Compress AVI from a camcorder

[MrE_H]

Hi Guys,

I have captured some video from my digital camcorder and it takes up loads of space as it is uncompressed avi. I was trying to compress the video using TMPEG and Main Concept MPEG Encoder but the quality seems to be not good and there are funny lines around people (I guess this is interlacing but I have tried a few settings with no luck).

Does anyone know of a way to compress this video into something that Vegas Video can read but still keep some quality (I know that MPEG is compressed but the video is jumpy).

Also would compressing it to MPEG-2, editing it in Vegas and then rendering it as a complete MPEG-2 movie be daft (What I mean is does the second MPEG encoding reduce the quality or will it know that it is already an MPEG file.

Cheers

Mr E

[ormonde]

"Does anyone know of a way to compress this video into something that Vegas Video can read but still keep some quality (I know that MPEG is compressed but the video is jumpy)."

I'm not familiar with Vegas Video, but in TMPGEnc Try this:

1. Load your AVI file (start with one of the wizard templates if you wish)

2. Go to the "Advanced Settings" dialog or "Other Settings" from the "Filter Setting" window of the Project Wizard (3rd dialog)

3. In the "Video Source Type" section, select "Non-interlace"(progressive)

4. In "Field Order", Experiment with "Top Field First" and "Bottom Field First" to see if that helps the jumpiness of the video.

[ormonde]

You could also try the "Deinterlace" filter in the bottom window where all the filters are located in the "Advanced Settings" dialog.

[rsquirell]

I have to assume you have a digital camcorder capturing through the firewire (since you didn't identify a capture card or device.) ULead Video Studio7 will capture your DV/AVI and convert it to MPEG2 on the fly, real-time during capture. It costs $90 and they give you a 30 day trial...

[MrE_H]

Thanks

Cheers Guys,

I have used TMpeg with the Deinterlace option and that worked really well.

I will have a quick look at Ulead studio and see how that compares to Vegas's capture.

Thanks for your help

Mr E

[ormonde]

"Thanks for your help"

Glad (We) could be of help

[timwerx]

"Smart Render"

I use Ulead Video Studio which has a "smart render" feature, which means it won't "re-render" portions of a video file that are already in the target format. I have been able to edit and re-edit the same MPEG-2 files (for DVD) without any (visible) loss.

So I guess it depends on the software. I'm not familiar with TMP, but it may have a similar option.