[ExtractStream] Extracting to a non-SVCD format

[Edmond E. Shwayri]

I am doing that right now. This is what I did.

[1] Get the .ty stream from the Tivo. You obviously succeeded with 
that. Because I have a Sony Tivo I use StreamServer. Only one that I can 
get to work.
[2] Used splitstream to split into .m2a and .m2v. Save the offset values 
it spits out.
[3] Use WinAmp to convert the .m2a to a WAV file. Do NOT re-sample to 
44.1. Keep it at 32 or you will get audio distortion. Besides why 
up-sample its not like you can regain the lost quality.
[4] Play the WAV file. Does it sound right? It should if the stream was good.
[5] Use DVD2AVI to create the d2v file For DVD2AVI to work have the following :
TMPGEnc-2.02.31.119.zip
TMPGEnc-2.01.30.116-vfp.zip
DVD2AVI_176.zip
VFAPIConv-1.04-EN.zip
Be sure to install according to the instructions in each package.
My guess is that only the last 2 are absolutely necessary to create the 
AVI, but why not go ahead and install all. You may want to create an MPEG 
at a later date.
[6] Use VFAPIConv to create the "fake" AVI from the .d2v. It will create a 
small-ish AVI file that uses VFAPI as the codec. VFAPI has its index in 
the AVI file while the actual video is loaded from the .m2v file so be sure 
you don't delete it.
[7] I run VirtualDub, but NanDub should work. A matter of taste I 
think. Tell VirtualDub to open the .AVI file. Hits CTRL+Left Arrow and 
you should be able to see the first frame of the video.
[8] In VirtualDub click on the Audio option and chose .WAV. Show it to the 
.WAV file that you created above.
[9] Now the tricky part, you need to correct the audio skew so it matches 
the video. Chose the "Interleaving" option in the Audio menu and you will 
see the "skew" option which defaults to 0. Now in theory you should put 
one of the numbers that splitstream spat out when it divided the file. The 
2 numbers splitstream gave me were -56 and -123. Neither worked for 
me. After much trial and error I found -512 worked for me, but this may be 
different for each video and each TiVo, so you will need to experiment. As 
to how you do that, I basically forwarded to a section of the video where 
there was dialogue and close-ups of the face. I then marked the start of 
my selection with the Home key. Forwarded 20 seconds or so and then hit 
the End key to end my selection. I then set my Video->Compression and 
Audio->Compression correctly and en-coded (saved as AVI) those 20 
seconds. Any codec that you KNOW will do. I used DivX3 and MP3. Played 
it back in media-player and then re-adjusted the skew till it sounded good.
[10] Ok, once you figure out the skew its time to setup the filters to 
alter the video. You need to do several things :
A: You will need to use the Fill filter to block out the green bar at the 
left hand side.
B: Use a fill filter to get rid of the white stuff at the top of the picture.
C: On mine I found the right hand side was unstable for a few columns 
(color wouldn't match the rest of the picture), so I used a fill on that too.
D: De-Interlace the video.
E: With TiVo streams you will have to re-size or you will get a very 
squished image. My recording was at high quality (480x480) and I re-sized 
to (704x480). At this point I invite comment as to what size I should have 
used to maintain the 4:3 aspect. I just went with looks and I liked the 704.
At this point I opted to save off an intermediate file which was a real AVI 
since I didn't feel comfortable (and it was horribly slow) splicing the 
fake AVI. To do this I used the HuffYuv lossless codec and kept the audio 
un-compressed. I ended up with a 37 Gig file, but it was a real AVI and I 
had no loss of quality. With this new file I cropped out 16 columns that 
were black and then shifted the picture around to make it look centered. I 
then told VirtualDub to encode it to DivX4.12. I could have probably done 
it in one step, but I just didn't.

If you want my processing settings file for VirtualDub which will include 
the filters correctly set I will be happy to EMail them to you (they are 
small files).

Comments PLEASE... This is the first one I have done and will be happy to 
improve my procedure.

Oh and yes you do want a fast computer. Dual is nice, but a lot of this is 
serial in nature (the filters) and will benefit from a faster single processor.

At 05:17 PM 2/18/02, you wrote:
>Has anyone had any success in extracting to anything other than SVCD?
>I'm trying without success to get to a DIVX .avi file.
>
>I've been trying with TivoApp 2.0. Extracting as a single mpeg2 file
>gives me a file that I'm told has the audio out of sync. I haven't
>been able to verify that myself, because I can't seem to find a codec
>for the video. I've taken this file through DVD2AVI, then through
>GordianKnot and Nandub for the video. I can't seem to have much luck
>with audio. I'm trying to convert it to MP3, but WinAmp seems to
>start the conversion all over again once it completes it, and FreeAmp
>did OK, but there seem to be nasty spikes in the finished sound.
>
>Extracting as a separate video and audio stream gave me a video
>stream, but a 0 byte audio stream.
>
>Extracting a tyStream, and using TyConvert pretty much lead me to a
>similar situation as with extracting to a single mpeg2 file.
>
>Has anyone gotten an .avi file and how?
>
>(and yes, I know, I'm in the minority trying to get a DIVX
>file...it's actually more convenient for me... )
>
>
>
>
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