Catalyst + Nero makes SVCD creation easy!

[rbV5]

Catalyst seems pretty impressive to me so far, one of the new features is a preset for capturing directly to a compliant SVCD file. Using the new SVCD preset in MMC 7.7 and Nero 5.5.8.1, I was able to make a quick music video, complete with a menu. The entire workflow consisted of:

*Capture video with MMC 7.7's DVCR using the SVCD preset.
*Start a new SVCD project in Nero.
*Dragged captured video into the project(accepted file as SVCD compliant!) and burned SVCD.
*Played perfectly in PowerDVD (won't play in VCD player 7.6 or WMP, I've always used PowerDVD for VCD playback anyway)

Its never been easier for me to create an SVCD. Other than using the menu creation in Nero, I used only default settings. Video IQ was very good, especially via TV-out. My only complaint is that the ATI VCD player won't play the resulting SVCD, and PowerDVD won't work in "theater mode" while minimized to the task bar

 

[rbV5]

Had some trouble with hardware acceleration with PowerDVD unfortunately. Looking for a decent playback solution, I came up with using the Zoom Player frontend, and the Elecard mpeg-2 codec. The zoom player works great in "theater mode" minimized to the taskbar, and the elecard codecs have a respectable IQ and cpu utilization.

If anyone has another decent SVCD software player, I'd like to try t out.

 

[rb56]

Thanks for the tip on SVCD recording with Catalyst, I downloaded it this morning and installed it but hadn't taken the time to check it out. By the way I recorded a few min. of video and tried to open it in WMP and it worked fine. What I'd like to know is if there is a program to edit the SVCD with, cut commericals etc. and then burn the file to CD. I use Sonic Foundry for AVI but it dosen't do mpeg-2.

thanks again
rb56

 

[rbV5]

Yea, its not the captured video that's the problem. When you burn a SVCD there is a wrapper placed on the file and you need a parser to decode the file, its not a standard MPEG file anymore. After I installed the elecard direct show filters, the files play fine in WMP. I use the Zoom frontend because it will work in "theater mode" while minimized, and has just a great feature set.

While its very nice to capture a compliant SVCD file, editing MPEG-2 files and SVCD encoding is a whole other animal though (its what drove me to Divx, hehe) There isn't a single MPEG-2 editor that I can recommend. I have recently been re-examining SVCD creation however, and I'll be looking at a number of applications and see what I can find.

 

[NicColt]

>There isn't a single MPEG-2 editor that I can recommend.

RBv5 I had a heated discussion with the pros at creativecow.net on MPEG2 editors and the concensus among the pros is this;

No editors are true MPEG2 editors. Editors are mostly DV editors but can edit MPEG2 to a limit. The problem is within the limits in the compressed MPEG2 codec itself, the longer the MPEG2 steam the more difficult it will be for the editor to track the stream or clip. So the larger the MPEG2 clip the more problems you will have. Anything over 500megs and your starting to look for trouble. However you will have no problems with a 50 Gig uncompress DV codec clip because it's in raw form. So I'm starting to move away from direct MPEG2 captures to DV.

What they are saying is that if you are going to render or edit the video, capture it in DV format first and then render it to MPEG2 with the Editor either VCD or SVCD. If you are going to record direct to SVCD or VCD then record directly from MPEG2.

That's where Vegas is strong. no matter what capture I use, once it's in Vegas I can easily render it to SVCD or VCD and then burn with nero no problem. My main problem was with getting a 'quality' DV codec and now I have. Vegas uses the Main Concept MPEG2 which is just awsome so I gave the Main Concept DV codec a try and it is NICE.

Here's what I did.

I did a 10 min. capture test with the Main Concept DV codec, I then opend the clip in Vegas and rendered it to both VCD and SVCD and then burned it with Nero to cd-rw and was able to play it on my DVD player and it was very nice. Problem is that I only have about 20Gigs free so a 120Gig serial ATA drive is in order.

