Stumped - Video Bit Rate too High Error

This can be caused be several things, and we need a little more info to sort it out, but as a start:

export from FCP through to Compressor and create MPEG2 files and AC3 audio.
keep the bitrate of the video no higher than 7.4Mbps
keep the audio bitrate at 192kbps for stereo files

The error you're getting is not necessarily reporting only the video element, but includes the audio too. Often, using AIFF files (or PCM, WAV etc) raises it too high and you get the error. Use AC3.

ProRes files are OK from FCP, but you simply must go to encode them first. DO NOT rely on DVDSPs encoding engine if you want a good job done.

Check your preferences in DVDSP - you need to have everything encoded on your disc, and creating menus and adding other graphics means DVDSP has to encode these for you (which is why there is an encoder in there). If the rate peaks even 1 moment over the max (9.8Mbps for video) then you'll get the error. Set your DVDSP encoding settings around 3.5 - 7.4Mbps.

Try again!

Hey. I am having the same problem. I have set the bit rate to 3 and 6, and "still bit rate too high". I successfully burned this video to DVD with Toast, no problem. Seems the problem is my new 27" iMac , Snow Leopard 10.6, and DCVD Studio Pro V 4.2.2 Any additional ideas? I am stumped. For this project, Toast will be fine, but for more advanced work, I have to have Studio Pro capabilities. I would hate to have to output my materials to my old G4 and DSP V2.

So, I tried one more thing. I took the 8 second piece of music off of the menu, and created a new project, and it worked. Not sure what happened, but thanks for allowing me to process with you all.

Mike

Were you using AC3 format audio? did you encode all video to MPEG2 using Compressor?

If the answer to either of those is 'no' then your problems will still remain next time you create a disc.

This error is linked to the TOTAL bitrate for the disc, including video AND audio. Any audio that is not AC3 format will have a higher bitrate - AIFF for example will be just over 1.5Mbps, and this is added to the video bitrate. If you encode video up to 8.5Mbps in Compressor (i.e. you use VBR and set the range from 3 - 8.5Mbps), and then use PCM audio files (such as WAV, AIFF, or similar) you'll be maxing out the total available (10.08Mbps) especially when you then include all graphics and other parts of the disc.

The other cause is a bitrate spike caused by poor encoding. Often this will not be obvious and you'll have done everything according to the book, but your encoding software fails you. You reduce chances of this happening if you use Compressor v2 or 3... A spike is unfortunate, your only recourse is to re-encode.

Thanks. I was using aiff audio. But my video bit rate was set to 6. I am guessing it might have been operator error? Started new project, and it worked fine without the audio. Haven't tried to add the audio with re-encoding.

Mike Klausmeier wrote:
Thanks. I was using aiff audio. But my video bit rate was set to 6. I am guessing it might have been operator error? Started new project, and it worked fine without the audio. Haven't tried to add the audio with re-encoding.

No, it was the AIFF. Asingle spike in the bitrate that takes it beyond the DVD spec (which is like 20 years old) can stop the project dead.

bogiesan