*Editing 8mm cine film compilation*

stragglebod

Some of the 'advice' on this thread is frankly ridiculous.

Someone even suggests pointlessly re-encoding a video (which remember, is already compressed into mpeg) in some mysterious 'lossless' format. Perhaps they mean jpeg 2000, which would mean taking going from about 1GB/hour source to about 30GB/hour with no improvement in quality.

YOU DO NOT NEED TO RE-ENCODE.

There are tools which will merge VOBs without re-encoding. There are tools which will cut edit VOBs without re-encoding. There are tools which will strip out the VOB-ness of VOBs into mpegs without re-encoding. There are tools which will do all three steps without re-encoding.

Personally I use Womble MPEG Video Wizard DVD for this stuff, because I got it for a good discount years ago, but there were free tools which do what you need then and I'm certain there still are.

Not sure what the current recommendation for free options is these days, have a look at the lists on the Videohelp forums. Vobmerge, Mpeg Streamclip and AviDemux used to be good ones.

hybernia

I just wanted to thank everyone who has spared the time here to offer help and advice. I also wanted to provide an update for anyone who might be interested, because over the years on MSE I've often wondered about the outcome or progress of a poster's query but never been told about it. Frustrating!

The situation with my cine situation is that I've taken the advice to use Handbrake and yes, I've converted the VTS folder's contents into a single MP4 file.

The VTS folder's content amounted to 4.12GB.

The MP4 file size amounted to 1.24GB.

The file plays fine on my iPad, so it's been good to review it, sitting in an armchair rather than at the computer screen. But the Super 8 cine source material was not of the best though, so generally appears a bit dark. I note the size difference between the original and the conversion, and am assuming some quality loss may well have occurred.

Next: stragglebod's helpful insights into matters VOB (the word seemed daunting when I started in on this, but now I've read up on the topic, I understand a lot more) led me to the nice freeware Vobmerge. Sadly, although it merged the vobs OK, playback in both VLC and MPC-HC failed. The merged VOB stuck after 12 minutes run time and was blank thereafter.

As I'm using Windows 7, I wondered if there might be an incompatability issue with Vobmerge so looked for a more recently developed app. I found something called: JoinVob Files Tools. It seems not to have been progressed since the days of Vista but it ran perfectly on my Windows 7 computer. More to the point:

JoinVob File Tools flawlessly merged the seven vobs together from the VTS folder. And unlike Vobmerge, I didn't have to pick out the vob files; the app identified the ones it wanted as soon as I browsed to the folder.

So now I have a single 4.12GB VOB file. Progress!

The only video editing program I own (but have never yet used) is VSDC Pro. (I paid a nominal sum to upgrade from VSDC Free.) So. . . would VSDC actually open that VOB file? Answer: yes. It did. No problems at all.

Today, then, I'm wading through YouTube video tutorials to get to grips with the basics of VSDC editing. (If there's a less complicated editor for a numpty like me, information would be appreciated . . . )

The biggest challenge I now face, or so it seems to me, is how to strip the audio track from the VOB.

The commercial firm who did the original conversion of the cine files into a single DVD kindly provided what they must've thought was some nice Muzak as a soundtrack. Unfortunately, it's pretty awful, and I know when I start cutting and joining I'm going to have audio that's all over the place. I'd rather have my own choice of music as a replacement.

Anyway. That's my update. Hope I haven't bored anyone with this! Thanks again to all who have helped.

that

When it comes to audio, have you seen this?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8CCYDnJSpr8
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1PiN9Zgt_Kg


also using google suggest than handbreak can also delete audio as mentioned here https://forum.videohelp.com/threads/352643-Handbrake-audio-questions

hybernia

that wrote: »

When it comes to audio, have you seen this?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8CCYDnJSpr8
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1PiN9Zgt_Kg

also using google suggest than handbreak can also delete audio as mentioned here https://forum.videohelp.com/threads/352643-Handbrake-audio-questions

Sincere thanks for the heads-up. I've now downloaded both the YouTube videos you kindly linked to and put them on my tablet. The link to the Handbrake forum is also very useful with its tip about deleting any audio from the audio set up section so that Handbrake won't process it.

Thank you again!:):)

rhysadams

Handbrake is absolutely brilliant for encoding videos into different formats. But also try VLC as that can play most video files.