Pinnacle DVD editing and authoring

[MITgrad]

Pinnacle is a complete authoring environment with capture, edit, and DVD menu authoring. But, it is full of bugs and crashes, which is bad, but also has an organized user group, which is unbelievably good, at:

webboard.pinnaclesys.com

I digitize with an ATI card, but it can only keep up with 352X240 picture. So to digitize with DVD resolution, I use a Centrino burner and +RW media.

The VOB files created by Centrino import into VideoReDo 1.6.2.248 with no problems, just write VOB files 1,2,... from +RW disk to MPG on the hard drive. The VOB files created by Centrino are sequential, so no decoding is necessary. VideoReDo is super fast at inputing these files. Pinnacle itself can't read VOB files (even the ones it creates!), so the library of videos you create under Centrio can't be edited by Pinnacle, but VideoReDo can save the day!

So, let's review the progress I have made at getting this triad to work:
(1) a DVD burner, (2) VideoReDo, and (3) Pinnacle 8.12.7

After you burn a DVD+RW, just import the VOB files using VideoReDo, and write to disk as MPG.

FIRST PROBLEM
You must UNCHECK "Movie Factory Output" during VideoReDo write because this causes Pinnacle to generate an error during DVD burn, "Unexpected data packet encountered". This is tricky, because the file imports to Pinnacle OK, edits OK, plays inside Pinnacel OK, but crashes during the DVD write mode.

NEXT PROBLEM
Pinnacle's DVD burn is unbelievably slow, and poorly programmed. However, if you match EXACTLY the bit rate for the source MPG and the bit rate for the burned DVD (as well as screen resolution, audio type, etc), then a ten our burn can be reduced to about 20 minutes - GREAT NEWS.

The bad news is, Pinnacle WILL NOT tell you what the source file bit rate is, no matter what you do (and there are plenty of tricks to try, just log onto the forum mentioned above). HOWEVER, VideoReDo, in all its wisdom, DOES tell you the bit rate, so click on the GENERAL tab, note the bit rate, and use this in the CUSTOM field before burning, and Pinnacle will zip through burning at a fast pace.

LAST PROBLEMS
So far, after downloading dozzens of editing and DVD burning environments from the internet, the combination of VideoReDo and Pinnacle is the best I have encountered - trouble prone though it is. The SONY Movie Studio is a close second, but it requires ACTIVATION, meaning you can't buy SMS, you can only LEASE it, so you can't use it on your lap top, new computer, or even use it if you upgrade your computer's memory, hard drive, video card, etc. So, for now, Pinnacle is best, though EVE is pretty good, and AVS is great, but crashes my computer.

So VidReDo conquers the enormous innefficiencies of the Pinnacle environment, while permitting all its power and features. As great as this may sound, the DVD's that Pinnacle burns are not completely bug free, so I will report on fine tuning. But this combination should become an Internet standard because it beats any other combination of digitizing, authoring, burning, and retrieval software I have encountered - and that includes a LOT of territory, after four years of working with this off and on, and after configuring my last four computers to work this.

I might ad that I have had no luck with the Adobe environment, or their tech support. However, I haven't tried some of the high end hardware solutions like Canopus - althoug I would be interested in any one else's experiences.

[Harry]

if you want: quality, flexibility, compatibility there's currently only one product for me: dvd-lab pro.

i did some testing of all available dvd authoring programs some months ago. i don't know how the current versions are. tbh: they all have their drawbacks. mostly it's asynchronity. the only good program for authoring is imho ulead dvd workshop 2. but this one has the drawback of asynchronity as well. their muxing egine doesn't work.

i had no problems with dvd-lab pro thought it's a bit complicated. besides: if you need multiple VTS or multiple audio then this is the (only affordable) program for you.

if you want to author a dvd quickly, then you should use tmpgenc dvd-author. the only drawback of that program is the poor layout possibilities of menues. the rest is perfect: synchronous files, quick authoring, motion thumbnails etc.

ps: OFFTOPIC comment on online activation: as for products which have to be activated ... don't buy them. these processes suck, especially as they don't work some time. i've bought half life 2 and this is the worst thing i've ever encountered. i bought the retail version before official release date, but couldn't play it because the activation server didn't activate it. you have to activate the game and that takes about 20 minutes. then the game always makes a call home when you run it. it's said to work in offline mode as well, but it doesn't always. sometimes it just has the urge to go online. i ask myself if with the activation process the companies - excuse my words - really try to piss the last legal buyers off with all possible means. online activation is the worst copy protection ever invented - it's good for companies maybe, but it's a nightmare for legal buyers.

