Video Types Explained, and what to use to play em’

This is a guide (really a video type dictionary) that explains almost every single video type on the Internet and everything you will run into while torrenting….

You will always run into other weird formats you have never seen before and be like WTH how do i play this….Usually VLC and The K-Lite Codec Pack will help you play all the formats i am about to mention. A link to them is in the 1st format which is the format you will probably see the most in your torrenting years.

Heres it goes!!!
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.AVI (Audio Video Interleave)

AVI is a video format from Microsoft. Currently it’s the most common file format for storing audio/video data on the PC. Also it’s a standard video format in the scene. AVI itself doesn’t specify how it should be encoded, so the audio/video can be stored in very various ways. The most commonly used video codecs that use the AVI structure are XViD and DiVX. AVI can be played by almost any video viewing program. When it’s coded with XViD or DiVX you’ll need to download the codec to view it. I prefer K-Lite Codec Pack which usually plays all formats I have ever thrown at it. But also VLC Media Player is a separate program that contains all the codecs with it so there doesn’t have to be any installation and all the codec and video settings are in the program> K-Lite and VLC

.DIVX

Old file format of .avi files encoded with the divx codec. See .AVI. you will rarely see these anymore and usually you can use VLC to play them..

.FLV and .SWF

FLV Files are really just flash files that you usually download of Youtube or other video clip sites. VLC can play these but they’re are other programs like FLV Player that can also play these. Do not get FLV’s mixed with .swf’s found at places like ebaumsworld.com. Usually you can save .SWF’s easily and just play them with your brower.

.MKV (Matroska Video)

A .mkv file is a very modern multimedia container file that contains one or more tracks, each of which store a particular type of data, such as audio, video, effects, or text (for subtitles, for example). The .mkv is unique because it supports almost any format, and it has advanced features, like: chapters, selectable subtitles/audio, stream able for Internet and menu’s. In the scene, this format is often used for high definition content, in combination with modern codecs like: x264 and h264. This is also pretty rare but you probably will see it in your lifetime especially if you like high-definition.

.MOV (MOVie)

A .mov file is an Apple Quicktime movie file. A .mov file functions as a multimedia container file that contains one or more tracks, each of which store a particular type of data, such as audio, video, effects, or text (for subtitles, for example). Each track in turn contains track media, either the digitally-encoded media stream (using a specific codec such as mp3, jpeg, divx) or a data reference to the media stored in another file or elsewhere on a network. I usually do not use .mov files because their quality is not super great, but you will see them especially with little clips and such. These can be played with Quicktime and VLC or K-lite.

.MP4 (MPEG Audio Layer-4)

MPEG-4 -encoded audio or video file, using MPEG-4’s container format. MP4 files can be played by alternative systems like Apple computers and iPod’s. These are usually found on PSP’s and Ipods but can be used to make very small files for other portable systems like Mobile Phones.

.MPG / MPEG

MPEG-1 or MPEG-2 -encoded video file. A video standard developed by MPEG Group. MPEG-2 is not a successor for MPEG-1, but an addition instead — both of these formats have their own purposes in life; MPEG-1 is meant for medium-bandwidth usage and MPEG-2 is meant for high-bandwidth/broadband usage. Most commonly MPEG-2 is used in digital TVs, DVD’s and SVCD’s. MPEG-1 is mostly found in KVCD’s and VCD’s and other small movie files.

.ratDVD

A .ratDVD file has been created with the software ratDVD. ratDVD can compress an entire DVD movie to one single file including menus with full functionality, all extras, all audio tracks, all angles and any other material on the disc. The result .ratDVD file is usually several gigabytes smaller, but the quality is not so good. Also, it’s packed and compressed a lot. These are extremely rare now and you will probably never come across one.

.VOB (Video Object File)

It is one of the core files found on DVD-Video discs and contains the actual movie data. Basically VOB file is just a basic MPEG-2 system stream, meaning that it is a file that contains multiplexed MPEG-2 video stream, audio streams (normally AC3 and DTS formats) and subtitle streams. Usually on a DVD there will be multiple .VOB files. If you ever want to rip the main movie from a DVD and put it on your computer as 1 file, i recommend using VOB2MPG.

.WMV (Windows Media Video)

WMV is a generic name of Microsoft’s video encoding solutions and doesn’t necessarily define the technology what it uses — since version 7 (WMV7) Microsoft has used its own flavor of MPEG-4 video encoding technology (not very surprising, it’s not compatible with other MPEG-4 technologies). DivX video format is originally based on hacked WMV codec. The latest versions of WMV don’t have much in common with MPEG-4 anymore, but use Microsoft’s own video encoding technologies instead. The only releases which are in .WMV format are ususlly porn clips (since you download them as .WMV from the web and don’t require a re-encode) and High-Quality Xbox vids.

.XVID

Old file format of .avi files encoded with the xvid codec. See .avi at the top of the page for more info.

Video File Container Formats

.ISO

An .iso file is a complete copy of a CD or DVD, stored into 1 file. The extension comes from the full name of the CD-ROM and DVD-ROM file system specification, ISO 9660. .ISO files are one of the two most standard file formats for image files in the scene. It can be burned to a CD/DVD or virtually mounted.
I recommend a program like PowerISO to handle ISO files by Viewing, Editing, Extracting, Mounting, and Burning ISO Files.

.IMG (Image)

An .img file is a complete copy of a cd or dvd, stored into 1 file. If it’s ripped with CloneCD
the .img file should also be accompanied by a .ccd and a .sub file. .IMG files are one of the two most standard file formats for image files in the scene. It can be burned to a CD/DVD or virtually mounted. I still recommend PowerISO for this sort of thing since it does support the handling of this format also. Meaning it can do all the same things with a .IMG as it can do with a .ISO.

.MDF

If it is a rather large file, e.g. 650 MB, then it is most likely a CD image. If it is a file bigger than 700MB then it is a DVD Image. These MDF image files are created using a CD/DVD CD/DVD image file editor (and CD burner and CD/DVD backup tool) called MagicISO. But also these can be burned and handled with PowerISO.

CAM –

A cam is a theater rip usually done with a digital video camera. A mini tripod is sometimes used, but a lot of the time this wont be possible, so the camera make shake. Also seating placement isn’t always idle, and it might be filmed from an angle. If cropped properly, this is hard to tell unless there’s text on the screen, but a lot of times these are left with triangular borders on the top and bottom of the screen. Sound is taken from the onboard microphone of the camera, and especially in comedies, laughter can often be heard during the film. Due to these factors picture and sound quality are usually quite poor, but sometimes we’re lucky, and the theater will be fairly empty and a fairly clear signal will be heard.

TELESYNC (TS) –

A telesync is the same spec as a CAM except it uses an external audio source (most likely an audio jack in the chair for hard of hearing people). A direct audio source does not ensure a good quality audio source, as a lot of background noise can interfere. A lot of the times a telesync is filmed in an empty cinema or from the projection booth with a professional camera, giving a better picture quality. Quality ranges drastically, check the sample before downloading the full release. A high percentage of Telesyncs are CAMs that have been mislabeled.

TELECINE (TC) –

A telecine machine copies the film digitally from the reels. Sound and picture should be very good, but due to the equipment involved and cost telecines are fairly uncommon. Generally the film will be in correct aspect ratio, although 4:3 telecines have existed. A great example is the JURASSIC PARK 3 TC done last year. TC should not be confused with TimeCode , which is a visible counter on screen throughout the film.

