What is the best codec/format to use?

[Earwax]

I've been capturing and editing video for a few years and I've gone through a lot of different codecs. All of the friends I know who are into capturing swear by mpeg1 and mpeg2, but I'm a divx fan. I just think divx looks better with the right bitrate. I was wondering if anyone else had an opinion on what the best codec is to use, assuming you are going to capture around 90 minutes of video with audio, and want to fit the entire capture onto a single cd. I know normal mpeg1 bitrates can only fit about 60-70 minutes on a cd, but for the sake of argument, supposed you could fit 90 minutes on a CD, would you use mpeg1, mpeg2, or divx?

I've been going with divx, wondering if there is another (higher quality) route...

 

[rbV5]

I've recently been playing with Nandub. So far the best quality method I've come up with are Cap at 720x480 NTSC using huffyuv, and then using Nandub, 2pass SBC, and it gives me great quality, far superior to any other combination of capture/codecs I've tried. I've simply been going for quality rather than size, so total disrequard for fitting on a CD.

MPEG(1or2) for me, is great for cap and view, but poor for cap and burn. Too big of files, and poor quality at VCD or SVCD resolutions and bitrates, and too lossy and unwieldly for editing and re-compressing. DVD burners and good codecs could change that for sure, but for me, right now, for the absolute best quality its AVI>Nandub, hands down.

 

[pcclub2000]

I use DivX 4.12.
Best quality and a DVD-Movie fits onto a 700MB CD.

 

[Earwax]

Thanks for the advice guys. I don't know why so many of my friends think VCD is so great, I've never really been impressed by it.

I've used nandub in the past, did a few long movies with it over the summer. Recently I've been working with Divx4.1, since it supports VBR. However, I have a winTV card now (before I had a DC-10) and the wintv card does not do any hardware encoding, so I've been limited to capturing directly to mpeg2. I haven't been able to get much done...hopefully in a few days I'll have my new rig up and running and be able to attempt to capture at a higher bitrate... I think I'm going to keep using Divx to make the CDs, thanks for the input.

 

[duragezic]

I'll have to try that rbV5. I capture in mpg1 and then edit and usually output to divx. Or .wmv if I really need to shrink it.

Is huffyuv almost uncompressed though? I don't think I'd have the disc space for it.

Also when you use Nandub and convert to divx, do you keep it at 720x480? Thanks.

 

[dnacard]

what's a good website for learning about how to rip with divx?

 

[Earwax]

Check out "Nicky's Guides" over at divx-digest.com. His guides also have links to all the software you will need to use in order to rip to divx. I don't remember whether his guides are under www.digital-digest.com, or www.divx-digest.com. The sites are run by the same people, so if you do a search they will show up. His guides are very comprehensive.

[EDIT] Here is the link to Nicky's Guides

 

[rbV5]

<< Is huffyuv almost uncompressed though? >>



It gives me about 2/1 compression over Raw AVI so my captures are nearly identical to uncompressed, but half the size(still huge though)



<< Also when you use Nandub and convert to divx, do you keep it at 720x480? Thanks. >>



I do, but only because this is the method I use to get the best quality output video without regard to file size, I'm only concerned in playback quality right now. I haven't played enough with Nandub yet to start burning my movies down to 1or2 CD's yet (to me, movies must be 2CD's or less to be acceptable for viewing) when DVDR's are cheap enough, and media is cheap enough, file size wont be be an issue until we start talking HDTV resolutions anyway.



<< what's a good website for learning about how to rip with divx? >>



I agree with the Nicky Guides, also check Doom9.