why to use or not use vegas to burn dvd’s

[John Rofrano]

[Donna Black] “So is using vegas to burn dvd’s better than just using the program that came with my dvd burner? Why should I use one over the other?”

The convenience of burning directly from the Vegas timeline that’s all. You can certainly take the MPEG2 file that Vegas creates and burn it with any DVD burning software you want. The quality will be the same as long as the DVD software doesn’t re-encode it.

You do understand that you can’t just place the files onto DVD media and expect them to play. You must use a program that will take the files and create the proper DVD file structures.

~jr

http://www.johnrofrano.com
http://www.vasst.com

[Roger Martin]

Why not?

If your edited video file is too large, I find it is very difficult to use Vegas Pro to produce a DVD. Typically, I have to reduce the quality too much and don’t want to burn a Blue Ray disc.

My most recent project involved combining 9GB of MOV files.

This why I usually use Cyberlink Power Director. It has a “make it fit” setting that results in a better finished DVD.

The consumer versions of Vegas may have that capability.

[Donna Black]

What is a good dvd burning program to use in your opinion and how do I know that it will not re encode it? What do you mean by about placing the files on dvd media and not playing? Are saying that my mpeg 2 file will not just automatically burn to a dvd? I am just a little confused there. Sorry about posting this in the regular forum. I meant to post in the sony basic forum.

[Stephen Mann]

While we say that DVD video is compliant MPEG2 files, you generally can’t put MPEG files on a DVD and expect the DVD player to play the video. Some will, but most won’t.

The DVD player is looking for a very specific file structure. At the root is your VIDEO_TS and AUDIO_TS folders. (AUDIO_TS is for the HD Audio format that never took off in the market, so it’s always blank. But, many DVD players are “looking” for both folders).

Inside the VIDEO_TS folder, there are one or more VOB files. And a bunch of other stuff, but we’re getting into details that really don’t matter because your DVD preparation program (DVD Architect, in my case) prepares all those files and the necessary file structures for you. VOB files are your MPEG files with a new filename. If your MPEG and AC3 audio files (and menus and extras folder) all total less than 4.5Gb, then your DVD burn program won’t need to recompress the files. (Unless the files themselves are not compliant, like the audio not in AC3 format, for example).

If your video needs recompression to fit the DVD, and if you’re lazy or in a hurry, you can let DVDA or whatever DVD program you use recompress for you. But the key here is RE-compress. When you recompress already compressed video, you WILL lose quality. If you have the time or picky to care about quality, the best workpath is to compress your MPEG file ONCE in Vegas, adjusting the average bitrate (look for a bitrate calculator) so that your DVD files will fit in a 4.5 Gb space.

No program or bitrate calculator can accurately estimate your compression bitrates without actually compressing the video. There are simply too many variables involved. If your video is an interview against a blank wall, the CODEC can compress the file a whole bunch without losing quality. But, if your video is a fast moving football game, then the CODEC will need a lot more I-frames due to the huge amount of changes between frames. The same amount of compression will look like crap. This also explains why those of us with experience don’t ever pay any attention to the DVDA file use estimator. It’s never accurate.

Hope my rambling helps..

Steve Mann
MannMade Digital Video
http://www.mmdv.com

[John Rofrano]

Donna, After reading Steve’s very accurate post, hopefully you are now convinced to just use Vegas to make your DVD because it will create the proper structure for you. That’s all you really need to know. 😉

~jr

http://www.johnrofrano.com
http://www.vasst.com

[Donna Black]

Wow. That was some great information. Thank you Steve for taking the time to explain all of that. I think I understand at least 50 percent of it but plan on researching, reading, researching some more to fully understand it. I am here to learn everything that I can.

And John, I was actually thinking that I just needed to use vegas to burn dvd’s as I was reading Steve’s post before you posted anything.LOL! So I do have a question. The reason I was not wanting to use vegas is because I don’t have DVD Architect loaded on my computer and do not know how to use it yet. I have Vegas pro 8 and the only option that I see for buring a DVD just from Vegas itself if for a Blue Ray. Is DVD Architect the only way that I can make a regular DVD? Am I missing something or not reading correctly?

[John Rofrano]

[Donna Black] ” The reason I was not wanting to use vegas is because I don’t have DVD Architect loaded on my computer and do not know how to use it yet.”

It’s really easy to use. Just open it up and select File | New | Single Movie. Then point to your movie file and press OK. Then press the Make DVD button and burn yourself a DVD. That’s it!

If you want a DVD with a menu, just drag your video onto the menu area. Change the title to something nice. Press the Make DVD button. Of course you could select a template to make it look nicer. You can also add chapter pages, etc. It’s very easy to use.

[Donna Black] ” I have Vegas pro 8 and the only option that I see for buring a DVD just from Vegas itself if for a Blue Ray. Is DVD Architect the only way that I can make a regular DVD? Am I missing something or not reading correctly?”

As strange as this might sound, Sony didn’t add the ability to burn a DVD directly from the timeline until Vegas Pro 9.0! They added Blu-ray support before DVD support. So you’ll have to upgrade to a more recent version to get this capability.

~jr

http://www.johnrofrano.com
http://www.vasst.com

[Donna Black]

That does sound easy. Ok 2 more quick questions then I will hopefully quit asking questions for the evening. You said to point to movie file then press ok. So by movie file do you mean the mpeg 2 file that was rendered from vegas or am I going to have to re render everything and select to render to DVD Architect? In other words can I just drag my mp2 file into DVDA?

[John Rofrano]

[Donna Black] “So by movie file do you mean the mpeg 2 file that was rendered from vegas or am I going to have to re render everything and select to render to DVD Architect? In other words can I just drag my mp2 file into DVDA?”

You can just drag your MPEG2 files into DVD Architect if you rendered them using one of the DVD Architect templates like: “DVD Architect NTSC Widescreen video stream” or any of the “DVD Architect …” templates.

If you did not use one of the DVD Architect MPEG2 templates, then you may have created an MPEG2 file that is not DVD compliant and DVD Architect will have to re-encode it and you will lose quality. You always want to render your video to one of the DVD Architect templates that matches your project, then render the audio as Dolby Digital AC3 Pro. Give the two files the same name (just with different .mpg & .ac3 extensions) and DVD Architect will know that the audio goes with the video. DVD Video Object (VOB) files are created from separate video and audio streams so this is the best way to render them that way from Vegas.

~jr

http://www.johnrofrano.com
http://www.vasst.com

[Donna Black]

Thank you so much for all the help. I won’t be able to load DVDA until tommorrow night but hopefully be posting success. I am very greatful that you ( John and Stephen) have taken time with me and everyone else that has questions. Thankyou!!