SCREENER (SCR) –

A pre VHS tape, sent to rental stores, and various other places for promotional use. A screener is supplied on a VHS tape, and is usually in a 4:3 (full screen) a/r, although letterboxed screeners are sometimes found. The main draw back is a “ticker” (a message that scrolls past at the bottom of the screen, with the copyright and anti-copy telephone number). Also, if the tape contains any serial numbers, or any other markings that could lead to the source of the tape, these will have to be blocked, usually with a black mark over the section. This is sometimes only for a few seconds, but unfortunately on some copies this will last for the entire film, and some can be quite big. Depending on the equipment used, screener quality can range from excellent if done from a MASTER copy, to very poor if done on an old VHS recorder thru poor capture equipment on a copied tape. Most screeners are transferred to VCD, but a few attempts at SVCD have occurred, some looking better than others.

DVD-SCREENER (DVDscr) –

Same premise as a screener, but transferred off a DVD. Usually letterbox , but without the extras that a DVD retail would contain. The ticker is not usually in the black bars, and will disrupt the viewing. If the ripper has any skill, a DVDscr should be very good. Usually transferred to SVCD or DivX/XviD.

DVDRip –

A copy of the final released DVD. If possible this is released PRE retail (for example, Star Wars episode 2) again, should be excellent quality. DVDrips are released in SVCD and DivX/XviD.

VHSRip –

Transferred off a retail VHS, mainly skating/sports videos and XXX releases.

TVRip –

TV episode that is either from Network (capped using digital cable/satellite boxes are preferable) or PRE-AIR from satellite feeds sending the program around to networks a few days earlier (do not contain “dogs” but sometimes have flickers etc) Some programs such as WWF Raw Is War contain extra parts, and the “dark matches” and camera/commentary tests are included on the rips. PDTV is capped from a digital TV PCI card, generally giving the best results, and groups tend to release in SVCD for these. VCD/SVCD/DivX/XviD rips are all supported by the TV scene.

WORKPRINT (WP) –

A workprint is a copy of the film that has not been finished. It can be missing scenes, music, and quality can range from excellent to very poor. Some WPs are very different from the final print (Men In Black is missing all the aliens, and has actors in their places) and others can contain extra scenes (Jay and Silent Bob) . WPs can be nice additions to the collection once a good quality final has been obtained.

DivX Re-Enc –

A DivX re-enc is a film that has been taken from its original VCD source, and re-encoded into a small DivX file. Most commonly found on file sharers, these are usually labeled something like Film.Name.Group(1of2) etc. Common groups are SMR and TND. These aren’t really worth downloading, unless you’re that unsure about a film u only want a 200mb copy of it. Generally avoid.

Formats

VCD –

VCD is an mpeg1 based format, with a constant bitrate of 1150kbit at a resolution of 352×240 (NTCS). VCDs are generally used for lower quality transfers (CAM/TS/TC/Screener(VHS)/TVrip(analogue) in order to make smaller file sizes, and fit as much on a single disc as possible. Both VCDs and SVCDs are timed in minutes, rather than MB, so when looking at an mpeg, it may appear larger than the disc capacity, and in reality u can fit 74min on a CDR74.

SVCD –

SVCD is an mpeg2 based (same as DVD) which allows variable bit-rates of up to 2500kbits at a resolution of 480×480 (NTSC) which is then decompressed into a 4:3 aspect ratio when played back. Due to the variable bit-rate, the length you can fit on a single CDR is not fixed, but generally between 35-60 Mins are the most common. To get a better SVCD encode using variable bit-rates, it is important to use multiple “passes”. this takes a lot longer, but the results are far clearer.

XVCD/XSVCD –

These are basically VCD/SVCD that don’t obey the “rules”. They are both capable of much higher resolutions and bit-rates, but it all depends on the player to whether the disc can be played. X(S)VCD are total non-standards, and are usually for home-ripping by people who don’t intend to release them.

DivX / XviD –

DivX is a format designed for multimedia platforms. It uses two codecs, one low motion, one high motion. most older films were encoded in low motion only, and they have problems with high motion too. A method known as SBC (Smart Bit-rate Control) was developed which switches codecs at the encoding stage, making a much better print. The format is Ana orphic and the bit-rate/resolution are interchangeable. The majority of PROPER DivX rips (not Re-Encs) are taken from DVDs, and generally up to 2hours in good quality is possible per disc. Various codecs exist, most popular being the original Divx3.11a and the new XviD codecs.

CVD –

CVD is a combination of VCD and SVCD formats, and is generally supported by a majority of DVD players. It supports MPEG2 bit-rates of SVCD, but uses a resolution of 352×480(ntsc) as the horizontal resolution is generally less important. Currently no groups release in CVD.

DVD-R –

Is the recordable DVD solution that seems to be the most popular (out of DVD-RAM, DVD-R and DVD+R). it holds 4.7gb of data per side, and double sided discs are available, so discs can hold nearly 10gb in some circumstances. SVCD mpeg2 images must be converted before they can be burnt to DVD-R and played successfully. DVD>DVDR copies are possible, but sometimes extras/languages have to be removed to stick within the available 4.7gb.

MiniDVD –

MiniDVD/cDVD is the same format as DVD but on a standard CDR/CDRW. Because of the high resolution/bit-rates, its only possible to fit about 18-21 mins of footage per disc, and the format is only compatible with a few players.

Creating Torrent/Screenshots/NFO The EASY way

If you prefer just to download the program itself it can be gotten here
http://tdmaker.googlecode.com/files/TDMaker-1.10.0.1-setup.zip

After you install the first step is to setup the program’s defaults so that when you choose to create a torrent it will automatically assign THC’s announce URL so you never have to fiddle with it after the first time.

This step will automatically create the torrent file and NFO in the same folder as your movie file. Alternatively you can assign a default folder in which all your torrent and nfo files will be created.

This step will assign the THC announce URL as the default tracker when used to create the torrent.

Next step, setting up default screenshots.

Here is where you can add the amount of screenshots by default or adjust size etc

Now to choose your type of media. Either select DVD Folder for a file containing multiple items or Video File for a single Avi. All previous steps up to this point was simply setup and only needed to be done the first and only time.

Once done your .Torrent and NFO file will be created in the same folder as your media OR in the folder that you specified. The .Torrent will be ready to upload here and the NFO will contain all specs of the file itself including Framrate, Bitrate, Aspect Ratio. It will also contain the already published screenshots with BB codes so all you need to do is copy/paste the NFO details into your Notes/Comments section of your upload.

All future .Torrents should only take about 1 minute to create and you get to avoid using seperate programs for NFO and Screenshots.

Check out my uploads’ description to see that type of info/screenshots that TDMaker makes.

DVD ripping with AviDemux 2.6.6

This ripping guide was written for AviDemux 2.6.6 which can be downloaded from sites like filehippo or sourceforge.

AviDemux can encode several video formats, handle multiple audio tracks, and can add a single burned subtitle track. I’ve settled on using this after trying many other
programs, all giving me trouble in one way or another. So far, this program seems to work without too much of a hassle, save for the occasional DVD it somehow refuses to rip.

