Page 1 of 2

importing to timeline from DVD

Posted: Wed Feb 19, 2014 3:58 pm
by Peter Stedman
I have an elderly friend who has started some video editing and she has Pinnacle Studio 12plus on her machine. Over a period of time she discovers some old VHS tapes and I have put these onto DVDs for her. I did some this week – straight from to tapes to discs. Some I did in 2102 and these were put on a timeline of either Pinnacle 12+ or my older Premiere CS4. I did some very basic editing before exporting to DVD. Prior to that she had someone put tapes onto DVDs in 2010. I don’t know how these were recorded and she has about half a dozen of these DVDs.

Now she wants to properly edit these DVDs and Pinnacle has the facility to import from DVD. Here come the problem. The DVDs I have made recently import fine but the previously edited footage I did and placed onto DVDs in 2012 are recognised but cant be imported and the ones made in 2010 by A.N. Other are just not recognised by Pinnacle 12 at all. I went to a friends machine with Pinnacle 15 and the first two DVD types imported fine but the older ones are just not recognised at all.

Bringing each of the 3 DVDs to my place I find that my Premiere CS6 will import all with no problem. To our various minds we thought that a DVD is a DVD is a DVD. However, it appears not to be so. There is clearly something different about each of the three types of discs. I have so little knowledge of this sort of thing so seek your help here. Yes, I know I could do all the editing on my machine but that’s not the point. The lady wants to do it herself (I certainly don’t want to at all).

Any explanation and help would be appreciated.

Pete. :(

Re: importing to timeline from DVD

Posted: Wed Feb 19, 2014 4:26 pm
by Mike Shaw
A trick that I have used in the past to get round problems like this, where a DVD isn't recognised by the programme, is to

* Access the content of the DVD on the PC - 'view files' - then locate and copy the largest of the VOB files to a new folder on the hard drive.
* Access the copied file name in that folder's listing, and change/rename its extension from '.VOB' to '.MPG' You can do that by right clicking on the file name and choosing 'rename' - then just changing the last three letters after the full point. There will be a warning against doing this "..because the file may not be useable any more" - ignore it!
* In the video editor, choose the 'Import' action under the file menu, browse to that folder and file. Most of the time, it will then load in OK.

Re: importing to timeline from DVD

Posted: Wed Feb 19, 2014 4:37 pm
by Peter Stedman
Thanks Mike for that interesting and helpful (and quick) reply. I will visit the lady soonest and give it a try. Will report back in due course.
Thanks again. Peter

Re: importing to timeline from DVD

Posted: Wed Feb 19, 2014 9:09 pm
by Peter Stedman
Thanks again Mike. It has worked on my own machine. I seem to recall reading about this moons ago. Most likely you have posted this advice on previous occasions.

One odd thing is that there were 12 VOB files on the really difficult old DVD so I copied all 12. Then I discover that there appear to be three sets of identical four . . . Any explanation of this oddity. Not that it's going to make a lot of difference I suppose.

Cheers. Pete.

Re: importing to timeline from DVD

Posted: Wed Feb 19, 2014 9:45 pm
by Mike Shaw
Three versions of the same file ... It sounds like a quirk in the DVD authoring software to me !!

Changing VOB for MPG is a trick from way back that we discovered when beta testing very early versions of Pinnacle Studio. I thought they'd sorted out the problem, but obviously not!

Re: importing to timeline from DVD

Posted: Thu Feb 20, 2014 7:49 am
by Peter Stedman
Thanks again Mike. I will now see how the lady gets on with it all.
Cheers. Pete

Re: importing to timeline from DVD

Posted: Thu Feb 20, 2014 8:40 am
by col lamb
The straight copy and rename method that Mike has suggested works well.

That said there are limitations that need to be known.

If there is a long movie or a series of movies on the one DVD then the VOB's will probably be spanned. That is part of a movie will be on one VOB and the rest on another VOB.

To get around this download and install some free software called VOB2MPG, it will do the same copy and rename but it will also split the VOBs which have spanned movies and produce a single MPG movie out each of them.

Re: importing to timeline from DVD

Posted: Thu Feb 20, 2014 9:27 am
by Mike Shaw
That's interesting - I didn't know that someone had produced a software solution. Could be useful to have VOB2MPG available as a 'standby tool' ... because " there's always one " as they say!

Re: importing to timeline from DVD

Posted: Thu Feb 20, 2014 9:33 am
by Peter Stedman
Thanks Col,
Yes, the DVD to hand is one long session of VHS files copies. In other words, it a long movie and I can understand what you mean by 'spanned'. I will see how the lady gets on with what I have done and saved for her.

I appreciate your further advice and will keep it to hand should it be needed.
Cheers. Pete

Re: importing to timeline from DVD

Posted: Thu Feb 20, 2014 9:50 am
by tom hardwick
And to come back to your original question Pete, I too would side with Mike and say that that the 'difficult' DVDs had been authored using a different program. The resulting DVDs will play ok, but extracting the files for editing in Pinnacle will have confused it - yet the more modern CS6 can see through these difficulties.

Re: importing to timeline from DVD

Posted: Thu Feb 20, 2014 10:08 am
by Mike Shaw
Just downloaded VOB2MPG - it looks pretty impressive. The Pro version offers the ability to re-order scenes and chapters ... not sure why anyone would need that, but as it is 3x faster (they say) and only 12 quid, it might be worth having. Thanks for the pointer Col.

Re: importing to timeline from DVD

Posted: Mon Mar 03, 2014 12:19 pm
by Peter Stedman
Following on . . . . I've renamed the files as suggested on my computer at home. I'm now at the lady's computer (Vista) and trying another DVD to rename the files, but cannot see the file extension in Explorer. Very odd, can anyone let me know how I can bring up the file extension so that I can change it. The files we are looking at are VOB files and we need to change the extension to MPG.
Pete

Re: importing to timeline from DVD

Posted: Mon Mar 03, 2014 12:49 pm
by col lamb
Peter
In the Explorer menu there is a check box ....... Show file extensions.......that needs selecting

Re: importing to timeline from DVD

Posted: Tue Mar 04, 2014 10:31 am
by Peter Stedman
Thanks Col,
I have emailed your instructions to the lady and hopefully she will be able to resolve her problem. I do hope so.
Cheers. Pete

Re: importing to timeline from DVD

Posted: Wed Mar 05, 2014 7:44 am
by Peter B
col lamb wrote:Peter
In the Explorer menu there is a check box ....... Show file extensions.......that needs selecting
I think that in Vista the option is in Explorer under Tools / Folder Options / View tab and you need to un-check the box marked 'Hide extensions for known file types'