[Anonymous]

Harry - thanks for the recommendation, I will check it out right away.
Pinnacle DVD burns are still giving me fits, and lots of users on their forum page complain as well.

ACTIVATION
Let's be clear on this. Activation is a way to LEASE software, instead of allowing users to BUY software. If you change a RAM chip, the vendor has the legal right to make you BUY the package again. Or, you migrate it to a new computer and the sofware vendor has the right to say, "We don't support that package any more - why don't you upgrade?"

And after you no longer use a package, forget abut donating it to your local school and getting a tax write off - the package is worthless.

Since WinXP requires activation, it means computers with removable hard drives will no longer run their OS, and that is the only way I can get ANY Microsoft OS to work. So, I am slowly migrating everything to LINUX, although I will still have to run W2K under Linux for some applications.

Microsoft never went broke underestimating the naivety of its customer base - their compilers have been crashing since the early 80's.

[Keevin Doster]

I'm new to this forum business so I might be doing this wrong, replying into this thread rather than creating another one, etc.

I have an 88 min MPG that I ran through VideoReDo, and got a bit rate of 6,000 - great. Pinnacle has a custom option for that. I used it. The rendering and compiling to my hard disk was fast.

But in Studio 9, when I go to write from existing project, it goes straight to Completed - I tried closing the program and coming back in, same results.

So then I go over to Ulead's MovieFactory 3, which is usually my backup for getting things done when Studio 9 is a problem, and after going through its process, says the file is too big. 88 minutes can't fit????

I captured in Studio 9 at DVD (best) quality - after running it through VideoReDo, the size was under 4 gigs.

How can 88 min be too large to burn??? Do I have to do it all over, or is there some way to save what I've done?

I have a Compaq Presario SR1230NX, AMD 3200+, 160 gigs with 130 gig available, with a Lite-On SOHW-832S DVD drive.

Keevin

[phd]

Keevin,

Load the clip into DMF. Right click and select properties.
What are all the details of the clip properties? Video and audio.

Look at the project properties in DMF. What is listed for the project properties? Video and audio.

Do you have "Do not convert..." checked.

Are you NTSC or PAL?

Do you have DMF3 basic or Disk Creator version?
Have you installed all the patches including the latest dual layer patch and the Burning Engine patch?

Also try authoring to a folder on the hard drive to make sure it isn't the famous Ulead problem of incorrectly estimating final size as well.

[Keevin Doster]

I'm sorry - the problem isn't in Ulead MF3 - we're talking Pinnacle here. I just mentioned that as one of the avenues I took to try to get past the problem in Studio 9.

I do write DVD folders to hard drive as a matter of course now.

As it turns out, Studio 9 went buggy, so I completely uninstalled it, uninstalled MF3 (and have not reinstalled it, so I can't do what you suggest, at the moment). I reinstalled Studio 9 (to 9.3.5.10). Tried the same old MPG - but in a new project, with exactly the same results. This points to the original captured file (now run through VideoReDo twice) as the problem.

What I was looking for here was whether there is any way(s) to work from the problem file, or start all over again. I can just trash the MPG, and recapture, but I'm trying to expand my knowledge about this stuff, and see if the MPG itself can be cleaned up, or my DVD folder on the hard drive can be burned.

Without MF3, if Studio 9 won't burn the DVD folder it made, then I have no way to burn it, so I'm online now looking for freeware to use as an alternate burn capability.

To restate my problem. Studio 9 did fine, all the way through "Make Movie" as DVD folder on my hard drive. But when I then ask it to burn a DVD from that folder it created, it goes through the "writing image" stage, but when it comes to actually doing the burn, it says "successfully completed" (when in fact it hasn't). I've tried different things, to shake it out of that, including the uninstall and reinstall, but nothing has worked (including trying to burn to a DVD+RW rather than DVD-R).

