I use the MPEG-2 format for producing SVCDs. When played through a stand alone DVD player to a full size TV screen, the quality is clearly better than MPEG-1. What I have done so far has not been DVD quality, but to be fair, I have to admit that the final product was limited by the quality of my source video.

kcarroll

paging kcarroll or any other mpg2 plugin user....I bought the plugin...Tell me if I am missing something, I could only write the mpeg2 to my hard drive? why? I expected to click "make movie", then click "make VCD" followed by seeing mpg2 in the drop down. It is not there. the only way I get mpeg2 / SVCD as a choice is saving to a file on my hard drive. I liked how easy itr worked for reg VCD's and had hoped mpeg2/svcd would be a new option there. Any thoughts? am I missing something? I also noticed that the file I write just says mymovie.mpg. How can you tell if it is a mpg2 or not? And how can I use the file to make a svcd if thats not an option. I know SVCD's have about 4 files on the disk so I know this mpg2 file cant b e used stand alone for a dvd player to understand. Sounds like you have your act straight on this plugin, just thought I would bounce it off you. the_ripper

Sorry..........., my first post was brief, and not very informative about the actual mechanics.

I do not believe that VF supports any format beyond regular VCD. I use NERO 5.5 to burn the SVCDs. With Nero, all you have to do is specify that you want to create a SVCD, feed it your rendered MPEG-2 file, and NERO does the rest. (Creating the three other related files, etc.)

I am told by some serious disk authors that NERO isn't so great on menus, but that doesn't really bother me, because I'm not in the habit of using them.

Another burning program that looks good is Pinnacle Express. It has a VERY simple user interface, is is dedicated to burning VCDs, SVCDs and DVDs only. Drop Wrangler95 an Email on the subject of Express, because he is much more familiar with it. (I've only started fooling with it.)

There are many other burning programs available, some for sale, some for free, and I haven't had the time to really look at them. The site VCDHELP.COM is a good reference.

kcarroll

Sometimes I'll burn my SVCD in Nero, but if I want to add menus with chapters and self-selected entry points, thumbnails, background music(including MP3s)/pictures, I burn with Ulead DVD MovieFactory:

http://www.ulead.com/dmf/runme.htm

It's inexpensive, works great, and easy as all with their wizard-like approach. There is more sophisticated software you can find, too, but this does a great job for me. You can even do some capturing and trimming with it.

Thanks for the info kcarroll, but this whole SVCD thing is getting on my nerves...This will add yet another package to do what I need to do. AS long as all this mickey mouse multi program use is required, the movie industry can sit tight and not worry about too much bootlegin' going on. Many people would have given up by now....This does suck though, I thought it would have been supported by sonic foundry as a burn tool as well as redering tool. They gave half the tool if you ask me for the $30..... the_ripper

Ripper;

In the context of the current discussion, I can understand why you would feel that you got only "half the tool", but I think that there is another point of view.

The whole SVCD and DVD burning thing is really still in it's infancy, and probably has nothing to do with why most people purchase the MPEG-2 plug-in.

I use MPEG-2 format all the time to produce "Video Data CDs" that are intended to be played only on other computer screens. The MPEG-2 format is the most widely supported format that provides both good on screen image and manageable file size.

Most of my storm chase footage that gets sent to people elsewhere in the country gets sent as MPEG-2 files. If you think of it only as a path to SVCDs, I think you're potentially missing out on a really serviceable format.

For my own personal viewing, for reasons of quality, I watch most of my own video on the computer screen, not the TV. I have the SVCD versions mainly so that family and guests can sit in the living room and see what a tornado looks like, without having to crowd into my absurdly small office to watch it on my computer.

Personally, I don't have a problem with a "two package" approach, because both Nero and VF are solid performers; and being separate apps, I am free to upgrade one or the other without necessarily having to do anything to the other one.

(I think another part of my problem is that I'm getting a little jaded: after all the money I wasted with Dell, $59 for a second software package is well below my pain threshold.)

kcarroll