instead of 4 minutes...

If you want audio as well this falls back to around 70 minutes of video on a disc...

It is in this compression we lose the quality! Some programs do a better job then others but the difference is small!

When DVD came around with 4.5 GB of space we moved up to a much higher bitrate (up to 8Mbps) so we needed less compression and as a result better quality. Even then you'll still see the difference with DV!

One thing happening in the compression as well is reducing the pixels. IN DV the resolution is 720X576 Pixels(in PAL), while in MPEG1 this is brought back to 352 X288 pixels...

If you need real decent quality you'll have to invest in a DVD-burner... They are around 5500 Baht for a multiformat (+R, -R) and around 25 baht for an empty dvd if you buy in bulk...

Cheers,

Monty

[Pink Mist]

I used that windows movie program to edit out adverts from movies captured from TV once. What a time consuming pain in the but.

You can use TMPenc program to edit and dvd's and vcd.dvd help

Go to that site and look thru forum and or post your questions in the newbies section.

[phazey]

forget capture cards, just get a firewire interface if your camera is capable. This will allow you full control over your camera with the ability to dump raw video on your machine (pretty big tho)

You'll get a lower quality when converting to VCD format (320x240).

Perhaps consider going for the higher quality SVCD format if your player supports it.

I'd use either NERO or VCDGear to do this.

./P

[bonsaimax]

Thank you all for shedding more light into this dilemma. I also tried using Windows Media Player, but wasn't satisfied by the results.

I understand that you lose some quality because of the compression. All I'm after is something decent enough without the mosaic patterns.

Monty, thanks for the detailed explanation. NOW it makes sense.

Francois, I've heard about Pinnacle too. I sure will give it a shot. How about Adobe Premiere? What do you think of it?

Cheers, gentlemen!!!

[francois]

hi'

Adobe premiere .... WHAOOO

you want to make pro looking video

well, surely the best, but it's no use if it's only to make "home movies".

far too rich, like it's brother photoshop, useless just to adjust brigtness and size ...

requires a lot of CPU power as well as a lot of ram ...

they say runs better with : dual CPU (P4 >2ghz, 2 of them ..), and more than 512mb ...

it says it all

surely better to stay with programs that do a good job without pain

francois