I can't think of what else to do, unless someone has some idea what might be done.

Thanks.

[Keevin Doster]

Sorry, but posting a reply, I was blind to the reply I was responding to.

Answering your suggestions more directly:

Do you have "Do not convert..." checked.
** This is for MPG audio? (We're talking in MF3, right?)

Are you NTSC or PAL?
**I am NTSC

Do you have DMF3 basic or Disk Creator version?
**I have the Disk Creator version

Have you installed all the patches including the latest dual layer patch and the Burning Engine patch?
I have been working with Ulead tech support for 2 months now, and yes, I have the latest patches - I check every other day or so to see if there is a new patch available.

If Pinnacle (Studio 9) can do the job, I work out of there now (it's their capture card, so I capture through Studio 9). Only going to MF3 when Studio 9 won't do the job, but I usually get a loss of image quality by going through MF3. Since I started using VideoReDo, I've pretty much stopped using MF3 (for its DVD authoring, I use it for Copy DVD, which is how I get a DVD folder created in Studio 9 burned to DVD when Studio 9 can't do it, and for Erase DVD (DVD+RW)).

I originally had VideoReDo set for MF3, but since I wasn't using it anymore, I changed that in VideoReDo.

Thanks.

[DanR]

Kevin,

Go to our FTP site: ftp://upload:upload@videoredo.net And look in the folder DVDStyler. This is a freeware DVD authoring tool that seems to work pretty good. I would appreciate your feedback on it.

[Keevin Doster]

That isn't a full robust version, is it? The one I downloaded and installed doesn't open Configuration / Settings, nor does About, to a functional page.

This program writes ISO and DVD folders, only, right? So I used my MPG file, wrote it to ISO, then tried to burn a DVD (disk) with DVD Decrypter. It assessed that my file was too big for the disk.

How do I get a file that is too big down to size without having to go back through the whole creation process again? Is there any way? (I know Studio 9 tells you whether the file will fit on the disk or not, in theory, but that is where my problem is with this file - Studio 9 makes it look like everything is fine, proceeds as if everything is fine, up to the point of the actual burn, then says "completed successfully" - when it didn't even burn!!! As I posted earlier, a uninstall and reinstall did not change anything, in that regard - Studio 9 is still doing that.)

So I'm looking for another solution to getting this filed burned. Does one exist?

As far as I can tell, DVDStyler only got me to an ISO file - which is still too big to burn. Aughhh!

Keevin

[DanR]

Author to VIDEO_TS folders, not ISO. Then download and run DVDShrink. It will compress and burn in 1 step.

[consulting]

Since using a PIONEER HDD/DVD Recorder I got back a huge amount of my lifetime.

To remove ads from 2 recorded TV movies, to copy the cleaned movies from HDD to DVD, to select one of the menu templates when finalizing the DVD - all this results in less than 30 minutes.

All the editing and authoring applications are now jobless - except in two cases:
1) Editing, authoring and burning from own shots (D8 cassettes).
2) Authoring captures from TV (e.g. reports, features, movies) für special purposes and with sophisticated menu layouts.

To prevent rerendering if captures must be shortened I'll try now the VideoReDo application. (I'm a press writer and TV author, and I'll be be anxious to see the result...)

However, for "normal life" I prefer now the HDD/DVD recorder.
It's a big hit!
---
Must I touch on the fact that Pinnacle Studio is only a shadow of what it should be, an "idea", an "in any way a little bit working" blueprint of what it should be if working as advertised?
Read an email that I got from the US:Re: Pinnacle:

If I had to guess, I'd think that Pinnacle's Studio line is just about ready to implode. Too many competing products (including the one that you mentioned), and too many problems in their code to fix in the short term.

New with 9.3.5: Non-Interlaced MPEG can no longer be imported. Yes, you translated that correctly. Progressive-Scan MPEG, which worked all through the Studio 8 line, and continued to work up to 9.1.2, is now forbidden. So: All of those Windows Media TV Capture devices with which Studio was bundled are unusable with 9.3.5. (!!!) How would you like to be the person who decided that bundling Pinnacle's software with your company's new capture device?

