3 replies to this topic

[hm42]

Hi,

I'm just trying to burn a video dvd with Toast 7 from an eyetv recording.
The source is vbr mpeg2 dvb-t recording with dvb subtitles and the file size is approximately 6GB.
What I'd like to do is to fit the recording to a 4.7GB DVD with the subtitles intact.
By simply pressing the toast button from eyetv, Toast opens with the video imported but it lacks some options.
I can't seem to find the "shrink to one DVD" option  and I can't find where to control the subtitles.

I tried to burn the video file: toast said the file does not fit to 4.7GB DVD but did not offer any way to shrink it and refused to write it to a dvd.

Then I tried to save a dual layer disk image: the result was a 2.5GB (!) file which burned well as a video DVD but there were no subtitles and the picture quality looked too compressed.

What am I missing here?

Edited by hm42, 28 May 2006 - 03:06 AM.

[miketall]

Howdy "hm42",

I'm in the USA, and don't have the exact same EyeTV unit that you have.  However, I do use my EyeTV 500 quite extensively for recording OTA-ATSC (HDTV) signals.  This is also a digital MPEG-2 encoding; so I'm hoping it may approximate issues you are also experiencing.  It's worth a shot anyway.

A 1-hr recording (minus commercials) from EyeTV 500 is typcally around 5GBytes.  I can normally fit two of these on to a 4.7G DVD once Toast 7 finsishes compressing them.  Note, I always save the output of Toast 7 to a Disc Image first.  It takes me 6 hours on my PowerBook to output these files, and I have too many failures writing directly to the DVD.

When I go to write this disc image, I just usually use the simple setup to "Automatically" force reencoding.  Sometimes, I will force reencoding if I really want to squish down file size, but then I have had problems where my AC3 audio is not passed through but reencoded also.  I don't know how the audio is handled in the DVB-T system over there.  But it seems to me that your biggest concern is getting this to fit on a disc first.  After that you can worry about the details.  I know, we shouldn't have to endure trial & error at this point, but there are still quirks, and once you figure them out, you'll be able to use the product much better.

As for subtitles, I don't know how they are handled in Europe.  In the USA, the subtitles (actually called Closed Captions) are included with the video signal.  You need a tuner to be able to see these Closed Captions.  Hence EyeTV will work fine in viewing Closed Captions since it is a tuner.  However, once  you pass this info on to a DVD, the subtitles are not typically available as you might expect.  Subtitles on DVDs are not the same as Closed Captions that you see from a typical broadcast channel.  They may appear the same to the viewer, but how they are implemented are completely different.

There must be some software out there that will let you do what you are asking for, regarding subtitles.  It is possible that EyeTV or Toast may do this, but I am unaware of this functionality.  Maybe someone else can add to this later.

Please check out Jim Taylor's DVD FAQs for some great info on this and anything DVD related.  A link to this specific topis is below:
http://www.dvddemyst...vdfaq.html#1.45

Regards,
Mike

[hm42]

Thanks for the reply.

It seems I'm not fully familiar with Toast reencoding options yet since the results are not what I'm expecting in some cases.
Let's say I have an mpeg2 recording done with eyetv. The file size is 5GB. I'd like to squeeze it to a single layer (ie 4.7GB) DVD.  Automatic direct to dvd re-encoding does not work: toast says I don't have large enough DVD in the drive - no matter what automatic or custom parameters I set for the re-encoding. When I create a DVD image from the same source the image is around 1.5GB of length and only then does Toast happily write it.
The re-encoding settings do not seem to matter to the size of the created DVD image. If I click "never" to re-encode, I'm still getting a 1.5GB image from a 5GB source.   There seems to be no way for me to adjust the quality of the re-encoding: the result size is identical no matter what settings I choose.

Subtitles: Elgato told me they do not support dvb subtitle export yet so that's the reason.
(btw, the subtitles in dvb-t transmissions are not unlike subtitles used in dvds; they are separate mpeg streams and you can have multiple subtitle streams in a recording just like audio streams or even video streams (angles))  

Thanks,

- hannu

[What's the frequency Kenneth?]

miketall, on May 31 2006, 06:56 AM, said:

Howdy "hm42",

I'm in the USA, and don't have the exact same EyeTV unit that you have.  However, I do use my EyeTV 500 quite extensively for recording OTA-ATSC (HDTV) signals.  This is also a digital MPEG-2 encoding; so I'm hoping it may approximate issues you are also experiencing.  It's worth a shot anyway.

A 1-hr recording (minus commercials) from EyeTV 500 is typcally around 5GBytes.  I can normally fit two of these on to a 4.7G DVD once Toast 7 finsishes compressing them.  Note, I always save the output of Toast 7 to a Disc Image first.  It takes me 6 hours on my PowerBook to output these files, and I have too many failures writing directly to the DVD.

When I go to write this disc image, I just usually use the simple setup to "Automatically" force reencoding.  Sometimes, I will force reencoding if I really want to squish down file size, but then I have had problems where my AC3 audio is not passed through but reencoded also.  I don't know how the audio is handled in the DVB-T system over there.  But it seems to me that your biggest concern is getting this to fit on a disc first.  After that you can worry about the details.  I know, we shouldn't have to endure trial & error at this point, but there are still quirks, and once you figure them out, you'll be able to use the product much better.

As for subtitles, I don't know how they are handled in Europe.  In the USA, the subtitles (actually called Closed Captions) are included with the video signal.  You need a tuner to be able to see these Closed Captions.  Hence EyeTV will work fine in viewing Closed Captions since it is a tuner.  However, once  you pass this info on to a DVD, the subtitles are not typically available as you might expect.  Subtitles on DVDs are not the same as Closed Captions that you see from a typical broadcast channel.  They may appear the same to the viewer, but how they are implemented are completely different.

There must be some software out there that will let you do what you are asking for, regarding subtitles.  It is possible that EyeTV or Toast may do this, but I am unaware of this functionality.  Maybe someone else can add to this later.

Please check out Jim Taylor's DVD FAQs for some great info on this and anything DVD related.  A link to this specific topis is below:
http://www.dvddemyst...vdfaq.html#1.45

Regards,
Mike

Actually, many factory DVDs have closed captioning AND subtitles available (especially, but not exculsively, titles that contain TV productions on DVD.)  In fact, my cheesy DVD recorder saves them as well (but it does not allow editing and screws up the frame rate.)  Unfortunately, my experience has been that almost all video-encoding software annihilates closed captions, and I have not found any software(non-pro--there are pro packages costing thousands of dollars that do things I have no interest in) to preserve them or convert them to subtitles.

I'd particularly like to convert closed captioning to subtitles on my ReplayTV content before or after converting them with rtvtools to burn with toast...I may have to experiment with this on my windows box (blech!) as there are some titles for Windows that may be helpful.