What software do I need - preferably freeware - to be able to make a svcd from my canon film clips? Adobe premier won't accept them (maybe because mine is an old version?) Ulead DVD Movie factory seems to work okay when i test it with a couple of clips but when I put together a bigger svcd it stops processing after some time and declares there's a problem with the mp3 files or somesuch.. pure rubbish. "all or part of the video data in the MPEG file is not compatible with this program" is what it says - it is just saying it now. I've got tmpgenc but I don't know how to use it.
I don't know what type of compression is used by this camera, but if you can play it on your PC, you should be able to open it in most video editing programs, but meybe there is a problem with the sound. Anyway, try TMPGEnc to encode to MPEG-2. TMPGenc is very simple to use. Dig into it a little bit and you'll understand.
I don't even know what/why I'm doing. Is mpeg2 the format for SVCD? Will I get better definition with SVCD? (better than vcd). I've even got adobe premier but don't know how to configure it. Premier (and, I'd guess, TMPGEnc) will turn out a file but how will I know it is suitable for SVCD? And how will I burn it? Does the burner (eg Nero) do the processing to make SVCD or does Premier or whatever do it?
Looks like there are too many questions to answer at once and if anwered if you understand them. I recommend you first to get sme basic knowledge about working with digital video and the different formats there are. Read the articles in the section "Basics" of the site mentioned in my sig.
Thanks TPFKAS. I just spent the last couple or three hours browsing around the site and links you mentioned, reading, downloading, learning. I'm not sure what I make of it all yet. In a different place I've run across the suggestion I should just forget all this old stuff and go straight to DVD. I'll try to digest it all and make up my own mind. Thanks again. ab
Well, that suggestion was right I think. SVCD is a format that originates from the time before recordable DVD's. The only reason I can think of right now to use it is because CD blanks are cheaper than DVD blanks. But recordable DVD's are getting cheaper every day...
O.K. I might clean this thread up for the sake of people in the future who just might read it hoping for an answer. 1st Answer - as provided by anonymous someone and endorsed by TPFKAS - is don't do it. Go to DVD instead. 2nd Answer - for the sake of those who've got their own reasons for wanting to do it anyway (about which later) is: Using Ulead DVD Moviemaker. Using TMPGEnc Using Virtual Dub. For various reasons you have to do this OR maybe there's other ways around so perhaps I should say you CAN do this: Feed the Canon A520 .avi file into Virtual Dub. It will create an enormous (relatively) .avi file for you. This second .avi file will be acceptable to TMPGEnc. Feed it into TMPGEnc and it will create an MPEG2 file for you - I've seen them as much as one tenth the size of the original .avi. Feed the .mpg file into Ulead's MovieMaker. It will produce a SVCD for you. ---------------------------------------------------------- I don't understand completely enough what is going on. So it is quite possible that tweaking the camera might fix things, or tweaking Virtual Dub or tweaking TMPGEnc. But I don't know how to tweak them. The only tweaking I've done it to set MovieMaker for PAL because that's what we need in Australia. So this method works with stock standard, out of the box, software as mentioned. Now, lastly, why? Why not go straight to DVD? Price, I guess, would be the only thing. It costs more for DVD blanks. They also are capable of recording much more so's there more chance that I'll be only partially burning them. Many times I only have a small CD to make. That doesn't change the cost. But I just don't like doing it. AND it seems to me that the resolution I get from SVCD is every bit as good as I can expect from my camera. So I might as well use up my stock of 700mb blanks. regards ab