It describes how I rip my stuff, which doesn’t mean it’s the only way or best way to do it. Statistically speaking, it probably is neither…

step 1
Open the program by clicking on the desktop icon.

step 2
In Windows Explorer, locate the DVD folder. You cannot rip directly from a DVD, since the porogram wants to write information to the VIDEO_TS folder, so always copy the
DVD to your hard disk first. Once you have found the folder, figure out which VOB file series holds the main movie. Usually, this is simply the one that is the biggest
(eg: VTS_02_01.VOB, VTS_02_02.VOB and VTS_02_03.VOB). Drag and drop the first file of the series onto the AviDemux window. Do not use the VTS_xx_0.VOB file for this.

AviDemux will now discover there are several files with sequential filenames, and wants to know if it should load them all. Naturally, the answer is yes since that will
load the entire main movie.

After clicking yes, this will take some time. When done, AviDemux will show the very first frame of the main movie. Don’t worry if this is all black – in many movies
the very first frame is black.

step 3

Under Video output select the tab marked copy and select which format you would like to encode to. I choose MPeg4 ASP (xvid4) here. The configure button will
allow you to set some stuff, most interestingly you van choose your quality options here. Under encoding mode I choose Two pass – average bitrate and select 1500 kbps.
You can opt to go lower or higher (the higher the number, the bigger your rip will be of course). You can also go for Constant bitrate.

step 4
AviDemux also has several filters.

I mostly use the crop filter to crop away all the black borders around the image, followed by the swsResize filter. When cropping, you can  opt to use the
autocrop option, but that never gives me the right results.

Even without cropping, you definitely want to use the swsResizefilter.AviDemux has a standard of outputting video to 640×480 pixels, which is incorrect in many cases.

So before I load the DVD in AviDemux, I figure out what the correct resolution should be. A few pixels off isn’t important here, you won’t see that in the result anyway.
Be sure to untick lock aspect ratio, input the correct resize dimensions and pick your favorite resizing method. You can also experiment with deinterlacing filters and add subtitles here.

step 5
Under Audio output you can choose which format the audio should be encoded to, and configure that, which mostly means setting the bitrate. If there is more than one
audio track, the configuration you choose here will be for all of them. If you wish to have different bitrates for different audio tracks, or even remove audio tracks (because
they’re a german dub or something), choose audio – select track in the top menu.

You can then tick only the boxes of the audio tracks you wish to keep (original language, audio commentary tracks, etc), and set the bitrate for each. You can even
encode one track to AC3 and the other to MP3 if you wish.

step 6
Sometimes you might want to crop off part of the beginning or ending of the movie. You can simply move the slider below the preview to the start point of your rip, set this as
point A, then move the slider to the end of your rip and set this as point B.

step 7
All that’s left now is some patience: click on the disk icon at the top, select where to store your rip and with which filename, hit save, and wait for several hours for the
encode to finish. Encoding time will depend on movie length, quality of the rip, but also of course on if you’re encoding in one pass or two. When don,e remember to delete the VTS_xx_1.VOB.idx file from your VIDEO_TS folder if you plan to do something with the folder like burn it to DVD or create a torrent file.

Introduction to Xvids the ape Way

Introduction to Xvids the ape Way

This tutorial assumes you have the following installed on your computer:
AviSynth http://www.mediafire.com/download/kjdzqyz4dyj/AviSynthMT_258.exe, http://www.mediafire.com/download/zt4gzeoo3nk/AviSynthMT_258_INSTALLER.7z
AvsPmod http://avspmod.github.io/
DGIndex
DVD Decrypter or DVDFab
Gordian Knot http://sourceforge.net/projects/gordianknot/
VirtualDub http://sourceforge.net/projects/virtualdub/
VirtualDubMod

All of the above are included in the Gordian Knot except AvsPmod, DVDFab, VirtualDub and maybe AviSynth if I’m not mistaken. I will not go over the installation because that would need another complete tutorial, but if you can’t do the install, you proabaly won’t be able to use the rest of it anyway. So once you’ve got all of these working we can procede.

Since decrypting and copying the DVD is really easy and many times you’ve just downloaded it from some tracker, we’re going to skip that step and go right to the indexing.

This is just an introduction, so it will be a really easy encode.

It also would be a good idea to read through the entire tutorial at least once before beginning

STEP 1 Indexing the Source

You will need to open DGIndex:

Click: File > Open > then find your DVD’s folder and open it > open the VIDEO_TS folder and you will see the VOB’s. Pick the ones that correspond to your movie. Start with the first one over 1GB and highlight it and all others in that series. Click Open > OK

The DVD will then open in DGIndex. You can use the slider (1) or the arrow buttons (2) to move through the movie. The brackets (3) can be used to set your start and end points, but usually don’t get used on DVD’s.

Now we can make our .d2v file.
If we Click File > Play the DVD will start to play. If and only if it says ‘Film’ in the Video Type box, you can force film and it saves you a line in your script since it will take care of the IVTC for you.

So now close that video window, click File > Stop and it will stop playing. Now click Video > Field Operations > Forced Film. This will make it be 23.976 fps when we open it in AvsPmod.

NOTE: If it is not at least 99.5% film you will need to use Honor Pulldown Flags on this step. At least one additional line of script will be needed too. TFM().TDecimate() would be used after your source line in AvsPmod

The last thing to do in DGIndex is to make the .d2v
Click File > Save Project, name it and send it to a folder where you can find it later.

Now click Save and it will index the movie for you and extract your audios.

STEP 2 Writing the script

You will need to open AvsPmod.

Once its open you want to type in your script.  It starts with opening your source by using the .d2v file created in DGIndex. So put this line into your AvsPmod where xxx = the path to your .d2v file and yyy = the name of your .d2v file:

MPEG2Source(“C:\xxx\yyy.d2v”, cpu=0)

Then hit f5 to refresh it. Any time you change your script you will need to hit f5 to see how your changes look.

There’s a lot of interesting information on you AvsPmod. It tells you what frame you are on, how many frames there are total, the fps, the width and height, and the AR. You can see that since this is an NTSC DVD that the dimensions are 720×480 before we do cropping and resizing. You never want to be bigger than that.

This DVD is a really good source, so considering its got no Telecine, no Interlace, and needs no filtering, all we have to do is crop and set the AR.

To crop, all you need to do is right click in the view box and click Crop Editor. Then just use the up and down arrows  to do your crop. When you have gotten rid of all matte, hit Apply. Hitting Apply does the same thing as f5, so you don’t need to do f5 this time to view your script changes.

To make sure you got it all, just right click again Zoom > 400% and you can easily examine all edges for any matte you may have missed. I got it all, so no need to do any more cropping.

Now its time to do the AR. Using another script (see below) I have determined that AR is 1.8:1. When working with xvid you must keep it mod 16. This means that the height and width must be divisible by 16. The width will be the deciding factor here. It can be either 720 if we slightly upscale it, or 704. Since we only cropped 4 and 716 is closer to 720 than 704, we’ll use 720 as the width in this example. To make it be 1.8:1, the width will have to be 1.8 times larger than the height. 720/1.8 = 400. 400 is also mod 16 so it will work for this xvid just fine.

