Posted by Ken Maltby on 11/18/05 01:06

>>Does quoting the above mean that the following applies
>>to what you are doing with the MF4 clips?
>
> Basically yes. I used VRD's Quickstream Fix (aka "Quickfix") with "MF
> option" off on the MF4 rendered clips (MF4 exports). Then I imported
> them into TDA using "Add new track".
>
>> After you click the "Save As..." button, the "Save As"/output
>>window pops up. In the bottom right corner there is an "Options"
>>button. One of the options is "Bit Rate:", set it to 8Mbps. But
>>this only changes what is recorded in the header, it has no actual
>>effect on the video. It may make the clip acceptable to other
>>programs though.
>
> I found the "options" button on the VRD Quickfix output box and set
> the bitrate to 10Mbps as instructed in Help, viz.:.
>
> "Technical Note: If you specify a bit rate override of 10 Mbps,
> VideoReDo will assume that you want the MPEG headers to correspond to
> DVD specifications. The video bit rate will be set to 9.80 Mbps less
> the audio bit rate, and the overall program stream mux rate will be
> set to 10.08 Mbps."
>
I just set it to 8Mbps, remember this setting has no actual
effect on the video's bit rate, as you see in that the PTS are
still there. Fortunately, DVD players can handle some of that
off spec video and can even deal with some stream correction
themselves.

> But the results gave the same PTS error, which I ignored. I then
> imported the fixed MPG into TDA and the input dialog said 9.544 Mbps.
> It rendered without incident. So it would appear that I will have to
> Quickfix all my MF4 clips with the 10Mbps bit rate in VRD. There's a
> Batch Manager - I wonder how I could put that to use to save having to
> do the fixes manually one file at a time.
>

The Batch process lets you set up your editing projects,
for later processing. This can come in handy when you have
a number of edits in each project (clip). If you are only
changing the header bit rate, it is faster and fewer steps, to
just do each of them, one after the other. After you do the
first one, and return to the main editing window of VRD,
the "Open Video" selection under the "File" tab -or- Ctrl-O;
will take you right back to the folder that the first clip came
from. Just select the next clip.


> I played this TDA-rendered output in WinDVD and it works just fine.
> The text I overlaid for the menu is preserved on the clip as I wanted
> it. So far,so good. I still have to learn menu construction, but at
> least I am past this important hurdle.
>

If you want to add text to a menu, that's easily done in TDA.
You might be much better off if you just started over from your
original DVD and forget about trying to correct the MF4 files.
Perhaps if you describe that you are using MF4 to accomplish,
I can describe an alternate way of doing it.

> I am really beginning to like TDA - it seems to work, which is so
> refreshing. MF4 was broken at the very outset. I wish I had known
> about it before I wasted all that time with MF4.
>
>
> The DVD begins with the first title instead of the menu as I want. I
> need to study that writeup I printed that you furnished in an earlier
> post.
>
> But the menu still only has 1 entry - I can't find the other two
> titles.
>

It sounds like you have the "Menu display settings" wrong.
You need the "Firstplay action:" set to "Display Main menu".
If you want just the one "Main" menu, to be able to select
the VTS, then use the "Only Main menu" option and not the
"Automatic settings" option.

>>As you said that your source was a DVD, you should not have needed
>>to do that encoding, by the way.
>
> If I did not do Two Pass rendering, the clips has serious audio sync
> problems. I was forced to do Two Pass. Using QuickStream Fix in VRD to
> fix the audio sync problems did not work. Only forcing a resync
> (Adjust Audio Sync) worked in VRD and only Two Pass worked in MF4 (but
> not on all clips - I still had to fix one with VRD forced resync).
>

Why not try an experiment; copy a large .vob file from your
original DVD to your hard drive and run it through VideoReDo.
Then see if that .mpg is in sync. If so then feed it to TDA and
author a DVD. Play it from your hard drive and see if it is still
in sync. I take it, this was the point after MF4 that things were
out of sync.

>
> BTW, I thought there was a manual for TDA but I can't find it. Maybe
> they expect you to use Help instead.
>

Yes, all the help there is, is in electronic formats. There is
also what's on their web site, but there is a much greater
volume of help from all the "How To" guides at sites like:
www.videohelp.com www.doom9.org www.digitalfaq.com
www.afterdawn.com ( And some of us here can help.)

Luck;
Ken

P.S. All the negative comments about MF4 aren't helpful.
Because you find it hard to work with or even nonfunctional
with your source material, doesn't mean that it would be
problematic for everyone. Some find that it works well for
their purposes.

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