Missing video with avi, but just for a few seconds

howardnwhite wrote on 3/3/2010, 1:55 AM
Yeah, this is wierd. Firstly, these files are fine on media player and similar. But after rendering/preparing/burning when I play the DVD, the picture goes to black maybe once every three minutes, just for a short time between one and fifteen seconds. The audio carries on perfectly well. It is a straight blackout which then returns. No freezing, pixelating or other kind of breakup. They are avi files, between 300Mb and 500 Mb. Three hours of play maybe comes to 1.5 GB which apparrently wont fit onto diosc after rendering (on a 4.7GB disc!!!) Yep, wierd I know!. It comes as about 170 percent, so I use the fit to disc feature. But then I get this problem. If the whole thing had no picture, or it just would not take the file, it would kind of make more sense! Any ideas? Is the compression too much, and putting a bit less on a disc may help? This would make the compression less severe. Or do I need to render in Moviemaker first as is suggested when there is no picture at all? The problem with this is that it will be rendered twice taking about six hours instead of three. And would this give further quality loss? Please help. Please dont be mad if I have forgotten some important detail. I am using version 4.5. I never have this prroblem with my DV files (prerendered to MPEG 2 from Adobe Premiere), but as this does not take avi very well I cant go down this route. But I do have Movie Maker. Thanks for any help. This is the only forum I am not scared of getting treated like an idiot on!

Comments

cbrillow wrote on 3/3/2010, 5:00 AM
Hmmmm... lots of interesting things going on here.

I'm wondering about the origin of these AVI files. Three hours of AVI translating into 1.5gigs? Where did they come from? Sounds like they may have been produced by a high-compression codec, like DivX. DVD-A will have to transcode the files to MPEG-2 to write a video DVD, so this may be the reason that the projected size is more than will fit on a single disc.

Also, you've mentioned Movie Maker, which I'm assuming means Windows' built-in video production utility. As I recall, Movie Maker II (the latest version) writes Type I avi files, and I would guess that they must be converted to Type II avi to work correctly in DVD-A.

Can you work with these videos in Vegas? The safe route would be to render to MPEG-2 and AC-3 in Vegas, where you have more control over encoding bitrates.

It sounds like some investigation into the avi files is in order. You might run them through GSpot or MediaInfo, two freeware applications that will tell you a lot about your video files and the codecs needed to play them. If you find that they're Type I avi files, there are a converters from Panasonic & Canopus that can convert them to Type II.
howardnwhite wrote on 3/3/2010, 6:11 AM
Thanks for that. They are just avi files downloaded from the net. I do not have Vegas, I only use DVD architect. My main editing program for my camcorder stuff is Adobe Premier, but this does not like avi files of any kind (dont ask me why!). I was just interested if anyone has had the same problem. I will be honest, I dont even know what Vegas is, I just got DVD architect cos it is a good DVD authoring tool (nearly as powerful as Adobe Encore) but for about one hundredth of the price!! I download things from various sites and prefer to put them onto DVD as I dont really like watching on PC screen. Maybe that sounds daft, but I find a genuine TV screen better than the computer. Anyway, I am rendering in Windows Movie Maker now to see if that improves things. I shall render to DV and then do the architect bit. I expect this will take several years to complete, but I will hopefully know if it works before I retire!! Any ideas welcome, and sorry I dont know any more technical details about the avi. They are torrent downloads if that gives you a clue. Tell me that I am asking for trouble getting involved with torrents if you must! It would be nice if the properties gave you more info on files, but it doesnt!
cbrillow wrote on 3/3/2010, 7:00 AM
I won't presume to lecture about torrents, but I will comment that it's 'unusual' for someone to own DVD Architect without also owning Vegas or Vegas Movie Studio. Under normal circumstances -- unless something has changed that I'm not aware of -- DVD Architect is not sold as a standalone program. I can think of at least one way that it might be legally obtained, so I won't come out and accuse you of using a cracked or otherwise purloined version - giving you benefit of the doubt here.

At any rate, if you're rendering from Windows Movie Maker, version 2, you're producing a Type I avi file which may not work properly in DVD Architect. If I'm wrong, someone will come along and correct any misinformation I've given you.
TOG62 wrote on 3/3/2010, 7:27 AM
DVD Architect is not sold as a standalone program

Perhaps Howard is using the Studio version, which is sold without Vegas. I use it and don't have any version of Vegas.

Mike
howardnwhite wrote on 3/3/2010, 7:27 AM
Hi. Thanks again. I am not at all offended by anbything you say please dont worry. I do have a legally owned Sony DVD Architect 4.5 that I paid for. I do not even know what Vegas is! I just have the thing that makes the menus, chapters, etc. Unless this is also Vegas. It was paid for and downloaded with the seriel number, and only cost about twenty pounds which I thought was a bargain for what is pretty powerful stuff. If that sounds too cheap and I did get from a source that was not genuine then I can only say I was genuinely unaware, but it came with the serial number, etc, and no problems with me accessing web helpo etc so I always assumed it was genuine. Anyway, I am not rendering to avi in Movie maker, I am rendering to DV. This was recommended to someone else here who had a similar problem to me (but they were not getting any picture at all in their case. I thiunk this will work, just very time consuming. Thanks for all your help. Maybe I should consider purchasing this Vegas thing, as Adobe Premier (which is an expensive editing suite) does not handle avi well. This is pretty poor, and you would aggree if you knew how much premier cost!
howardnwhite wrote on 3/3/2010, 7:29 AM
That gentleman Mike is probably right. I just bought the DVD studio version after my Ulead one packed up. This Vegas thing was not even mentioned.
cbrillow wrote on 3/3/2010, 9:42 AM
Glad you weren't offended, because it certainly wasn't intended. And I'm also happy to be corrected about Sony selling DVD-A Studio by itself. First I've heard of this.

Hope you're able to sort out your problem.

For the record, Vegas is the video editing counterpart to DVD Architect. It's used to capture, edit, add effects/titles and render video files for DVD-A to use.