LSVA.com

[robneale]

For all you guys who get last minute video, here's a great way to convert it to MPEG quickly and reliable.

Get yourself a VCD recorder. Most people don't know this but a VCD recorder encapsulates video into an MPEG format. In one of the folders on the VCD (Usually the MPEGAV folder) you will find a big ole file with a .DAT or other extention. THAT is your MPEG. Right click one and open with windows media player and you'll see.

Copy that rascle over to a hard drive, rename it "anything".MPG and you've got yourself an MPEG-1 video that will open in any trial support or sync program. If you're using TD you can even port out clips for your attorneys to email or put on disk (as long as it's MPEG-1)

The VCD recorder will set you back about $200 but it's a quick fix, it's 1:1 encoding time and it won't go down on you in the middle of the night (I didn't just say that...) like a Windows software app will.

Be sure to limit your recording time to 1hr of video per CD, otherwise you will not be able to get the segment back on a CD (VCD can write over 750mb per disk). Figure about 8-12MB per minute for recording time.

Hope this helps

Rob

[Robbh]

I think that everyone in the game will agree that an Optibase or a Digital Rapids board is the only way to go here on this one.

Robb

[robneale]

Try it... you'll like it... (better)

I think that everyone in the game will agree that an Optibase or a Digital Rapids board is the only way to go here on this one.

Robb

[TrialConsulting]

For all you guys who get last minute video, here's a great way to convert it to MPEG quickly and reliable.

Get yourself a VCD recorder. Most people don't know this but a VCD recorder encapsulates video into an MPEG format. In one of the folders on the VCD (Usually the MPEGAV folder) you will find a big ole file with a .DAT or other extention. THAT is your MPEG. Right click one and open with windows media player and you'll see.

Copy that rascle over to a hard drive, rename it "anything".MPG and you've got yourself an MPEG-1 video that will open in any trial support or sync program. If you're using TD you can even port out clips for your attorneys to email or put on disk (as long as it's MPEG-1)

The VCD recorder will set you back about $200 but it's a quick fix, it's 1:1 encoding time and it won't go down on you in the middle of the night (I didn't just say that...) like a Windows software app will.

Be sure to limit your recording time to 1hr of video per CD, otherwise you will not be able to get the segment back on a CD (VCD can write over 750mb per disk). Figure about 8-12MB per minute for recording time.

Hope this helps

Rob

Rob,

You would be using the VCD Recorder as a stand-alone device with VHS tapes as your source in this example, if I understand you correctly?

Then you would play the vhs tape and record it to the VCD?

So this would not work for DVD-->Mpeg, correct, as the VCD would be taking up that slot? Or would you be able to hook up a separate DVD player? Or are we at this point no longer looking at a "quick-fix"?

Tom

[robneale]

"Rob,

You would be using the VCD Recorder as a stand-alone device with VHS tapes as your source in this example, if I understand you correctly?

Then you would play the vhs tape and record it to the VCD?

So this would not work for DVD-->Mpeg, correct, as the VCD would be taking up that slot? Or would you be able to hook up a separate DVD player? Or are we at this point no longer looking at a "quick-fix"?"

Tom,

We're not talking about a card in a computer. We're talking about a stand alone device similar to a VCR. One purpose of this is to free up computer resources by using a secondary device - one that is not dependant on software. Another is to eliminate software crashes and long rendering times.

With the VCD recorder, you plug in "any" device and walk away for an hour. It does the encoding (one to one) directly to a CD. You simply copy the file to a hard drive and change the file extension to .MPG and you've got your MPEG-1. Take a look at these links, maybe it will describe it better.

http://www.ccu.cc/vdr
http://www.ccu.cc/vcd

Rob

[houstonlegal]

If you limit the recording to an hour (a CD) -- then you would need an editing tool to merge 2 MPEGs together, if you have to and burn to DVD. Does the VCD recording also records to DVD?

