I was asked to convert some European (PAL) dvds to the American (NTSC) format. With the help of a few linux tools, the process is pretty painless. A cautionary note: the process takes about 3 hours for one dvd using my AMD X2 7750.
What you need:
- vobcopy or dvdrip
- projectx
- avidemux
- mplex (part of mjpegtools)
- wine
- dgpulldown.exe (windows app)
- dvdauthor
- dvdxchap (part of ogmtools)
First, we need to rip the DVD to the computer. We can do this by using dvdrip or vobcopy. Vobcoby is a simple command line utility that rips vob files straight from the dvd to the hard drive. dvdrip is a gui tool which is very easy to use. Load it up, create a new project, select the rip tab, and pick the title you want to rip. Ripping the dvd will probably take anywhere from 15-20 minutes.
Vobcopy Example: cd /home/pyther/dvdrip and vobcopy /dev/sr0
Next, we want demux (seperate) the audio and the video. ProjectX is very easy to use for this task and ProjectX insures the video and audio stay in sync.
To Demux the video:
- Start
projectx - File->Add
- Select all the vob files that were just created
- At the bottom where it says “recent output directories” select “output to same location as 1st file in collection”
- Then click the Quick Start button on the side
This result in the following files being created:
- *.m2v = mpeg 2 video file
- *.ac3 = AC3 Audio File
- *.sub = Subtitle Files
If there are multiple audio tracks you will see zorro-001.ac3, zorro-001[1].ac3, zorro-001[2].ac3
In my case:
- zorro-001.ac3 == Hungarian
- zorro-001[1].ac3 == English
- zorro-oo1[2].ac3 == Directors Comments
Lets clean up the directory right now:
- move *.vob files into a new folder called vob
- move *.sub into a new folder called subs
- Rename the audio files (ex. zorro-001.ac3 -> hu.ac3)
- Remove any audio tracks that you do not want in your remastered dvd (ex. Directors Comments) (more…)