Author 5.1 Surround Blu-Ray?

[Glenno]

Can Toast Titanium (or Pro) author a Blu-ray with 5.1 surround? Or is Lt/Rt (ProLogic II) the best it can do?

Thanks!

G

[theoldarchiver]

As I understand it, Toast converted audio will always be 2.0, but for audio files that don't need converting (AC3 elementary stream) 5.1 will be accepted.

[Glenno]

Thanks. I'm not quite clear on what an AC3 "elementary stream" is... or how I output that from Final Cut and/or Compressor. Searches haven't turned up anything very clear, so any tips would be much appreciated!

[theoldarchiver]

I'm not quite clear on what an AC3 "elementary stream" is... or how I output that from Final Cut and/or Compressor.

 

Elementary stream means a file with just one kind of data: e.g. just video or just audio. (The terminology comes from the MPEG-2 standard, so a different but similar term may be applicable in a more general discussion.)

.m2v and .mpv would be examples of a file with just MPEG-2 video.

.ac3 would be a file with just AC3/A52/Dolby Digital audio.

.264 would be a file with just H.264 video (maybe other extensions are used as well).

 

http://documentation.apple.com/en/compressor/usermanual/index.html#chapter=18%26section=3%26tasks=true

 

If you add a video-only file to Toast, it should notice that and look for a suitable audio file in the same folder, or ask the user to point to it.

[Glenno]

Thanks again!

 

Cool, looks like it's working so far... I created a 5.1 elementary ac3 stream in Compressor from the 6 audio stems my sound mixer gave me. Attached it to the video stream in Toast, and Toast seems to recognize it as Dolby Digital 5.1 sound.

 

Final questions in Toast:

 

Under Encoding, any idea if can I choose PCM for uncompressed audio, or must I choose Dolby Digital? And should/can I set Reencoding to Never?

[theoldarchiver]

Under Encoding, any idea if can I choose PCM for uncompressed audio, or must I choose Dolby Digital?

Leave it at DD; PCM would not be beneficial with a DD source file.

 

And should/can I set Reencoding to Never?

 

Set Reencoding to Never. This will prevent Toast from re-encoding the streams that are already compliant. Streams that are not compliant will be re-encoded anyway, regardless of this setting.

[Glenno]

Leave it at DD; PCM would not be beneficial with a DD source file.

Okay, thanks, I wasn't sure if there'd be any further compression going on.

 

 

Set Reencoding to Never. This will prevent Toast from re-encoding the streams that are already compliant. Streams that are not compliant will be re-encoded anyway, regardless of this setting.

Lastly: So if Compressor did the audio at 640kbps, but Toast's highest setting is 448, any idea if Toast will still re-encode it at 448?

[Glenno]

Hm. I tried authoring 2 versions, one with the Lt/Rt mix, and one with the full 5.1 mix. The 5.1 Blu-ray definitely sounds better, I'm hearing sounds that are lost in the Lt/Rt mix. Any idea why that might be happening? FWIW, we didn't put anything solely on the surround channels. It may be a flaw in the Lt/Rt mixdown itself.