Its time to set the AR with another line of script. There are a few resizers, but Spline36Resize is a good all purpose one. To use it you add this line to your script:

Spline36Resize(720,400)

In case you didn’t figure it out, the 720 and 400 inside the parenthesis is the width and height for the resize.

After you hit f5, it will look like this:

You can see that the Width, height, AR, and fps are all what they should be. So now we save the script and start testing to see what the size will be. Save the script by clicking File > Save Script, naming it the same as the .d2v and clicking Save.

STEP 3, Compression Testing

This is where the Gordian Knot comes in. Time to open it up. once its open you’ll have to open your .d2v in it by clicking the Open button in the bottom left and finding your .d2v again.

When you open it another box opens with another viewscreen. Now we go to the Bitrate tab and put in all the audios. Then we go to the Resolution tab and set your width, height, and AR. Make sure the number of frames and fps match your AvsPmod.

That’s all you have to do there, go to the viewer window and hit Save & Encode on the bottom left. Another box will pop up that says save avs, but you don’t want to save anything, just run the test. so where it says Compressibility Check, click the Use (1). We’re going to dabble with the matrices in the future, but for now you’ll just work with the size. So go ahead and click the Edit button (2).

You’ll get the Avisynth Comp.test Frameserver window. That’s the script that its going to run the test on, but its not the script we made. So what you have to do is edit theirs into yours by deleting all that text all the way down to #COMPRESSIBILITY CHECK and replacing it with your script. Either copy your script from AvsPmod, or open it with Notepad and copy it, then past your script in. When you do that it will look like this:

Then just press the Comp Check button (1), click OK, and it will open VirtualDubMod and run your test. This should take about 10 or 15 minutes in this case. It could be much longer with complicated filtering though. VirtualDubMod is now doing an encode on 5% of source and analyzing it to see how compressible it is. You need to do this because different factors in the quality and content of a movie can alter the size needed to make your best encode. Its a service to everyone to make the best possible encode

After its done it will shut itself off and you can go back to your Gordian Knot and see the results. We are shooting for 80% to 100%. If its lower than 80% you will need to make your size bigger. If its over 100% you will need to make it smaller.

So what size should we make this? There is a thing called AFR that is very well explained by ShadyGuy in a CG tutorial.

Quote:

The term ‘AFR’ stands for Advanced Filesize Regulation; it’s a set of criteria which can be employed to accomplish DVDR-sized rips. The big difference about AFRs when compared to normal movie rips is you get the highest resolution and bitrate for the smallest possible size. It’s all about maintaining source transparency while keeping filesize as small as possible; image quality is retained to almost 100% and sound quality is identical to the original source What are the specific AFR sizes? 1/6 DVDR: 0.73 GB (0743 MB or up to 0747 MB with subs) 1/4 DVDR: 1.09 GB (1116 MB or up to 1120 MB with subs) 1/3 DVDR: 1.46 GB (1490 MB or up to 1494 MB with subs) 1/2 DVDR: 2.19 GB (2236 MB or up to 2241 MB with subs) 2/3 DVDR: 2.92 GB (2984 MB or up to 2988 MB with subs) 3/4 DVDR: 3.28 GB (3358 MB or up to 3362 MB with subs) 1/1 DVDR: 4.37 GB (4478 MB or up to 4482 MB with subs)

There is also 1 CD size that he did not list 700 MB

Generally xvids over 90 minutes need to be 1.46 GB and under 1.09 GB so we’ll try 1.09 GB first. You will want to go to the Bitrate tab (1), make sure all your audios are entered (2), and set your Total File Size (3) to 1116 MB to 1120 MB (1116 MB to 1120 MB = 1.09 GB). I usually use 1119 MB myself as you will see below.

If the # next to the Load button (4) is between 80 and 100, your size is correct. If its bigger than 100 you will need to put the 1/6 DVDR or 1 CD size in the Total File Size box (3). If its smaller than 80, you will need to use the 1/3 DVDR or in extreme cases the 1/2 DVDR size. When you’ve found your size you can open VirtualDub, but don’t close Gordian Knot yet.

STEP 4: Encoding

Open VirtualDub, then find your script in its folder and drag it onto VirtualDub.

Click Video it should have Full Processing Mode ticked, if not tick it, then click Compression and pick Xvid MPEG-4 Codec from the dropdown in the left window then click OK.

Now click Video > Compression > Configure and the Xvid Configuration window opens. This is where we set the passes so you will click the arrow next to Encoding type, pick Twopass – 1st pass and click OK > OK > File > Queue Batch Operation > Save as AVI > Save. Your first pass is set.

We’ll do the same thing again to set the second pass except we have to set the size here. You will now need the data from Gordian knot. This time do Video > Compression > Configure > Twopass – 2nd Pass > calc… This is where I’ll put in the data from Gordian Knot. My total audio size was 546642 kb, and the target size is 1145856 kb so I enter these and the time and frames per second. When finished click OK > OK > OK > File > Queue Batch Operation > Save as AVI > Save. Your second pass is set. You can close Gordian Knot and AvsPmod now if you like.

Its time to start your encode. Press the f4 button and your VirtualDub Job Control window appears. Choose your first pass and hit Start. It will run both passes for you so VirtualDub will do all the work. You’re done now until the encode finishes. Depending on your computer and the amount of filtering this could take anywhere from a couple hours to several days. When it finishes we have to add the audio using VirtualDubMod. Close VirtualDub when your encode is complete.

STEP 5: Adding audio

Open VirtualDubMod. Click File > Open Video file, find your freshly made Xvid and choose it > click Open.
When its loaded, click Video > Direct Stream Copy. Direct Stream Copy simply copies what you put in it without changing anything.

Next we have to tell it which audios to add so click Streams > Stream List > Add > pick your audio > Open.
If you have more than one audio, you will have to repeat this step for each one.

These are the audios that were made in the DGIndex step. The streams will now appear in the available streams box. If you are happy with them, click OK.

Now its time to make the finished product. Click File > Save As > put in a file name (I always use name of the video I opened and add the tracker) > Save.
It will start adding the audios to the video. This should only take a minute or so and concludes the process.

STEP 6: Watch and Upload

All that’s left to do now is watch your entire video to make sure there were no errors anywhere and upload it where ever you can so the world can benefit from your work

Important things to remember

Here are some important things to remember when encoding to Xvid:

1) Your dimensions always need to be in mod 16

2) Since Xvid is SD, your width should never be greater than 720 and you height should never be greater than 480 for NTSC, or 576 for PAL.

3) All matte should be cropped from all four sides.

4) Total file size should be AFR standard whenever possible.

5) The fps size will almost always be 23.976 fps. There are exceptions to this such as badly blended sources, variable bit rate sources, or movies shot straight to video. If you are dealing with newer DVD’s you will probably never see one of these.

