Movie too long - won't fit on DVD

[Splunge]

Hi gang,

I have a movie in WMM all edited and ready to burn to DVD. In WMM, it
says the movie is 1 hour and 53 minutes long.

I then use Roxio 7 and load the movie file into it. Then I try to burn
it to DVD. It attempts the DVD burning process and says "complete"
when it's done, but then I get an error saying the movie is too long.
There's nothing on the DVD either (maybe there is but I can't read it).

I've been back and forth--first I go back to WMM and edit the movie
even more to reduce the length. But I should be able to put a 1-hour
53 min movie onto a DVD, right?? I'm using DVD-R format.

I've also tried saving the movie from WMM in lower-quality NTSC
formats. That does reduce the size of the file, but the result in
Roxio is the same, it won't burn the DVD and says it's too long.

I don't understand where to go from here. I could edit the movie yet
again and split it into two movies and try to burn each separately to
DVD, but that's a huge inconvenience. Besides, commercial DVDs have
long movies on them, why can't I do the same? And I don't have any
"special features", fancy titles or anything. I have just one menu
item to play the movie, that's it.

Help!

Thanks, in advance!

 

[PapaJohn \(MVP\)]

it's the size of the MPEG-2 files that the DVD software makes from the input
movie file, not the file size of the saved movie from MM2.... and how much
fits on a disc depends on the DVD software.

I don't use Roxio 7, so don't know its limits, but that's where to check.
--
PapaJohn

Movie Maker 2 and Photo Story 3 website - http://www.papajohn.org
MM2 Tips and Tricks: http://www.simplydv.co.uk/simplyBB/viewtopic.php?t=4693
Online Newsletters: http://www.windowsmoviemakers.net/PapaJohn/Index.aspx

 

[KDE]

Your DVD authoring program will take whatever movie file you give it and
re-encode it to a DVD compliant Mpeg2 movie, so the format and quality of
the input file doesn't really make a difference as far as final movie size.
Some DVD authoring programs do not allow the user any options as to quality
and bitrate in this process. at the high end of quality a standard DVD+/-R
will only fit approx 60 minutes of video. If Roxio has anywhere to adjust
quality you can encode the dvd at a lower bitrate and fit more video on. I
know Nero allows for this and you can squeeze close to 3 hrs on a DVD (of
course quality suffers somewhat) There are also dual layer DVD's that will
hold twice the data of a regular DVD but compatibility with your burner and
many players may be a problem


| Hi gang,
|
| I have a movie in WMM all edited and ready to burn to DVD. In WMM, it
| says the movie is 1 hour and 53 minutes long.
|
| I then use Roxio 7 and load the movie file into it. Then I try to burn
| it to DVD. It attempts the DVD burning process and says "complete"
| when it's done, but then I get an error saying the movie is too long.
| There's nothing on the DVD either (maybe there is but I can't read it).
|
| I've been back and forth--first I go back to WMM and edit the movie
| even more to reduce the length. But I should be able to put a 1-hour
| 53 min movie onto a DVD, right?? I'm using DVD-R format.
|
| I've also tried saving the movie from WMM in lower-quality NTSC
| formats. That does reduce the size of the file, but the result in
| Roxio is the same, it won't burn the DVD and says it's too long.
|
| I don't understand where to go from here. I could edit the movie yet
| again and split it into two movies and try to burn each separately to
| DVD, but that's a huge inconvenience. Besides, commercial DVDs have
| long movies on them, why can't I do the same? And I don't have any
| "special features", fancy titles or anything. I have just one menu
| item to play the movie, that's it.
|
| Help!
|
| Thanks, in advance!
|

 

[Guest]

It is a well known bug in creator 7 burn an hard disk image in creator
classic first then it will function download the update70to71_2 size 119 Mb
http://www.roxio.com/en/support/emc/software_updatesv7.jhtml
you have to login first to get it

 

[Splunge]

Thanks for the responses. I will check into the movie size again
(MPEG-2). And I will try downloading the update to Roxio 7 and try to
burn an ISO image and then try burning that.

But just for laughs, can anyone tell me what you "typically" see for a
file size (NTSC best quality) for a 2-hour movie in Windows Movie
Maker? The files I get are quite big, some as big as 24GB (best
quality). And I know going from WAV or whatever WMM is saving as to
MPEG-2 isn't going to shrink that much, so no way it fits on a 4.7 GB
DVD. I understand that. The movie has a lot of sound/music in
it--it's a sports game I filmed and I have music playing throughout,
and the music probably is contributing quite a bit to the file size. I
might try to cut out the soundtrack and see what that does, too.

Thanks again.

 

[Guest]

Hi Splunge.....just a few comments I can make about your observations and to
add to the comments of the others. I just completed a lengthy wedding
video.....I ended up putting it on two dvd's .....each of 1 hr and 8 mins.
This is generally the highest quality (1 hr) that will fit on a dvd.....I use
Movie Factory and it has 4 levels of quality, which you can choose in the
preferences, such that you could fit up to 60, 90, 120, or 180 minutes on a
dvd. Of course, the 180 minutes (3 hrs) is 'long play' and of lower
quality. The 68 mins i got was the max....at the highest quality.

As regards to your question about NTSC high quality and sizes....here is my
experience. When I 'captured' the raw footage, I had over 3 hrs which I
edited down to the final movie. That original capture as DV-AVI ran 24
Gigabytes per hour average. When I saved the final edited movies (In
short clips of about 15 min each) I saved in both DV-AVI and then saved the
clip again as NTSC high quality.
The DV-AVI files remained at 24 gig per hr of video, and the NTSC high
quality was only at about 700 MEGABYTE per hour. You need to use the
DV-AVI ones for DVD burning at the best quality.....and I use the NTSC HQ for
viewing on my computer.
Later I delete the DV-AVI files, but save the original and projects to an
external drive.

It isn't the size (i.e. 24 gig per hour) that determines the conversion to
Mpeg from you Movie Maker video saved in DV-AVI then, it is the quality of it
based on the time of the video on the dvd. So, I am able to save 24 gig of
DV-AVI as a one hour <4.7g
video on dvd at the high quality it can be at that length. I could have
chosen a lower quality and put the whole two hours on one dvd, but I didnt
want to do that. Professional dvd's are Dual Layer and thats why full
length movies fit on one....thats why we now have the new Dual Layered
Burners and Dvd's available.

Just one suggestion to you.....I think you should lighten up on the length
of your project.....2 hours of it can become quite complex and time consuming
to make changes and re-rendering and such. Since I made smaller sections of
my video, I was able to make changes to those individual 'modules' and resave
much quicker.
And then you can put all of the clips in order within your third party
software for burning onto a dvd.....You must have a pretty good computer if
you could save a 2 hour video without pulling your hair out.... ha ha ha I
used a lot of effects and transitions and overlays.....and everything from
slow motion to black chroma showing confetti falling on the dancers so mine
was complex even in the shorter clips of about 15 mins. Anyway, good
luck on getting your project completed. If you have your project saved you
can always go back and delete first half/second half and save it in two parts
for an easier method of controlling those huge files.....and with 1 hr parts
you'll be able to burn it in the highest quality on two dvds possibly. Hope
I made sense, it is pretty late here ya know!!!! ha ha ha bye....

 

[Guest]

See, it is late. I just re-read what I wrote and it should have read 12
Gigabyte per hour for the DV-AVI for the video I captured. Good night!