encoding video for dvd burning

[Larry Grover]

Michael Beattie wrote:
> I am trying to encode the video that comes off my digital camera so
> that I can burn it to a DVD with varsha.  I have tried using mencoder
> and transcode and neither of them makes valid mpeg files.  Transcode
> can change the codec to xvid, lavc, mp3lame or whatever, no problem,
> but it leaves it in an AVI container which I guess varsha doesnt like.
>  mencoder seems to make a valid mpeg container but the stuff inside it
> is corrupt.
> 
> I have tried many different options, but this is what I seem to get
> the best results with even though it still doesnt work.

Standard DVDs use mpeg2 video format, not divx/xvid.  This may be your 
problem.

> transcode -i "/home/mike/MVI0023.avi" -x mplayer -y divx5 -V -N 0x55
> -b 64 -o "/home/mike/first.mpg"

I have used transcode a few times, but not as often as mencdoer, so 
I'm less familiar with it.  I don't have transcode installed, 
currently, so I can't test it, but you should be able to get enough 
help to get started from these web pages (page wrapping will probably 
mangle the URLs):
http://www.transcoding.org/cgi-bin/transcode?Tutorials/Authoring_PC_Media_To_DVD
http://www.transcoding.org/cgi-bin/wiki?AviToVob

> mencoder MVI0023.avi -oac mp3lame -ovc xvid -of mpeg -o first.mpg

For mencoder, something like this should work:

mencoder MOVIE.avi -oac lavc -ovc lavc -lavcopts \ 
vcodec=mpeg2video:acodec=mp2 -of mpeg -o MOVIE.mpg

This assumes you don't need to do anything fancy, like change aspect 
ratio, frame rate, etc

Good luck!

Regards,
Larry