6) Be sure to use correct AR. Here are some common maximum AR’s:
Full Screen NTSC 4:3 = 640 x 480
PAL  4:3 = 720 x 540
Wide Screen NTSC or PAL 1.80:1 = 720 x 400
NTSC or PAL 1.85:1 = 720 x 384
Cinematic Wide Screen NTSC or PAL 2.35:1 = 720 x 304

The script I mentioned above to determine AR is:

Quote:

#DON’T FORGET TO CHANGE THE FORMAT AND WIDE ACCORDINGLY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! avsfile = “C:\Users\Public\unknown\encode.name.here.avs” # Encoding script format = 1 # 1=NTSC, 0=PAL wide = 1 # 1=Widescreen 16:9, 0=Full screen 4:3 ######################### ITU = (format==1?10:12)/11.0*(wide==1?4.0/3:1) SARs = “”””12:11″,”16:11″,”10:11″,”40:33″,”16:15″,”64:45″,”8:9″,”32:27″””” ITUprof = “”+(wide==1?”ANAMORPHIC “:””)+(format==1?”NTSC”:”PAL”) i=import(avsfile).converttorgb i ab = round(height*(sqrt(45.0/44)-1)) a = spline36resize(round(width*ITU),height) a = a.addborders(0,floor(ab/2.0),0,ceil(ab/2.0)) bb = width(a)-round(width*ITU/sqrt(45.0/44)) b = spline36resize(round(width*ITU/sqrt(45.0/44)),height+ab) b = b.addborders(floor(bb/2.0),0,ceil(bb/2.0),0) interleave(a,b) scriptclip(“””subtitle(“Playback Resolution: “+\ string(round(width(i)*ITU*pow(44.0/45,current_frame%2)))+”x”+string(height(i))+\ “\n”+ITUprof+(current_frame%2==1?” NON-ITU”:””)+\ “\nx264 –sar “+eval(“select(2*format+wide+current_frame%2*4,”+SARs+”)”),lsp=0)”””) #This script is functioning with a script in my C:\Users\Public\unknown folder called encode.name.here.avs. You would have to change the paths to suit your setup. I do my analysis add tfm().tdecimate() or whatever is needed, crop and save

Just open a new tab in AvsPmod and paste this script in it. Then save your script before you set the AR, replace ‘encode.name.here’ in the new tab with your script name, do 1 or 0 for NTSC or PAL, 1 or 0 for Wide or Full screen, and hit f5. The AR appears at the bottom right. 1.79:1 in this case which will I rounded up to 1.8:1.

That concludes this introduction. I hope it helps you to make great Xvids!

FairUse Wizard ripping guide

*This tutorial was written assuming you are starting from scratch with a retail
copy of a Movie. If you already have a decrypted ISO You can skip DvdDecryptor.
**The first step is to open DvdDecryptor and change the mode to Read R ISO.
To do this , just **Click the Mode dropdown and check Read R**.

Once you are in ISO Read Mode, **insert the disk to decrypt**,  Wait for it to read, and
**Click the DVD to Harddrive Icon**

Making the ISO should take between 15 and 30 minutes, depending on the Movie you are
Decrypting and the speed of the machine you are using

That’s it. Your done with DvdDecryptor. Just make a note of the location of the newly made
ISO file. And Start up FairUseWizzard.

Let’s start by setting some default options. **Click Options**

It looks like a lot of shit  but it’s actually quite simple because most of the option defaults are already set..
*First **Click the codec dropdown** at the top and select Codec Settings. (It’s all the way at the bottom).
**Then select Xvid, size 700mb and make sure Two Pass is checked.
***Next , Select Your language for the audio track.
I have checked Use TV Display mode Because I Primarily play my movies on my TV. If you mostly play them back on the computer,
Do not check this option.

*Now , you need to select a Destination folder for your completed avi’s.
This is to the right , on the options screen. Just **Click the Browse button**

Make something descriptive so you can find it easy.
All done with options. **Click Next**

*Back to here. **Dot Create new Project** , if it’s not already, and type in a name.(I use the name of the movie)
**Now , to the right of the Folder box, **Click Browse** and select a working folder for the project.
I use FairUse_Temp because I always delete the files when I’m done.
***After you select a working folder, **Click Next**

Now, **Click Browse** and navigate to the ISO you created with DvdDecryptor.

Find the file and **Click Open**

**Click OK** then **Click Next**

Most of the time this is a “no brainer’ because there is only one PKG large enough. In this case, there are 2, one fullscreen and
one Widescreen. AnyHoo, select one, and **Click Next**

Fair Use will automatically start indexing the movie, to avoid any A/V sync issues. This will take a few minutes.

*After indexing, the croping and subtitles option screen will popup.
**If you want subtitles, **check Include subpictures** and select the titles from the dropdown below.
***If you do want subtitles, I suggest checking the Extract Subtitles box. — This will prevent hardcoding of subtitles and force
FU to create a seperate file for the Subtitles.
**Note** If you get to this screen and Include Subpictures is already checked, there are probably forced subtitles built into
the film and you should just check show forced subtitles only, if you don’t want Subs.
Croping — This program has a excellent autocrop function. It’s almost flawless.
Just **Click Auto set** to use it.

As you can see, it cropped nicely
**Click next**

Unless you know how this particular film was encoded, **Click Auto Detect** To determine the field Combination.

Almost there ) **Click Next** To go to the final settings screen.

At this point , you may want to make some changes to size or resolution. If you change the size from 700mb to 800mb, you
will see that the resolution also changes automatically. Adjust the size – resolution to suit your needs and then **Click Next**

This will take quite some time, depending on the movie and the speed of your machine.

All done. Weeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee.

*I did not make this tutorial i did however pirate it

Ripping/Converting Guide

This guide assumes you are running a Windows based PC. All tools mentioned are freeware. This guide is quite complex and not intended for absolute beginners. The purpose of this guide is to create a fully customizable rip and achieve the most you can at a specific filesize. In this case a standard 700Mb Rip.

Tools Needed:

VobSub hxxp://www.afterdawn.com/software/video_software/subtitle_tools/vobsub.cfm
XviD Bitrate Calculator hxxp://www.divx-digest.com/software/xvid_bitcalc.html
DVDShrink hxxp://www.afterdawn.com/software/video_software/dvd_rippers/dvd_shrink.cfm
Audacity 1.3 Beta hxxp://audacity.sourceforge.net/download/beta_windows
XviD Codec hxxp://www.koepi.info/xvid.html
Megui 0.3.1.1056 hxxp://sourceforge.net/projects/megui/
Avisynth hxxp://sourceforge.net/projects/avisynth2/files/AviSynth%202.5/AviSynth%202.5.8/Avisynth_258.exe/download
VirtualDub hxxp://sourceforge.net/projects/virtualdub/files/virtualdub-win/1.9.6.32618/VirtualDub-1.9.6.zip/download
VirtualDubMod hxxp://sourceforge.net/projects/virtualdubmod/files/VirtualDubMod%20bugfix_cvs/1.5.10.2%20build%202542/VirtualDubMod_1_5_10_2_b2542.zip/download
.NET Framework 2 hxxp://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=0856EACB-4362-4B0D-8EDD-AAB15C5E04F5&displaylang=en

PART ONE: RIPPING THE DVD

We need to rip the DVD. To do this, insert the DVD into your pc’s DVD-ROM and open up DVDShrink. Click on the “Open Disc” blue button to your top left, then a window will pop up, click ok.

DVDShrink wil begin analysing the DVD. Once it finishes, click on the “Re-Author” button to your top right. Here, you will see everything the DVD has. Menus, Movie, Extras etc. Scroll down if needed and look for “Main Movie” window, here you will see the main movie. Click on it and hold the button, and drag it to your left, the left window that says “DVD Structure”.

