DVD size too big

Defuser wrote on 12/19/2009, 12:44 AM

I've been using SONY Movie Studio & DVD Architect for a few years but for some reason when I rendered a 1hr 25min movie, it came out to 5.2 gigs.

Not sure what I can do to make it smaller without greatly comprimising the quality.
Was rendered with standard DVD NTSC defaults.

Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

-jarrett

Comments

Steve Grisetti wrote on 12/19/2009, 7:48 AM

You just need to compress it a bit, which will compromise your quality a bit but probably not terribly so.

Go to the File menu and select Optimize. On the Optimize screen, you'll see a Fit to Disc button that will automatically shift the bitrate from the maximum of 8 to whatever it takes to squeeze it down about 10-15% or so.

Arthur.S wrote on 12/19/2009, 8:34 AM

Or run the ISO through DVD shrink. Free programme, works brilliantly.

bStro wrote on 12/19/2009, 10:05 AM

First, if you really do mean the "DVD NTSC" template, don't use that. It's a bad thing, and I wish Sony would remove it. Use the DVD Architect video stream template for the video and then a PCM / WAV or AC3 template for the audio.

Second, there are exactly two factors involved in determining the final file size of an MPEG2 (the format used by DVDs): The bitrate (number of bits per second) it's encoded at, and the length of the video (in seconds). If your video is approximately 1.5 hours and 5.2 gigs (assuming this is the actual size and not the size reported by DVD Architect in its lower right corner, which is almost always wrong), then it has been encoded at somewhere in the area of 8.5Mb/sec. To get a smaller file size, you need to use a lower bitrate.

Unfortunately, Vegas Movie Studio (as opposed to Vegas Pro) doesn't give the option of customizing MPEG2 encodes (licensing issues, I've assumed), so you either use the templates they give you or nothing.

Your best option (other than Arhur's, which is a good one if you've already prepared the DVD files or ISO) is to render your file as an AVI (use a NTSC DV template) and give that to DVD Architect Studio. Then use DVDA Studio's Fit to Disc feature. Do not give it an MPEG2 or other highly compressed file (this includes things like Divx, Xvid, MP4, and the like) and then use Fit to Disc. That will just give it more work than it needs to do, not to mention run your video through multiple encodes, which will likely result in a lower quality video.

Let us know if you have any more questions -- and also if you got that 5.2GB number from DVDA's estimation in the lower right of the screen. The number is not to be trusted.

Rob

Defuser wrote on 12/21/2009, 12:23 AM

Thanks guys!
I gave Architect the .avi and it then FIT it...worked fine. I really appreciate it.