[robneale]

If you limit the recording to an hour (a CD) -- then you would need an editing tool to merge 2 MPEGs together, if you have to and burn to DVD. Does the VCD recording also records to DVD?

DVD is not a useable format for trial presentation (at least not with any presentation or sync software). That's the whole purpose for converting video to MPEG-1. Trial presentation software doesn't care how long the video is, neither does the synch software. They only care about the video format, which must be MPEG-1. You can play MPEG-2 with trial software, but you can't synch it or make clips with it within the trial presentation software.

The video techs who shoot video (such as depos, IME's or "day in the life") have to change the tape at an hour anyway. If they don't they're not very good video techs. Squeezing more than one hour of video onto a one hour tape degrades the quality of the video.

VCD's can be played in DVD players just like a DVD. The advantage is you can strip the MPEG-1 file from the VCD should you need to. Further you don't need a DVD decoder to play it in a computer like you do with a DVD, you can play a VCD with Windows Media Player.

It's a much easier and faster way to get any video source into an MPEG-1 format. A VCD recorder records at 1:1. Software takes much longer to encode and render the MPEG, it ties up computer resources and there is the risk of a crash (which means you start over again).

It takes 5 minutes to set up a camera or other device to record onto the VCD. Just set it and walk away. Since the VCD records 1:1 your MPEG-1 file is done when the video stops. There's nothing else to do. You can immediately put the VCD into any DVD player (built after 2002) and it will play just like a DVD.

Then... should you ever need the video for trial, the MPEG-1 is already done. It's not necessary to chase down a vendor and pay big bucks to get them to convert it for you, and in a timely fashion. Just copy the file to the hard drive, change the .DAT extention name to .MPG and you're ready to go to trial.

[Newton]

If you limit the recording to an hour (a CD) -- then you would need an editing tool to merge 2 MPEGs together, if you have to and burn to DVD. Does the VCD recording also records to DVD?

Any decent Trial Software Presentation application will let you "group" multiple MPEG-1 clips of any length so this is a moot point.

You can play MPEG-2 with trial software, but you can't synch it or make clips with it within the trial presentation software.

Wrong. TrialSmart, one of the best looking presentation apps, (MAC OSX only of course), uses quicktime for playback, allowing MPEG-2 and H264 among others, to be synched.

The video techs who shoot video (such as depos, IME's or "day in the life") have to change the tape at an hour anyway. If they don't they're not very good video techs.

This comment is misleading. Changing tape at 1 hour intervals has nothing to do with being a "good" or "bad" videographer. This is dependant on the equipment being used. Are you saying mini's are better than DVC? Who told you that?

Software takes much longer to encode and render the MPEG, it ties up computer resources and there is the risk of a crash (which means you start over again).

MPEG-1 encoding is done in realtime on most professional rack systems just like the VCD system you describe. If computers are dedicated to the task of encoding the video how are their resources being "tied up" doing their job?

It takes 5 minutes to set up a camera or other device to record onto the VCD. Just set it and walk away. Since the VCD records 1:1 your MPEG-1 file is done when the video stops. There's nothing else to do. You can immediately put the VCD into any DVD player (built after 2002) and it will play just like a DVD.

Think about this one minute...

CD=700 mb of data.

You want to encode 1 hour of video.

What bitrate do you hope to achieve? 600-700 kbps? This video will be of slightly better quality than the typical YesVideo garbage, is this what we really want to play at trial?

MPEG-1 can be encoded many different ways. You do not need to settle for fuzzy pixelated low bitrate MPEG-1. If you learn "Video", like any good Video Tech, you can encode MPEG-1 at birates well over 3000 kbps and screen sizes above 352 X 240. Go check out MPEG-1 in Wikipedia if you want to become intimate with it's possibilities

[henrygrik]

Hi,
This discussion has helped me a lot for getting, for what I was eagerly waiting for.Thanks a lot for providing such a wonder full information.