Once you do that, click on the “Compression Settings” button to the left of “DVD Browser”. Now you will see “Video”, “Audio” and “Subpicture” (Subtitle) Sub menus. Under “Video”, set it to “No Compression”. Default should say “Automatic”, so just switch it to “No compression”. Under the “Audio” sub Menu, select the Audio tracks you want to include into your DVD. In my case, Im only including the main audio track, no commentaries or anything special. Under the “Subpicture” Sub menu, leave the subs you want checked. In this case, this DVD didn’t bring any subtitles so everything is blank.

Once you have all of this set, click oh the “Backup!” button. A warning might come up saying your DVD is too Big to fit on a single layer DVD, just ignore it and click yes. This window will pop up afterwards:

Now, go to the “DVD Region” tab, once there, check the box that says “Region Free”. Now go to the “Target Device” tab, under “Select backup Target” set it to “Hard Disk Folder”. Underneath that, you will see “Select Target Folder For Output Files”. Creat a new Folder on your Desktop and name it “Example-DVD-R” or something similar. Mine will be “DEAD-RIOT-DVD-R”. Now click the browse button on the “Select Target Folder For Output Files” and set it to the folder on your desktop. Now uncheck the box that says create Video Ts and Audio Ts subfolders. Afer that Click OK and Shrink will begin to rip the DVD into your selected output folder. Once it finishes it will let you know, click ok and close out DVDShrink.

PART TWO: DEMUXING THE AC3 AUDIO AND CREATING A .d2v FILE FROM THE VOB’S

Before anything, create a folder on your desktop with the name of the release. I do this to keep the project more organized. Mine will be “DEAD-RIOT-RIP”. So once you do that, there will be two working folders on your desktop, “EXAMPLE-DVD-R” and “EXAMPLE-RIP”. In my case the two folders are “DEAD-RIOT-DVD-R” AMD “DEAD-RIOT-RIP”. Once you do that, open up megui.

NOTE: If its your first time using megui, it will prompt you to install avisynth. install it if you havent already. It will also ask you to update everything in it, do it. While updating it will ask you if you’d like to import profiles, click cancel on all the profiles. Once done updating, it will ask you to restart megui, do it and once opened again, it will be fully up to date

Once open, click on “Tools/DgiIndexer/D2vCreator” It will take you here:

Click the button next to “Input File” and locate your “EXAMPLE-DVD-R” Folder. Select only the first vob file and click “Open”.

Now you will see that megui has loaded the audio streams. Under “Audio”, check the bubble “Demux All Tracks”. Under output, click the button and select your output folder which will be “EXAMPLE-RIP”. Name the output something unique, in my case it will be named “DR”, Then click “Save”. Now, Underneath that, uncheck the box that says ” Demux Video Stream” and check the two boxes that say “On Completion Load Files” and “Close”. Once you do that click the “Queue” button.

Now go back to the megui main window and look for the “Queue” button in the middle. You will see your job waiting. Clcik on “Start” to your bottom left hand side. It will begin the process

PART THREE: CREATING A AVISYNTH SCRIPT FROM THE .d2v FILE:

Now, once done processing, megui will auto-load the d2v file into its script creator. It will look like this:

now, click the “Filters” tab then select the “Analyze” button. Megui will begin analyzing what kind of source your DVD is. This can be done manually with DGMPGDec but we’ll stick to Megui. Detecting a source can be quite difficult for beginners. First you must lean about Interlaced material and progressive material. Some may even be Hybrids. For examples on all this just google interlaced pictures. Anyway, back on track, once it finishes analyzing, it will input the necessary filters depending on your source.

Now select your resize filter. I like the “Spline 36” Neutral. Click on the options button, you will see options “Crop” and “Resize”. Crop accordingly making sure to only remove the black borders. Once you do that, Check the “resize” box and check the “Suggested resolution” box to maintain aspect ratio. Try not to pass 640 width as some standalone divx players cannot handle higher than 640.

Now before you do anything else or save anything, open up the XviD bitrate calculator. This step is vital as you will get an idea of how the movie will more or less turn out at your selected resolution and filesize you plan on ripping it to. Open it and input all the required information. Once you do that it will let you know how the quality will turn out. Its not100 percent accurate but at least you have an idea of what you’re accomplishing, whether it be a good output or over compressing.

Notice the bits/pixels frames. Thats the frame quality. Ignore it if it says not a good idea. Anything above 0.170 is good. Below 0.170 is not so good.

Once you’ve got it all calculated and decided what resolution to input in megui, click on save. Megui will open another window but just colse out everything including megui.

Now you open your working folder, and verify that everything is there. The AviSynth Script, the ac3 audio, and the d2v file.

PART FOUR: ENCODING THE ac3 AUDIO TO mp3:

NOTE: This part is for those using Audacity for their first time. You will need to install two plug-ins. You need to install the lame and ffmpeg filter. They can be found here :
hxxp://lame.buanzo.com.ar/Lame_v3.98.2_for_Audacity_on_Windows.exe
hxxp://www.gaclrecords.org.uk/FFmpeg_2009_07_20_for_Audacity_on_Windows.exe

Once you get those plugins, install them to this directory. Crogram FilesAudacity 1.3 Beta (Unicode)Plug-Ins
Make sure you install them to this directory! Crogram FilesAudacity 1.3 Beta (Unicode)Plug-Ins
Your drive letter could be different but the Audacity directory does not change!

Once you do that, open up Audacity. Click “Edit/preferences”. Once there click on “Libraries”.

Click the “locate” button on both plug ins and locate them. They will be will you put them before:
Crogram FilesAudacity 1.3 Beta (Unicode)Plug-Ins

Once you do that, you’re ready to work on the audio.

Ok so open up Audacity, you will see this:

Click on “File/Import/Audio” Browse to your “EXAMPLE-RIP” folder on your desktop and select the .AC3 Audio track. Audacity will begin to import it and when it finishes, you will see a graph on Audacity.

Now go to “Edit/Select/All”. The whole graph will be highlighted. Once you do that, go to “Effect/Amplify”. Amplify as much as you can and click ok. If you amplify too much, the ok button will become unclickable. This means that the peaks went off the chart. So amplify to the max allowed and click ok. Audacity will then start amplifying the audio.

Once it finishes amplifying, go to “Edit/Select/All” again. Then go to “File/ExportSelection”. A new window will pop up, leave everything blank and select ok.

Afterwards a new window will pop up.

Select “EXAMPLE-RIP” as your output folder, next to “save as type” set it as MP3, Then click options. A config window will pop up, set it as average and select desired bitrate. 128Kbps in my case. Once you configure all that, click “Ok” then click “save”. Audacity will begin to encode the Audio.

Listen to your Mp3 results and see if you like it, if not, you can always set it at a higher bitrate.

PART FIVE: LOADING THE SCRIPT INTO VDUB/VDUBMOD AND ENCODING:

This is the last part. I will show you how to encode the movie using VDUBMOD and VDUB. I will be using XviD for this tutorial. I will also show you how to add filters to your movie to get a better result. Filters are optional and not always needed, but I will illustrate how to do it for the sake of this tutorial.

Using VDUBMOD:

First thing, find a good set of filters and intall them into your VDUBMOD and VDUB plugins directory. Go here:
hxxp://www.thedeemon.com/VirtualDubFilters/

Once you find all the ones you need, extract them to your plugins directory. In my case:
C:SA-APPSVirtualDub-1.9.6plugins
C:SA-APPSVirtualDubModplugins

Note: Both VDUB and VDUBMOD bring filters included, however, there are numerous great filters that are quite awesome and not included.

