DVD Ripping and Editing with Surround Sound - HELP ME! — Page 2

Can I get help with AGK? So to convert the VOB to AVI in high quality, do I have to change anything under "output size" or "advanced parameters"?

Also, to get the AC3 file, I use PgcDemux and then convert the AC3 to 6 WAVs with Besweet, correct?

Do I set output size to "Target quality: 100%"?

Advanced Options: Auto Width, Min Width, Fixed width, maximum width? And output audio to AC3, mp3 or Auto?

I personally wouldn't use AutoGK for this. VirtualDubMod is probably the easiest to get to grips with. You'll need a lossless codec (e.g. Lagarith) as well.

Load the VOB into VirtualDubMod, go to Video->Compression, select Lagarith, and configure it to use YV12 colorspace. Select Audio->none (as you will be loading your demuxed/decoded audio separately). Then save as AVI. Do not change any other options; the output AVI will be exactly the same quality as the original DVD.

Is VirtualDubMod a free download?

yes, virutaldubmod is free.  google it or go to videohelp.com or doom9.  Yes, Moth3r is right, a lossless codec is quite nice, just keep in mind you will need A LOT more hard drive space for that.

So then I'll just go with the one you suggested ThrowgnCpr. Can you help me with this?

output size to "Target quality: 100%"?

Advanced Options: Auto Width, Min Width, Fixed width, maximum width? And output audio to AC3, mp3 or Auto?

you want quality at 100?  i believe auto width should be fine, and remember that audio doesnt really matter since you are using the ac3 file from the DVD.  so choose whatever you want here.

Wait, so I DO want 100?

Auto width? Not max width? But wouldn't that resize the video's resolution?

You really should use a lossless codec (lagarith or huffyuv - lagarith will usually output smaller files though) if you're serious about the final quality. I would NEVER edit in anything other than that.
It takes more space, yes, but not overly much and why degrade the picture needlessly? 500GB or maybe 1TB should be enough space for most projects, depending on how much source material you need to have access to at any given time.

Ahahaha, I have a 40GB computer. I'll stick with AGK. I think I've figured out how to keep the video good. I'm gonna see if I can get someone else to do the DVD after words. I'll provide the Deleted Scenes and Actual Film as well as a few possible featurettes. That person would only have to do Subtitles, collecting the clips for the menu and assembling it. I should be finished editing after about 6 months. Then I'll give the DVD creator another 6 months to work on the DVD and once I know it's completed, I'll be doing some quick 30 second spots for people until the release.

Using Vegas, can I merge tracks? And what's the max audio tracks I can have with Vegas? And when I'm finished how do I set the tracks to each speaker?

what do you mean by merge tracks?  you can have multiple items on a layer, or multiple layers for the same speaker if thats what you mean.

I'm not sure if there is a limit to the number of audio layers in Vegas.  Its essentially unlimited.

You can set the pan/speaker of an audio layer.  If you are working in 2.0 Surround, there is a pan slider on the Audio Layer name.  If you are working in 5.1, you can set which speaker, and how much it is isolated on that speaker.

Ok, I found that you can just set which speaker you won't right there. And I won't need to merge tracks cause I found I can set more than one track to a speaker. Thanks for all your help! I think I've got it! I just need to work around the music bleeding from the FX (back) and Voice (center) tracks.

Ok, I just came across a problem, the video is lagging in Vegas. :S

EDIT: I don't get it, sometimes it's fine and other times it lags.

is this on the preview window? or in a final render?  what are the specs on your PC.  it might be too slow to properly display the real time preview

AGK messed up the Video resolution and FPS...

And I fixed the lagging. I just changed the video in the corner to preview. So ThrowgnCpr, you have the most experience with AGK, I want to keep it at 720x480. Auto converts the video size to 720x304 and sets the FPS to 23.

I don't get it... no matter what I do it comes out as 720x304. Help?

The size was smooshed down. Nothing was trimmed, so resizing it in Vegas worked.

Moth3r said:

I personally wouldn't use AutoGK for this. VirtualDubMod is probably the easiest to get to grips with. You'll need a lossless codec (e.g. Lagarith) as well.

Load the VOB into VirtualDubMod, go to Video->Compression, select Lagarith, and configure it to use YV12 colorspace. Select Audio->none (as you will be loading your demuxed/decoded audio separately). Then save as AVI. Do not change any other options; the output AVI will be exactly the same quality as the original DVD.

Moth3r, I'm working on a short edit, and I wanted to give the lossless route a go, since I've purchased a new hard drive.  I am having some issues though with the AVI.  My VOB is NTSC 16x9 anamorphic, with a framerate of 23.97.  When I save the AVI using the methods you have suggested above, it gives the video a framerate of 30fps.  Obviously, its a little out of whack.  Is there anyway to manually set the framerate on this.  I tried some other lossless codecs with the same result (btw, Lagarith does a nice job at keeping the file size a bit smaller).

Thanks :)

I'm assuming your VOB is 23.976fps, with 3:2 "soft" pulldown making the displayed framerate up to 29.97fps.

VirtualDubMod has not been updated for a while now, and on some occasions it can fail to recognise when a video is 23.976fps with pulldown flags.

You could try VirtualDub-MPEG2 instead, it has an option to disable pulldown.

However, if the pulldown pattern is irregular, you could end up with audio sync drift. The safest method - a little more work but worth learning in the long run - is to go DGIndex "force film" -> AviSynth script -> regular VirtualDub -> save AVI. 

thanks mum, I'll take a look into those options.  :)

would those 6 frames really make that much of a difference?

Asteroid-Man said:

would those 6 frames really make that much of a difference?

umm, yes! 6 frames a second makes a huge difference.

Now I have to rip this shit again!!! Dammit. So it wasn't agk? It was DVDFab that messed up on the ripping? I'll try using DVD Decrypter for the video now.