avi file

rollysons wrote on 11/26/2007, 6:15 PM
I'm rather new to this so please bear with me.

I am using VMS 6.0b Build 126. My question is, now that I have rendered my music/picture/video project into an avi file approx 2.5G in size, is it possible to just copy that file onto a DVD and put it into a cd drive on another computer and copy the file out onto that hard drive?

I have put them onto a DVD made with Architect, but if that disc doesn't happen to play in the DVD player of the people I send it to, I was thinking of also sending just a DVD with just copies of the avi files I used in Architect. In essence a data disc with 4.7G capacity. I thought they could play it through Windows media player on their pc so they could at least see the files if they can't play the menu based DVD.

I'm only sending this to family for the holidays but after spending the time to make it I at least want them to see it. I read in the forum to use the Taiyo Yuden dvds for the best results. Is there anything else I can do?

Shannon

Comments

rmack350 wrote on 11/26/2007, 6:22 PM
Yes, you can use DVDs as plain old data storage and put any file format you want onto them. Hopefully it's something they can all play whether they use a Mac or PC.

You could make Windows and Mac versions of the data discs with AVI or MOV files on them.

Rob
Chienworks wrote on 11/26/2007, 7:02 PM
Well, they won't be able to read the disc in a CD drive. They'd have to have a DVD drive.

Standard ISO discs have a file size limit of 2GB. In order to burn a 2.5GB file you'll have to burn it in UDF format. Most burning software offers the choice when you create a new disc. If you haven't chosen UDF format then the burning software probably won't let you add the 2.5GB file and may even warn you that you have to use UDF.

Not many DVD drives are fast enough to play a DV file straight from the disc. Your family may have to copy the file from the DVD to their hard drive before playing it.
rollysons wrote on 11/29/2007, 11:57 AM
When you say burning software, do you have any recommendations? I had Roxio EMC8 on my laptop with Vegas and had lots of problems. Therefore I got rid of Roxio. So how do I burn my AVI as a UDF file? Is that a Windows XP function or do I need to invest in another software?
rs170a wrote on 11/29/2007, 12:33 PM
Give them both a +R and a -R DVD. One of them should work.
You could also render the project as a WMV and stick it in a folder called Extras on the root of the disc (i.e. VIDEO_TS, AUDIO_TS & Extras).
A DVD player will ignore the Extras folder but a computer will be able to browse to it and play whatever is in it.

Mike
rollysons wrote on 11/30/2007, 5:42 AM
First, thanks to everyone who has helped me so far. These forums are great.

Next, I have picture/video/music compilation files in Vegas video. First I rendered it to .avi format and the files were huge 2G - 7G. After hearing from the forum, I rendered to .WMV format and they were much smaller. Approximately 1/10th the size, but the render time was inversely proportional to the file size.

So now I ask, what type of files do most DVD players recognize? Using DVD architect to make a menu based DVD should I use AVI files or WMV files or is there an even better file type? My family is not "technoligically" savy and have only the most basic of DVD players. I'm not worried about anything but the end user to be able to play the DVD.

Is this a doable or is this asking too much out of their DVD players?

Shannon
Bill Ravens wrote on 11/30/2007, 7:28 AM
Shannon...

If your intent is to make a playable DVD, then the best workflow is to generate an MPEG2 file from Vegas. You need to render the audio only portion out to AC3 in a seperate render step and name it the same as the video file.You can import these two files into DVD Architect to make the DVD.

Vegas has a preset called Mainconcept MPEG2/DVD Architect xxx for this purpose. Where xxx is the screen format and framerate you want. The tricky part is the amount of compression(eg datarate) you want to apply to the MPEG2 render. You should apply as much compression as you need to get it to fit onto the DVD. The more compression you apply, the more the final image will be degraded. The best images quality will result with a datarate around 8000 kbps, if it will fit on the DVD.

If you really want to automate your process, www.vasst.com has a freeware script called DVDPrep to do all this for you.
rs170a wrote on 11/30/2007, 8:10 AM
Bill, Shannon is using Vegas Movie Studio so my suspicion is that a lot of what's been suggested won't work.
Shannon, as I recall, Movie Studio has a "Make DVD" button or feature.
I'd suggest going through the Help menu or looking at the manual to look for this feature.
The full version of Vegas (what most of us on this forum use) has a lot more options than Movie Studio which adds to your confusion :-(
There is a separate forum for Vegas Movie Studio and you might get more appropriate answers there.

Mike