MicroMV capture, which is *still* listed in Studio specs, is still broken. Argh!

We've finally caught 'em on MPEG and OOS...a couple of engineers have admitted on the public webboard that there is a problem.. Also: A few of us have resorted to setting a bit in the Windows registry to turn off Smartrendering when working with DVD-compatible MPEG files. Quality is lowered, but at least sync is maintained. So, it's like we've been saying since 2003: SMARTRENDERING IS BROKEN! Still, though, the "cheerleaders" say that the answer is to capture only in AVI. To which I still respond "Here's my PINNACLE MovieBox USB. Show me how to capture in anything but MPEG?" Of course, there is no response. *sigh*.

But, you know me. I'm still in there...still trying to help the users, and still slowly making my way through my pile of VHS, 8mm and Hi8 tapes. By this time next year I'll be done with what I set out to do. We'll then see what the future brings.Enough...

[Keevin Doster]

This is the same reply I posted at Pinnacle Systems 9.3.5.10 authoring etc

(Note: I have not tried Dan's thing with DVD Styler to DVD folders not ISO, and then DVD Shrink - burning in one swoop. I found DVD Styler primitive with a learning curve, but for this one use, it might be okay. I'll be checking it out later. But since I have a system that works now, see below, I'm no longer in a rush to find a fix.)

I've been proving the process I've set up. It takes me 5 separate software programs to get the job done, but I get consistently clean burns now, with actually less time, and with more control along the way.

Here are the steps I use (with the programs) - this is for oversize files that won't fit on a DVD disk without compression.

1. I capture in Pinnacle Systems Studio 9.3.5.10 (because I use their capture card, Pinnacle AV/DV), at DVD quality (best) in MPG (not AVI).

2. I go to *VideoReDo* (shareware, $50) to clean up the OOS and dropped frames. (Then deleting the original MPG file, and doing a defrag here.)

3. Back to Studio 9 to edit the MPG with the menus, soundtracks, etc that I want. And I write to my hard drive at 8.5 format, 100%, and CBR to create a DVD folder.

4. I then go to *DVD Shrink* (freeware) to compress the DVD folder. (And then delete the original DVD folder Studio 9 created.)

5. Then I use *ImgTools Classic* (freeware) to convert the DVD folder into ISO files (have to remember to delete these later).

6. And ImgTools Classic automatically opens *DVD Decrypter* (freeware) and will burn the ISO files to disk (if the disk is empty, etc).

And I get my DVD disk.

****
All these programs are found at VideoHelp - if you can't locate it, search on its name.

As I said, the whole process takes just around 2 hours, with consistent results, where Studio 9 would take around 2 1/2 hours in "draft" mode (up to 5 hours - for a 100 minute movie - in standard or regular mode) - and around half the time have OOS problems.

I also bought Philips DVD-R 50-packs where 20 out of 50 resulted in bad disks, so I would have to do multiple processing / burns. With Studio 9, that usually meant going back through the whole thing again (another 2 1/2 hours each time), but with my new system, I can catch the problem somewhere along the way.

I am now a happy camper. I don't care that Movie Factory 3 or Studio 9 can't do the job, that their tech support strung me along for 2 months like my problem was unique and that the problem was on my end, not with their product.

Hope this helps you.

Keevin

[Anonymous]

i tried pinnacle 9 stuido full ver, could not find a place to load files from hdd , so i use, aslo have vegas video , and prefer to use
video redo--- on 2 or 3 hour movies on 3 hour movies i ues dvd styler and then dvd shrink with nero express 2 to burn,
on 2 hour movies i use video redo / with quick fix and then cut commercials out , i can got stright to nero vision 2 and burn , i have done about 10 dvd this way it's quick about 30 min total.
i record t.v. shows with a dvd recorder ilo dvdr04, from walmart paid 150
have had no issues what so ever
my hats off to dan and crew great job on the software, and been more that prompt in getting back with answers in email. thanks a lot