I have been viewing the material on this site. I have to admit I am new to this. Can someone tell me how to convert an MPEG-4 file from a digital video camera so it could be viewed on a DVD player on a TV. Just pointing me to the proper guide would be helpful. I could not find a guide stating MPEG-4, but possibly I am not looking for the right thing or not finding it. Thanks and forgive me if this is too elementary. Don
You don't need a video editing program but an encoder and a DVD authoring program (or one that has both inside). I haven't tried it but Nero VisionExpress (part of the newer version of Nero) should be able to improt mpeg-4 files and encode it to mpeg-2. Of course there are many other porgrams that can do it.
Thanks for the responses. TPFKAS wrote that Nero Vision Express could do it. I have the new Nero 6.6 suite. Although I am still working with Nero to get it to record DVDs I can work with it saving it to my hard drive then I can use one of my other programs to save it to DVD. Once I take my MPEG-4 file and encode it to MPEG-2 I would assume that I would then have to convert it once again into DVD format(vob)? I could probably use Nero to do that too? Or is MPEG-2 readable by DVD players? I have to admit I do not understand all these MPEG versions. Thanks Don
The format used by DVD is MPEG-2. A VOB-file is just a "container" in a format that a DVD player can read and which contains the MPEG-stream(s) together with other info (like extra audio tracks, subtitles etc.). You need an authoring program to create these VOB's. That is what Nero VisionExpress (not the standard Nero burning interface) automatically does when you use it to author DVD's.
Thanks for the fine explanation. It is starting to make sense, I think. That explains why I was becoming so confused, when I kept seeing the term MPEG-2 associated with DVD video burning. With this information under my belt, I will check the guides on this site once again and see if I can find some additional information. I will start up Vision Express and get the manual out and go to it. If I may ask you one more question, I have a friend in the same situation with his digital camera and MPEG-4 files. He does not have Nero and does not wish to spend $100.00 for the program. Do you know of a less expensive program that would convert the MPEG-4 files to video files as we have been discussing? He already has a burning program, but his program does not have a video component like Nero does. You have been a great help and the informmation is very much appreciated. Thanks Don
If you are looking for some easy guides, you may also want to check the site that I reference in my signature here below. It also conatins a listing of many well known programs, from quite basic to very advanced. I don't know of any freeware DVD authoring programs, but one of the cheapest ones (and still offers reasonable capabilities) is DVD MovieFactory. The standard edition is $50 and there is a 30 days free trial available. Another one is TMPGEnc DVD Author which at the moment is also sold for under $50. By the way: are you using a camcorder that records to MPEG-4?
I am all new to this but that is what it says, "Records at MPEG-4 Digital Video" I have checked out the site and I like it and subscribed to the newsletter. I believe once I have a general understanding of the types of files and once I understand at times two or more terms can be referring to virtually the same thing, I will be able to work with the files and get what I want. I am checking out the Vision Express documentation also that I have and I believe it is starting to become more clear. Someday someone will make a program that you insert a file and tell it what you want to end up with and it will do it all automatically, but for now I will keep plugging away. Thanks again Don
