80 mins on One DVD?

[Tyson Yoder]

Alot of my wedding and reception I can fit on one DVD using Sony Vegas and just burning it straight to a DVD (45 mins to 60 mins) but occasionally I have 120 mins plus and the file is to big for my 4.7 gig DVD. I was wondering how you guys do it with out losing any quality.

[Don Bloom]

If you're talking about SD, MPEG DVDs then you simply need to change the bitrate when rendering to MPG in Vegas OR you can render to AVI then bring it into DVDA and let it render to the proper rate. Myself and many other prefer to render in Vegas as we have more control over the render. Also keep in mind the AC3 audio that DVDA prefers. This can and will affect the bitrate. Edward has a newsletter on his site that is all about bitrates, changing them and what they should be for various amounts of footage. You might want to slip over to jet.dv and look it up. The bitrate chart I live with is in Vol. 1 No. 7

The newsletter is dated from June 2003 and talks about Vegas4/DVDA but is still relavent today for SD footage.

[Tyson Yoder]

Thanks, I will have to check that out. I input HD minidv and burn to DVD. I don't know if that makes a difference or not.

[Don Bloom]

It's all SD in that format. I've had as much as 2:45 on a DVD. Is the quality as good as 120 minutes or 90 inutes or 60 minutes. No but frankly it's not all that bad. Of course a seminar with pretty much static speakers is different than a wedding reception where you have a lot of movement, at least hopefully you do what with people dancing and all ;-).

You should have no problem doing what you want to do, I do it all the time.

[Adam Stanislav]

Have you considered double-layer DVD? That’s what most commercial movies use.

[Tyson Yoder]

Can you get Inkjet printable DVD-R DL disc? I can't seem to find any. What do you use?

[Don Bloom]

Frankly there is no reason to use DL discs for an 80 minute, 90 minute or even 120 minute wedding. I do 120 minutes routinely and play them on my own 52 inch and even on my sons 65 inch and they look fine. I've also seen them on a 10X9 screen and other than a little breakup due to the screen itself the DVD looked fine to all 800 people in the room,
Also remember that DL discs cost you more and there is a chance that you can't burn it but it's your choice.

[Mike Kujbida]

Tyson, Verbatim makes an inkjet printable dual layer DVD but it's +R, not -R.

I agree with Don on single layer discs.
I've done up to 2.5 hr. on a single layer disc and it looked fine.
The key is having good clean footage to begin with.
After that, everything else falls into place.

[Adam Stanislav]

Originally Posted by Tyson Yoder

Can you get Inkjet printable DVD-R DL disc?

You can get DVD+R, for example Blank DVD-R Media - Falcon 8x Silver Pearl Inkjet Dual Layer DVD+Rs.

[Edward Troxel]

80 minutes is NOTHING for a single DVD - no need for dual layer or multiple disks or anything else. You may need to lower the bitrate very slightly from default but there's certainly no reason to fret over 80 minute on a standard DVD. As the others said, I've routinely put up to 120 minutes on a standard DVD and will continue to do so with no worries. I try to limit things to 120 minutes but have exceeded that a couple of times.and I certainly would not fret over putting up to 120 minutes on a single DVD.

[Adam Stanislav]

Originally Posted by Don Bloom

Frankly there is no reason to use DL discs for an 80 minute, 90 minute or even 120 minute wedding

I agree. I was just offering an alternative solution. I believe the more options you have, the better.

[Stan Harkleroad]

Dual layer never reached the price point and compatibility that single layer did. Not the mention the layer break issue.

I routinely put longer projects on a single layer disc and have never had any quality complaints. I shoot weddings, beauty pageants, and high school graduations mostly. One graduation I film every year I also put 30-40 minutes of highlights along with it which always equals a 2 1/2+ disc. In years past I filmed in SD, rendered to AVI, and encoded with TMPGEnc Plus which I've used for years. I use this bitrate calculator and render AC3 audio: DVD-HQ : Bitrate & GOP calculator

Now I film in HDV and render straight from the Vegas timeline, still using VBR when necessary. For 80 minutes you should be able to use CBR and have no issues.

[Tyson Yoder]

Thanks for the help guys! What would be a good bitrate to use?

[Mike Kujbida]

Tyson, use the calculator in the link Stan gave you to determine your bitrate.

[Taky Cheung]

a DVD can fit up to 4 hours of video max. It's all depends on the bit rate. I use Procoder which did an excellent job at low data rate. Even at 2500mbps, the encoded MPEG-2 video is still very usable. I can fit about 3 hours on a DVD. Sometimes I split the DVD into a "Dual DVD Set" which includes the main movie and an extra bonus DVD. Clients love that.

I also have done DVD-DL. Never have any client calling for problems. I tested several DVD-DL that can only be used as data but not movie. Verbatim DVD-DL works 100% for me. I still don't like it because it's not hub printing.