 

[rbV5]

Hey Nic what software are you using for SVCD playback? I'm looking for something that works well with menu's and "Theater Mode". Currently, Im using the Zoom Player frontend (awesome) and elecard mpeg-2 codecs, which gives me a great picture, the lowest CPU use and works with Theater Mode while minimized to the task bar...but no menu's(that I can figure out anyway...bummer)?

So the Main Concept MPEG-2 codec makes compliant SVCD encodings? Thats good to know, I'm going to start playing with MPEG again after seeing how well catalyst does at real time SVCD's. Now I need a good solution for creating SVCD files from edited Huffyuv AVI files for burning to CDR.

Also, do you have a link for the Main Concept codec, all I can find are the DV and MJPEG codecs.

 

[joinT]

I found that the SVCD's I've made (using TMPEnc) play fine in my GF's standalone dvd player, but ATI's VCD player or DVD player doesn't work.. I haven't tried w/ PowerDVD or WinDVD yet.

Is it w/ MMC7.7 that you can capture directly to SVCD ? oh well, I still like to edit out the commercials

 

[rbV5]

Is it w/ MMC7.7 that you can capture directly to SVCD ?

Yea, there's a preset that will produce a compliant file. There's a registry tool to hack older versions. I agree it doesn't help with files you need to edit, but it sure makes it easy if you are just recording a movie off HBO for instance.

PowerDVD 4 is horribly laggy and wont use the Radeon's hardware assist on my rig(looking into this), and WinDVD plays them great, but won't go to full screen via TV-out in Theater mode, so unacceptable for me. ATI's file player works fine with the Elecard MPEG-2 codecs I installed (WMP also) but, the Zoom Player has a better interface and feature set...just won't use menus, unless I'm missing something.

 

[NicColt]

>Also, do you have a link for the Main Concept codec

HOLY SH** I just went to their site and they offer the MPEG1-2 codecs only as a plug-in kit for their main actor video editor. They don't even sell it.

But on their home page it says this;

"MainConcept has announced a licensing agreement with Sonic Foundry, a leading provider of rich media software, systems and services. MainConcept?s technology allows Sonic Foundry customers to open MPEG files, and to save MPEG files optimized for popular formats such as DVD, Video CD and Super Video CD"

so it's as if they don't actually sell the MPEG codecs but enter into licensing agreements with Video Editors as plug-ins.

Since I have Vegas from Sonic Foundry, when I registered the MPEG codecs they were from Main Concept but offered through Sonic Foundry. That would explain it.

>what software are you using for SVCD playback?

Actually I never play SVCD's on my computer only on my DVD player.

Damm all I have to say is with the Main Concept DV codec for initial capture and editing and rendering to VCD/SVCD with Sonic Foundry's Vegas with the Main Concept MPEG1-2 codecs and burning with Nero combo it's one heck of a pain free solution for SVCD's and VCD's. I havent used Factory ($69) in a while but I'm quite sure it can do the same as Vegas except that it's a non-linear editor that's it.

Now all I need is a pair of 120 Gig HD's because just 1hr of DV capture is about 14 Gigs.

The Holy Grail is near.

 

[rb56]

Factory uses the same MPEG 1-2 codec and has presets for VCD and SVCD, I have used both quite a bit and both work well. I have no problems playing on both my DVD players. Nick what are you using to capture DV as a front end for the MainConcept codec, or is it standalone? I need 17 gigs for a one hour of capture using avi, 320x240, @29.97 fps and would like to cut the size down a bit.

rb56

 

[NicColt]

>I need 17 gigs for a one hour of capture using avi, 320x240, @29.97 fps and would like to cut the size down a bit.

I hear ya on that, same here.

I was using the AIW with the MC-DV capture but I just found out that the Capture from within Vegas or Sonic foundry also works. Actually anything will work as long as you have the codec.

Also I saw that Main Concept has a demo of the DV codec if you want to check it out.