I have been given a home movie with a vob extension and I want to edit it into segments, connect segments into chapters, give each chapter a title, make a menu etc. I have never done any editing of movies before. When looking on the web to see what software to get I realized that I don't have enough understanding of the process to make a decision. Also, most of the most common editors don't seem to handle vob files. I don't particularly want to convert the file because it will lose quality.

It would be possible for me to get the original movie straight from the camera but I am trying to avoid that.

I would really appreciate any advice at all.

A VOB is a video container encoded in the MPEG-2 format (standard DVD encoding format) and has in fact lost some quality from the original source (assuming that it was a DV or a tape camcorder). It is likely easier to edit the source material by capturing it from the camera again, not to mention that more software is available to do so. Note that availability also depends on your operating system. All software mentioned below runs on Windows.

However, if you wish to edit a VOB, there are several options, differing in price and ease of use (there being a strong correlation between the two). The standard consumer package is probably TMPGEnc, which is 70$. It is quite easy to use. There's a trial version that may be enough for your purposes. Another commercial package is VideoReDo (50$). Then there's also the Womble MPEG VCR (35$) which edits VOB, but I'm not sure about its DVD authoring features.

Then there's also the freeware VOBBlanker (http://jsoto.posunplugged.com/vobblanker.htm), which does the same thing. However, it's a bit harder to use and not as intuitive. Lastly, there's a freeware product called VOBEdit. I don't know how well it works on current Windows OSes (XP or Vista), but it worked well enough on Win 2000.

emi

Addendum: As for Mac, Final Cut Pro does just about anything, but a license is insanely expensive. iMovie 08 can import the VOB file (if it's on a DVD) as if it were on a camera, but there may be loss of quality issues.

I've had VideoReDo (mentioned above) for several years and recommend it highly (becasue it is easy to use, but comprehensive). One version only does the edit so you have to have something like Nero to construct, compile, and burn a DVD out of the edited video files. There is another version of VRD that includes a somewhat awkward, but quite useable, compile/burn facility.

Warning: the world of DVD creation isn't simple unless you use prefab templates etc. The good news is that the editing is a snap with VRD.

Thank you both!

Lots of good info already. Let me add a bit.

I use Adobe Production Suite CS2, which is primarily Premiere for Nonlinear video editing, Encore for DVD authoring, Photoshop for menu creation and i really love it. Although the price may be prohibitive ($1k educational if you're in uni). Adobe does, however, provide a free 30 day eval, so if you want to get a feel and play with it, you can go to adobe.com, register, and download the full version that expires in 30 days.

To edit VOBs in Premiere, you have to rename to .MPG or .MPEG, b/c Premier doesn't recognize .VOB extension, although it does actually recognize the contained format. *shrug* Also note that typically .VOBs are about 1GB in size and that Premiere has to Index it and conform it for use. If you import several at a time, the app can become totally unresponsive while it is processing to the point where it may appear that the app has locked up.

Editing the segments into component vids in Premiere and then authoring in the Encore is ideal. You then have great control over chapters, menus, action that occurs after particular actions (eg., when a vid segment ends, you can set to go to particular menu or to play another video segment).

CS2 (and now CS4) as a package allows you to use Photoshop to do photoediting and then using that image as a menu. You can also create the stylilzed buttons etc in Photoshop and assign the regions that are the buttons, the button order, etc.

I'm so spoiled that whenever i do even the most simple video clipping i turn to Premiere.

HTH
HAND

-goro-