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vegas to DVD architect workflow
I’m curious about creating standard DVDs with Vegas. I usually render my videos to mpeg2 from Vegas and then import them into DVD architect. When the video is over an hour I sometimes have trouble getting it to fit onto the disk. What is annoying is that if it is too big the optimize disk command cannot do anything – yet if I re-render the same video as.avi and then import it the optimize disk(fit to disk) command works.
I shoot a lot of events and they are often longer than two hours. I obviously want to have the best video quality for my clients and I don’t want to sit around for hours waiting for a render I cant use.
Is there a recommended length limit for creating DVDs in this case.
Christopher Key
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10 Replies
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[Christopher Key] “I shoot a lot of events and they are often longer than two hours. I obviously want to have the best video quality for my clients and I don’t want to sit around for hours waiting for a render I cant use.
Is there a recommended length limit for creating DVDs in this case.”
Google for “bitrate calculator” and you will find plenty of them. Just plug in the time of your movie and it will tell you the average bitrate that you should use. Then open the MPEG2 template and adjust the average bitrate accordingly.
~jr
http://www.johnrofrano.com
http://www.vasst.com -
Thanks John!!
Christopher Key
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https://www.johncline.com/bitcalc110.zip
It’s my favourite and has been discussed here numerous times. -
One thing to note is that bitrate calculators are pretty accurate and can usually be trusted. What can’t be trusted is DVDA’s estimated size of the files on DVD. So if you have 4GB worth of data to burn to a DVD, but once it’s all in DVDA it tells you it’s gonna take up 4.8GB and won’t fit on a single-layer disc, try burning it anyway. A lot of the time it’ll burn just fine, then after burning it’ll change it’s estimate back to 4GB. It’s frustrating but what can you do?
The other thing you asked was is there a recommended length limit for creating dvd’s. I don’t know if there’s one consensus on the forums about when they start looking crummy. I personally don’t like to fit more than an hour and a half on a single layer disc if I can avoid it, but sometimes you can’t avoid it. When we have projects that go over two hours we try to divide them up onto two discs if it’s okay with the client.
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Yesterday I used the bitrate calculator and that worked fine for a program almost 2 hours long – this seems like something that would be worth having as part of the core program. If Vegas could calculate the length and then set the correct bit rate that would be a nice addition.
Thanks to all for your help!!
Christopher Key
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[Christopher Key] ” this seems like something that would be worth having as part of the core program. “
We included a bit rate calculator as part of VASST Ultimate S Pro and Lite plug-in because it is a useful function to have. Unfortunately Vegas doesn’t let you programatically change the bit-rate on a template so you still have to adjust that manually.
~jr
http://www.johnrofrano.com
http://www.vasst.com -
[David Shirey] ” I don’t know if there’s one consensus on the forums about when they start looking crummy. I personally don’t like to fit more than an hour and a half on a single layer disc if I can avoid it, but sometimes you can’t avoid it.”
IMO, it all comes down to how good your source footage is.
The better it is, the longer the program that you can fit on a disc.
For example, I shot a play last spring that turned out to be 2.5 hr. long.
I was positive that I’d have to burn it on 2 DVDS but a test using the encoding parameters for it (2-pass with VBR settings of 6,496,000 / 3,712,000 / 2,224,000) turned out just fine for me and everyone else who saw it.
Mind you, it was shot with a 1/2″ 3 CCD camcorder in a professionally lit theatre and that makes all the difference. -
Yesterday I finished up an edit that clocked in at 2 hours 11 minutes – I used the bitrate calculator and when I imported the finished render into DVD architect it said it was 5.8 Gigs – but, because of these posts, I decided to go ahead and burn a disk anyway. After it was finished it said “disk space used 4.7GB” and it looks OK and plays back fine.
Thanks again for everyones help.
Christopher Key
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[Christopher Key] “Yesterday I finished up an edit that clocked in at 2 hours 11 minutes – I used the bitrate calculator and when I imported the finished render into DVD architect it said it was 5.8 Gigs – but, because of these posts, I decided to go ahead and burn a disk anyway. After it was finished it said “disk space used 4.7GB” and it looks OK and plays back fine.”
That really burns me up. If windows explorer can tell you how large a file is, and Vegas can tell you the correct size AFTER you burn the disc, why can it not tell you the exact correct size before you burn it? Come on Sony, pick up your game.
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[David Shirey] “…why can it not tell you the exact correct size before you burn it?”
You can suggest it Sony as a feature for a future update but don’t hold your breath waiting for it.
I would rather have them focus on getting ALL the bugs fixed in the current version before adding anything else.I always use a bitrate calculator to determine optimum encoding parameters.
Once I’m in DVDA, I ignore any warning messages that may pop up and it proceeds without further fuss.I use a bitrate calculator the way I use Photoshop or any other app external to Vegas.
It’s just another tool used to make my productions that much better and I don’t mind the few extra moments it takes.
I have several custom MPEG-2 encoding presets already created and saved so that I don’t have to use it for each new DVD.
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