using video clips from a DVD
 

Hello,

I have a project that I am doing for a sorority and they need to reuse some video clips from a previous DVD that they had made. They have given me the DVD but I cant for the life of me sort out how to get the video clips from the DVD, there are .BOP, .IFO, and .VOB files and it is all greek to me.

All I need to do is use the video, no need for audio or anything, and import it into FCP for use in this new project.

thanks

The VOB files are basically MPEG2 files that contain MPEG2 video
elements and audio elements in usually AC3 or PCM. Depending
on the length and the amount of extra's in the project the main
movie can be in any (or multiple) VOB file.

The first thing you can do is copy the VOB files to your harddisk
and change the extension to MPG or MPEG and see if FCP accepts
it in that way.

Otherwise you will need a program for the Mac that combine the
needed VOB files (if there is more than one for the main movie)
and then rip/extract/demux the file to get the elementary video
stream.

I am on the PC so I don't know what programs would be available
for the Mac to do this. Sorry.

An easier way (but usually with a loss of quality) might be to play
the DVD and simply record the s-video out of your DVD player
with a DV camera, DV deck or analog to DV converter.

thanks for the help rob. unfortunately renaming the .vob's did not work.
does anyone else on the board have a suggestion? what mac program might work in this situation?

Check out:
http://www.alfanet.it/squared5/mpegstreamclip.html

That should do what you want I believe.

Funny you should mention this need. There is a good article in the latest issue of DVMagazine on just this very subject.

nothing is working!

this should be so basic but im not getting it. plugging the RCA cables into my tv and hooking it up to my gl2 in VCR mode does nothing, anyone have any ideas?

There's a setting in the VCR menu to make it do output instead of input through those cables. That port on your GL2 is used both for brining video in through RCA plugs AND out to a TV or VCR... so you have to set the menu option correctly. I'm assuming this issue has nothing to do with what you posted originally....

Use this software - DVD Shrink. It's free and works great.

http://www.dvdshrink.org/what.html

Um... he has a Mac and doesn't want to copy the DVD, he wants to pull the video FROM the DVD in a format he can then use in his video editor. Good to know there is a free app out there for PCs to copy DVDs though.

i ended up just going to a video editing company and paying 20 bucks for a transfer. thanks for all the help though