So now we have all that we need in our plug ins directory, open up VirtualDubMod.

Go to “File/OpenVideoFile” then go to your “EXAMPLE-RIP” folder. Select the avisynth script and open it. Vdub mod will now load it. Use the scroll bar on the bottom to see your picture

Once you do that, go to “Streams/Streamlist”. click “Add, and locate your mp3 file that you converted with audacity. If you have followed everything as I wrote it, it will be in the “EXAMPLE-RIP” folder. It will begin parsing the audio and vdub will give you a warning if the audio is VBR. ignore it and click “No”.

Now you will see it in the stream list. Click ok and VirtualDubMod will return back to the main window.

Once in the main window, its time for adding filters, then encoding. To add filters, go to “Video/Filters”. A blank window will open. Click “Add” and you will see the list of filters in your VDUBMOD plugins Directory. This part is solely up to you. You add what you think it might need. Im only going to add one . “Sharpen”.

Once you click on the filter you want, adjust the filters settings to your desire, then click ok, once in the filter list window, click ok to proceed or repeat previous steps and add another filter.

Once you’ve added all your filters, you can proceed to encode the movie. You can also skip the filters steps and just proceed to the step below:

Now we’re back at the main window. go to “Video/Compression” A window will pop up showing the list of all codecs you have installed in your pc. So we’re at the window, select Xvid and click “Configure”.

The Xvid Codec Configuration window will appear as illustrated above.

The first thing you want to do is set the “Profile Level” at “Unrestricted” Once you do that, click “More” next to “Profile Level”

Once you click “More” a new window will pop up.

Now its time to configure. If your movie will have 1000Kbps bitrate or more, set the “Quantization type” to MPEG. If it will be under 1000Kps set it to H.263. Check the “Adaptive Quantization” box and leave the three below unchecked. Check the B-VOP box. Set the max consecutive B-VOP’s to 4. Leave the “Quantizer Ratio” at 1.50 and “Quantizer Offset” at 1.00. Check the “Packed Bitstream” box. Disregard the “Level” and “Aspect Ratio” options and click ok.

your settings should look like this except the H.263. You can use MPEG or H.263, really up to you.

Now you’re back at the main XviD config window. Next to “Encoding Type”, set it to “Two Pass First Pass”

Next to “Quality Preset”, set it to “user defined”

Click “More” next to “Quality Preset” and a new window will open up.

Set “Motion Search Precision” to “6-Ultrahigh”. Set “VHQ Mode” to 4-Wide Search”. Check all three boxes : “Use VHQ for b-frames too” “Use Chroma Motion” “Turbo “. Leave Frame Drop ratio at 0. Set “Maximum I-Frame Interval” to the correct number. If your movie is PAL (25.000 FPS), Set it at 250. If your movie is NTSC INTERLACED ( 29.970 FPS) Set it at 300. If your movie is NTSC PROGRESSIVE (23.976 FPS) set it at 240. In my case, its is NTSC PROGRESSIVE so I’m setting it at 240. Your settings should look like this:

Now click on the “Quantization Tab”. Check the “Trellis Quantization” box and leave other settings at default. They should look like this:

Now click “OK” and you will be brought back to the main XviD config window. Go to “Encoding Type” and set it at “twopass-2nd pass”

Click on “Target Bitrate KBPS” and set it to “Target Size kbytes” if not already done.

Click on “Calculate” button next to “Target Size kbytes” and a new window will open.

Next to “Target size”, type in 714752

714752 = 698MB. 1024kbytes multiplied by 698Mb = 714752 kbytes. The reason I made it 2 mb smaller is to get exactly 700mb output file. With XviD, You gotta always take off 2 mb or you’ll end up with a 702-703MB file.

Next to “Format” leave it in “Avi-Open-DML”

Under “Video”, input the length of your movie in Hours, minutes, and seconds. Next to that input the FPS. If your source is pal it will be 25Fps, if your source is NTSC and is progressive, set it at 23.976Fps, if your source is NTSC and is not progressive, meaning that it is interlaced, set it at 29.970Fps.

Now under “Audio”, check the bubble that says “Sizekbytes”. If your audio is CBR set it to CBR and VBR set it to VBR. Look for the box to the bottom right hand side and click it. Locate your mp3 audio and select it and click ok, It should be in the “EXAMPLE-RIP” folder if you have followed this guide step by step. Once loaded, you will see that the xvid calculator has changed its numbers around and gave you a calculation for your movie.

Once you do this, click ok and you will be back to the main XviD window. Next to “Encoding type”, set it back to “Twopass-1st pass”, now click the “more button”. You will see this:

Check the “Discard First pass” box. Now click on the button next to “stats filename” and save the stats file in the “EXAMPLE-RIP” folder.

Now you will be back at the main XviD Config window, click ok and you will be brought back to the main VDUBMOD compression window. Click ok and you will be back to the MAIN VDUBMOD window. Go to “File/Save as”.

Before you do anything, make sure that “Video Mode” is in “Full Processing Mode”. Also MAKE SURE to check the box that says “Don’t run this job Now, add it to Job-Control”. Leave everything else unchecked. Now Select the folder you want to save it in, in this case save it in “EXAMPLE-RIP”. Name it the same unique name you named your d2v file. Mine was “DR”. Once you got that all set, click “save”.

Now go to “Video/Compression”. Select the XviD codec (Should already be selected) and click “configure”. The main XviD Config window will pop up. Next to “Encoding type”, set it back to “Twopass-2nd pass”. Click ok and ok again until you are back at the main VDUBMOD window. Go to “File/Save as” and repeat the previous steps. Now that you’ve done that. Go to “File/Job Control”. Here you will see you 2 passes pending. Click auto start and your movie will begin to encode

If you want to see how fast it is encoding, go to the main VDUBMOD window and select “Options/Show status window”

Using VDUB

Open up VDUB. Go to “File/OpenVideoFile”. Select your AviSynth Script which should be in the “EXAMPLE-RIP” Folder. VDUB will then load the script.

Go to “Audio/SelectAudioFromOtherFile”. Locate your mp3 file which will be in the “EXAMPLE-RIP” Folder. A new window will open up, select CBR if audio is CBR and VBR if audio is VBR.

Next is filter and compression steps. I will skip the filter and compression steps because the steps are identical to the ones in VDUBMOD so posting them all over again is useless. Once you got the filters and codec setup, its time to Que the two passes.

Assuming you have the Codec set up, stats file saved, and codec set at “Two Pass-1st pass”, Click on “Video” and make sure it is set to “full processing mode”. Once thats set, go to “File/QueBatchOperation/SaveAsAvi”

Save it in your “EXAMPLE-RIP” folder. NAme it he same as the d2vfile, in my case, “DR”. Once saved, go back to compression, set the codec to “Two Pass-2nd pass” and repeat the saving steps. Once you got both passes saved, go to “File/JobControl” you will see your two passes waiting to be processed. Start them and VDUB will begin to encode.

