[MEncoder-users] rip dvd to mkv, ogm, mp4 script

[Laine Lee]

On 10/13/08 4:00 PM, "Stroller" <stroller at stellar.eclipse.co.uk> wrote:

...

> 
> Comparing the size of the h264 video to VOB is comparing apples &
> oranges. DVD's vob files use mpeg2, which was dated even at the time
> DVD was first becoming mainstream, but which has low processing
> requirements for playback. h264 is a MUCH higher quality encoding.
> 
> BTW: I believe that undvd's "--cont mp4" outputs a more valid
> container format.

I haven't been the least bit successful when I've tried that. When I do, an
output file is created with a name like "[title].avi.partial", and then
disappears without being replaced by a "[title].mp4" or anything else.
"Remuxing" appears as the last entry in the terminal output with no values
in the line. I even went as far as compiling and installing mp4creator
because it was the only apparent deficiency in my tool set revealed by
"undvd -C".


> 
> You say "it looks really good" - well, that's the important thing. At
> the end of the day, it's only watching movies, and the content of the
> film - the actors, directory, story & cinematography - is the
> important thing. But even if you're a dedicated videophile, the true
> test is the quality that you see - play the rip alongside the DVD &
> see if you can tell any differences. If you can, then fair enough, but
> if you can't, then don't complain just because the file size is small!!
> 
> FWIW, I have been using `undvd ... -2 -c -r off` and am really very
> happy with the results. IMO, the "-r off" results - even at the
> default bitrates - can be much better than undvd's default resizing. I
> regard these results as really very watchable indeed.
> 
> Actually, ripping "Behind Enemy Lines", I couldn't IIRC tell any
> difference between the DVD & undvd's results at the default (75%?)
> rescaling. "Behind Enemy Lines" is quite a bright and well-lit movie -
> it is only when I compare the rip of "Heat" that I notice fairly minor
> compression artefacts that are not present in the original. I think
> this is because "Heat" contains more dark scenes - all the stuff I can
> pick out is in night skies behind De Nero as he walks along the
> station platform, or behind the cop when he returns home after a long
> day & is silhouetted against the picture window of his home. I think
> that such large areas of "flat colour" are typically problematic for
> video compression, and that in darker areas the results will be
> particularly noticeable, so these are "worst case" scenes for DVD
> ripping. I have a copy of a 2 minutes trailer of "Heat" here in which
> such artefacts are visible and which I will post in a day or two when
> I have had the chance to summarise my comparison comprehensively; I
> want to do some more homework on h264 encoding options before I open
> my gob further. But I have to say that even if I were not to improve
> on the quality of this rip, I am sure you could show it to 100 people
> and less than 10 of them would notice these artefacts. I would be
> pretty happy with these results for most of my viewing.
> 

...

> 
> I see that James Hastings-Trew's comments are far more comprehensive
> than any I could give. It might be interesting to know what playback
> system / software you're using, and also the details of the original
> DVD.
> 
>>> I have an NTSC PS3 here and expected to see some kind of "pulldown"
>>> effect when playing these "PAL" rips, but have been unable to do so.
>>> Perhaps it is just my eyes, but apparently to me the effect of
>>> different framerates is very minor.
>> 
>> But you do encounter a change between original and output frame rates?
> 
> I don't know - I'm not interested in the original framerates.
> 
> As I said in my previous post:
> 
>     here undvd is producing 29.97fps files from Region 1 NTSC DVDs and
>     25fps files from Region 2 PAL DVDs.
>     This has been consistent over all the handful of disks I have tried.
> 
> This seems to me to be near-as-damnit consistent with PAL 50hz & NTSC
> 60hz frequencies, so I had no interest in investigating further. If
> you'd like me to compare the framerates of some of undvd's rips
> against the original movies then post a command for checking the
> framerates of the original DVDs & I'll be glad to do so.
> 

Thanks so much for this reply. It's full of useful information.

-- 
Laine Lee