Compressed Audio

[JohnKleban]

Hi All,

It's been a long time since I've come into a situation that will almost require me to compress the audio on a DVD; doing so avoids me having to split a ceremony in two. I have a long Latin mass that my client wants in full. I always burn at a setting of HIGH and Uncompress Audio; but, this time around, to fit the material on one disc, I need to compress the audio (I really wish to keep the video setting at High vs. Normal). Any technical specs or anyone know just how much this audio is compressed? I haven't in the past the couple of times I've done this, but has anyone ever had a client have a playback issue with audio that was compressed on their DVD?

Thanks much.

John

[BobC]

Hi John,

The only issue I've ever had with compressed audio is sometimes a client's dvd initially seems to have no audio at all. In reality it is there, just requires them to change a menu setting on their dvd player.

[flvideo]

John I use compressed audio almost all the time. Most of my programs are close to 2 hours or just az little over. I have never had a complaint about it. I have had a couple clients tell me they have no audio on their dvd but I have always sent them another that has never failed to work and they were burned from the same master. Hope that helps.. Bob...

[JohnKleban]

Thanks for the replies thus far guys.

Perhaps this question, would one recommend sticking to Normal for the DVD setting and then uncompressed audio, or would you do DVD setting on High, and compress the audio?

In the past, I recall seeing a pretty noticable change in picture quality going from Normal to High, with almost no difference between High and Max. Thus, all the years, I've stuck with High for my DVDs, with uncompressed audio; but that only gets me about 78-80 minutes or so a disc. This time, I need about 90-95 minutes, at least for disc one.

[JPaul]

Well, John, I would say the best way to make your decision is to do both! Get a couple of dvd-rw disks and do a short sample using some shots from the video in question. Be sure to include a range of shots - some darker, some brighter - but use exactly the same storyboard for both editions.

I would make a 5-minute version with high video/uncompressed audio. Then I would remove that and add the film again using normal video/compressed audio. You can play each to find out how they differ. If you can get 2 players hooked up on different video inputs you could pause both at the same spot and check out the video back and forth.

I've burned videos using all 4 combinations and on my 50" set I really have difficulty picking out any differences.

[TimKennelly]

John,

With compressed audio you run the chance of getting a client that says the DVD has no audio.

This is a simple setting issue on their DVD player, but I hate the thought that I put a ton of work into a finished product and their first experience with it is without audio as audio is an important part of the video.

That said, I prefer the video quality at high and the audio compressed over the video quality at normal and the audio uncompressed.

If my client has ordered a package that I expect to go over the high/uncompressed time limit I like to send them a short sample DVD demo with compressed audio and ask them to play it in their system and let me know if they get audio with it.

If they say know I talk them through how to fix that.

It's a one time deal to do with a DVD player (simple internal memu audio control change from LPCM or PCM only to All) and then I know that their wedding video will play back with audio when they get it.

[JohnKleban]

Just an update for the curious (and thanks Tim as well for your input on this)....

Just finished adding disc 1 project at High and Uncompressed Audio; initial estimate before adding the project listed out at 115%; once project was added, came in at 93%. That's great, minor downside, is I ended disc one after the ceremony (which actually is fine), but I will have to start disc 2 with about 3 minutes of outdoor receiving line stuff (which I left off thinking I would be lucky at all to get this project in at the high 90s%), so, no biggie I guess, but I am surprised it all fit this time around. Total run time on disc 1 is seconds shy of 83 minutes. It's been common for me to have that orig. estimate come down some, but I just didn't think it would all fit this time around; cool. Now, disc 2 might be similiar in length, although it has more transitions built into the storyboard, etc.

John

[JPaul]

John, you could delete the project from Arabesk, then reinsert with the last 3 minutes - should be enough space based on your actual situation.