Now that we got our video done, you might want to throw in a subtitles folder and include optional Subs for the hearing impaired. To do this, you will need Gabest VobSub. Open up “VonSubConfigure” You will see this:

Click “open” and locate your “EXAMPLE-DVD-R” Folder. Open it. You will see a blank window. Next to “FilesOftype”, set it to “Ifo and Vob’s for creating idx/sub”. Select the first “VTS” file and click “Open. Then it will ask you where to save the output. Select your folder of choice. (Obviously Should be where the movie is )

You will then see this window, highlight all the subs you want to your top right hand side, Check the “reset time” box, and click “ok. VobSub will then rip your subs

Notice I dont have subs showing, thats because this DVD brought no subs. Once your subs are ripped into your folder of choice, rename them to the same name as your XviD rip making sure not to edit the .sub and .idx extenstion.

HARDCODING SUBS USING VDUB

To do this you must do it initially BEFORE encoding the video, otherwise it wont be possible without re-encoding. To hardcode, throw in the “vobsub_vd.vdf” file which comes with VobSub into the VDUB plug ins folder. When you are setting up your encode in VDUB, Slect the VobSub filter. Once you do that, select your .sub files that you want to hardcode. Set everything up How I explained earlier and your encode will turn out with hardcoded subs. Heres an illustration of the filter:

Well this concludes the tutorial, hopefully you didn’t get nauseated and actually read to the bottom of this tut!  

guide on How To Join A 2-CD XviD Rip into 1 avi File

*****Download “VirtualDubMod” (Freeware)
Also make sure to have the XviD Codec intalled in your PC*******

Open VirtualDubMod. Go to “File/OpenVideoFile” and select CD1 Then click Open”. CD1 Will be loaded into VirtualDubMod.

Now, go to “File/AppendSegment” and Select CD2. Then click Open. CD2 Will be appended now.

Now that we have them joined, its time to save. Go to “File/SaveAs” and save it in your directory of choice. BEFORE YOU SAVE ANYTHING READ THIS CAREFULLY: Under “VideoMode” set it to “DirectStreamCopy”. Also have the options how I have them here in my VirtualDubMod.

VirtualDubMod will now begin to save your out put file. Once it finishes verify the now joined 2CD rip in your destination folder of choice.

-HorrorFreek

How to convert audio files

So you have a lossless file (FLAC, ALAC, WAV etc) that you want to convert to another format. This will teach you how to do it using several different types of software depending on your OS

Windows

foobar2000

If you do not have foobar already installed, you can grab it here: http://www.foobar2000.org/download. MAKE SURE YOU INCLUDE THE CONVERTER WHEN YOU INSTALL.

This example shows converting a FLAC file to LAME 320kbps mp3

1. Right click the album or song you wish to convert. Go to Convert->...

2. Select Output format

3. Click Add New

4. Make sure the new audio type you want is selected from the dropdown box (eg MP3 (LAME)) and pick what quality. Beathau5 allows V1, V0, and 320kbps

5. Now go back and select Destination. In the name format box enter: %album artist% - %album%[ '('%date%')']' ['%codec%']'/%tracknumber% [%artist% - ]%title%

6. Lastly, go to Other. Uncheck “Transfer attached pictures” and where it says “Copy other files to destination folder” enter: *.*

7. Now save your settings (I called mine LAME 320) and click Convert! It will ask you for a destination folder and choose wherever you would like

NOTE: If it asks you for the location of lame.exe or flac.exe after choosing your destination folder, you have to download LAME or FLAC.
The current version of LAME can be found here: http://www.rarewares.org/mp3-lame-bundle.php
The current version of FLAC can be found here: http://sourceforge.net/projects/flac/files/flac-win/

Linux

Coming soon!

Mac

Coming soon!

Transcodes

Transcoding (verb) a file means converting from one format to another. A transcode (noun) can mean any converted file, but is usually used in a negative context (as in a bad transcode).

GOOD TRANSCODES

A good transcode means that during the transcode process, the file has either never been converted to lossy, or the file has only been converted to lossy once during the last step.

Examples of good transcodes:

uncompressed lossless > compressed lossless
compressed lossless > uncompressed lossless
compressed lossless > compressed lossless
uncompressed lossless > lossy
compressed lossless > lossy

BAD TRANSCODES

A bad transcode means that during the transcode process, the file has either been converted to a lossy format more than once, or the file has been converted from lossy to lossless. Bad transcodes are prohibited on Beathau5 and will get you a warning or worse.

Examples of bad transcodes:

higher lossy bitrate > lower lossy bitrate
same bitrate lossy > same bitrate lossy
lossy > lossless

If you are unsure whether or not your release is a bad transcode post in our “Is it a Transcode?” thread in the proper format.

Spectral Analysis

Spectral analysis is a visual way to display the data in a music file. Every music note has a specific frequency: lower notes have lower frequencies and higher notes have higher frequencies. All of the frequencies are displayed on a spectral diagram (“spectral” for short), which is a graph of all the frequencies vs. time in a music file. Frequencies are measured in hertz (Hz) and kilohertz (1,000 Hz). Humans have a hearing range from about 20 Hz — 20kHz (20,000 Hz).

Since spectrals show all the data in a file, they are helpful tools to use when you’re trying to decide whether or not a song has been transcoded. Every file has a relatively standard

Click on any of the spectrals below to view it in a higher resolution.

CD/LOSSLESS

However, different genres have different-looking spectrals. The example above was a pop song, so most of the frequencies were represented. But look at this classical piano song.

It looks much different, right? But it’s still a lossless spectral! Notice how “white noise” (the light purple) still extends to 22 kHz, even though those frequencies aren’t used.

MP3

Different types of MP3s have different frequency cut-offs. MP3s also tend to have a “shelf” at 16 kHz (you’ll see it in the spectrals).

MP3 320kbps (CBR) has a frequency cut-off at 20.5 kHz.

MP3 256kbps (CBR) has a frequency cut-off at 20 kHz.

MP3 V0 has a frequency cut-off at 19.5 kHz.

MP3 192kbps (CBR) has a frequency cut-off at 19 kHz.

MP3 V2 has a frequency cut-off at 18.5 kHz.

MP3 128kbps (CBR) has a frequency cut-off at 16 kHz.

TRANSCODES

How are spectrals helpful when trying to detect transcodes? Say you download a song in FLAC from a blog. The only way to verify that this song is truly a lossless file and not a transcoded file is by looking at its spectral. (Programs like AudioIdentifier are not reliable at detecting transcodes.)

For example, the spectral below is of a FLAC file: the file extension is .flac, it is 21.8 MB, and it sounds okay.

But whoa, does that look anything like what a regular FLAC spectral should look like? No! This file was transcoded from MP3 192kbps (CBR) to FLAC. It’s a lossy to lossless transcode, which is bad.

PROGRAMS

For spectral analysis, we recommend using either Adobe Audition (Windows or Mac OS), Audacity (Windows, Mac OS, Linux), and SoX (Windows, Mac OS, Linux — command line only). All of the spectrals that appear in this guide were viewed in Adobe Audition CS 6.

Although you should use spectral analysis to determine whether a file is a transcode or not, you will need to use another program to first determine what bitrate or encoding preset the file claims to be. For this purpose, we recommend using Audio Identifier or dbPowerAmp on Windows and dnuos or MediaInfo on Mac OS.

If you are unsure whether or not your release is a bad transcode post in our “Is it a Transcode?” thread in the proper format.