AVI to DVD

[ptesone]

here's 6 basic steps to convert a .AVI to DVD so you can watch your movies on your home player, not just your computer. . .But first we need to figure out if it's a fullscreen movie or letterbox movie. . .Movies normally come in two sizes: 4:3 (fullscreen) or 16:9 (letterbox) which they call aspect ratio. . .They also come in two formats PAL (Non-US) and NTSC (US). . .The following examples are for NTSC Only!

what you need first:
transcode
mplayer
Mjpegtools
ffmpeg
dvd+rw-tools
Dvdauthor
some hardrive space

in this example I will be using a 16:9 movie.avi for our conversion. . .

1.) Split the .avi file into 2 seperate files, one for video and one for audio:

transcode -i movie.avi -y ffmpeg --export_prof dvd-ntsc --export_asr 3 -o movie -D0 -s2 -m movie.ac3 -J modfps=clonetype=3 --export_fps 29.97

this will make:
movie.m2v (video)
movie.ac3 (audio)

note: if you're doing a fullscreen (4:3) movie then simply change --export_asr 3 to --export_asr 2

2.) (optional) Extract 5.1 Audio:

tcextract -d2 -i movie.avi -a0 -x ac3 | tcextract -d2 -x ac3 -t raw > movie.ac3

This is an extra step if you know your .avi file actually has 5.1 surround sound. (Step one only produces a stereo .ac3 file !)
How can you tell? Do this first:

mplayer -vo dummy -identify movie.avi 2> /dev/null | grep "5.1 ("

if you get this output then you have 5.1:

AC3: 5.1 (3f+2r+lfe) 48000 Hz 384.0 kbit/s

if you don't, just ignore this step!

3.) Put the video & audio file back together:

mplex -f 8 -o dvd_movie.mpg movie.m2v movie.ac3

this will make dvd_movie.mpg ready for DVD authoring. . .

4.) open your favorite text editor and paste the following:

<dvdauthor dest="DVD">
  <vmgm />
   <titleset>
     <titles>
       <pgc>
         <vob file="dvd_movie.mpg" chapters="0,15&#58;00,30&#58;00,45&#58;00,1&#58;00&#58;00"/>
       </pgc>
      </titles>
   </titleset>
 </dvdauthor>

save the file as: dvdauthor.xml
in the same directory as your movie files
(you can also change the chapters to fit the times of your movie)

5.) Create a DVD directory where your movie files are and do this:

dvdauthor -x dvdauthor.xml

this will create two AUDIO_TS and VIDEO_TS directories in your DVD directory. . .

6.) Test it & Burn it:

to test it:

xine dvd:/full/path/to/DVD/VIDEO_TS/

to burn it:

growisofs -Z /dev/dvd -dvd-video DVD/

note: I like to use DVD-RW discs for a test before I use a real disc. . .
If all goes well, the above will produce movie with no menus, just the movie that should play when you put in your disc. . .and if there's more than one .avi then simply do this in your dvdauthor.xml file:

<dvdauthor dest="DVD">
  <vmgm />
   <titleset>
     <titles>
       <pgc>
         <vob file="dvd_movie_part1.mpg" chapters="0,15&#58;00,30&#58;00,45&#58;00,1&#58;00&#58;00"/>
         <vob file="dvd_movie_part2.mpg" chapters="0,15&#58;00,30&#58;00,45&#58;00,1&#58;00&#58;00"/>
       </pgc>
     </titles>
   </titleset>
 </dvdauthor>

GOOD LUCK!

[oldcpu]

Thanks for taking the time to put this together.

I threw the following list together, which I think goes along great with your tutorial. One can pick and choose if one wishes to stay in the command line, or move to various GUI's, dependant on one's difficulty or progress.
http://www.linuxforums.org/forum/topic-49108-12.html

[ptesone]

here's how you add subtitles to your video stream:

1.) download the correct subtitle from http://eXTratitles.to

2.) use a program from dvdauthor called Spumux to add the subtitle text into the DVD video. Just make sure you have a .spumux dir in your home dir and put your fav .tff font in it. I used Vera.tff but any True Type font will do. Open your fav text editor and paste this:

<subpictures> <stream> <textsub filename="movie.srt" characterset="ISO8859-1" fontsize="18.0" font="Vera.ttf" horizontal-alignment="center" vertical-alignment="bottom" left-margin="60" right-margin="60" top-margin="20" bottom-margin="30" subtitle-fps="29.97" movie-fps="29.97" movie-width="720" movie-height="478"/> </stream> </subpictures>

save as 'subtitle.xml'

3.) Merge the subtitles into the DVD video:

spumux -s0 subtitle.xml < dvd_movie.mpg > dvd_movie.mpg.temp mv dvd_movie.mpg.temp dvd_movie.mpg

when complete you should now have subtitles in your dvd_movie.mpg

I goto http://cdcovers.cc for all my printing and menu needs. . .

[oldcpu]

here's 6 basic steps to convert a .AVI to DVD so you can watch your movies on your home player, not just your computer.

Both the posts of yours were great. It helps give a real insight as to what goes on "behind" the scenes in various scripts/software, and also provides a useful tool for those of us who on occasion like to have the option to roll up our sleeves and dive into the bash shell.

On the subject of AVI to DVD, here is a link to a script called "tovid" that will take .avi files and convert them to VCD, SVCD, or DVD. I haven't tried it out yet myself. I'm currently in the process of installing it.
http://tovid.sourceforge.net/
http://sourceforge.net/projects/tovid

[oldcpu]

here's how you add subtitles to your video stream:

1.) download the correct subtitle from http://eXTratitles.to

Further to this excellent post, and excellent web site, if the downloaded subtitle is not perfect, one can also edit the subtitles with "Jubler".

Jubler is a java based tool to edit text-based subtitles. It can be used an an authoring software for new subtitles or as a tool to convert, transform, correct and refine existing subtitles.
http://www.panayotis.com/jubler/
To run Jubler-2.0.0 requires v.1.5.0 or greater of the Sun Java Runtime Environment. (It also requires mplayer and aspell).

[tramni1980]

I have a .sub file, not a .srt file with the subtitles to the film. I wonder whether referring to that file will work? Or I will probably have to seach the net for a .srt file? Or probably try to convert the .sub to .srt?

Please shed some light on that problem