This tutorial is intended for the serious hobbyist who already have a collection of home videos on DVD. The tutorial shows how to get home DVD's onto your iPod in professional quality (Note 1) by:
- using H.264 and AAC, and
- avoiding intermidate transcoding steps

Software required (Note 2):
- DVD Decrypter (free)
- BeLight with VOB plugin (free)
- QuickTime Pro 7.0.3 ($30) with MPEG-2 plugin ($20)

Overview:
1 - DVD -> .vob Using DVD Decrypter (minutes)
2 - .vob -> .wav Using BeLight (minutes)
3 - .vob + .wav -> .m4v Using QuickTime (hours)


Step 1:
Insert DVD and launch DVD Decrypter

First time only:
Mode - IFO
Tools - Settings - IFO Mode - On Startup Enable Stream Processing + Options File Splitting None

DVD Decrypter will scan the DVD and automatically select the longest title in the Input tab.

Often there is more information on a DVD than you want on your iPod and DVD Decrypter allows you to select the video and audio streams you want to transfer. Furthermore it combines the information into one big .vob file, allowing QuickTime and BeLight to process this information directly.

Click on the Stream Processing tab and deselect the streams you don't want. (Note 3)

Set the destination to an empty folder you will be using for preparing the iPod movie.

Click DVD -> harddisk icon and wait for DVD Decrypter to complete

Exit DVD Decrypter


Step 2:
Launch BeLight

Select the .vob file as input

Click on the WAV/PCM tab and select 16 Bits Stereo Wave.

In case the audio stream is multi channel surround sound BeLight will down mix it to 2 channels.

Click Start and wait for BeLight to finish

Exit BeLight


Step 3:
Launch QuickTime

Open the .vob file (Note 4)

Open .wav file
Edit - Select All
Edit - Copy

Back in the window with the video
Ensure play position is at the beginning of the video
Edit - Add to movie

File - Export - Movie to MPEG-4 (Note 5)
Use most recent settings, except for the first time (Note 6)

Set extension of the file name to .m4v

Click OK to start export

This will take some time, typical 25 minutes for each 10 minutes on a 3 GHz Pentium IV machine.


Finalising:
Use QuickTime to boilerplate the movie.
Window - Show Movie Properties to add info like Title, Director and Producer
View - Set Poster to set frame as poster for movie (This will show up on the icon in iTunes)
You can even choose to add a still picture to the end of the movie and use that as poster.
Add the file to iTunes and it will show up under videos.

If you are happy with this tutorial, please acknowledge by voting + on this post to give it a positive rating.


Note 1:
Being on a Windows platform I have tried Videora iPod converter, PQ DVD Converter and the tutorial based on DVDx and Xilisoft, but they all have one or more severe shortcomings, such as audio being out of sync, wrong proportions, mediocre picture quality.


Note 2:
DVD Decrypter can be obtained from a number of locations on the internet. Google for DVD Decrypter to obtain a suitable location for download. In this tutorial the version of the software used was v3.5.4.0.

BeSweet can also be obtained from a number of locations on the internet. Google for BeSweet to obtain a suitable location for download. In this tutorial the following software was downloaded from http://dspguru.doom9.net/
- BeSweet v1.4
- BeLight
- VOBInput.dll v1.3 plugin

QuickTime 7.0.3 can be obtained from http://www.apple.com/quicktime/win.html
The MPEG-2 playback plugin is available here http://www.apple.com/quicktime/mpeg2/


Note 3:
If you are new to DVD's here's a short description of what you may find on a DVD.
When using Windows Explorer to examine the files on a DVD you will typically at least the folders:
AUDIO_TS
VIDEO_TS

AUDIO_TS is normally empty but VIDEO_TS holds a number of files, all with extensions like:
.IFO - Information file
.BUP - Backup of information file
.VOB - Video Object

A VOB contains streams of video, audio and subtitles. It may even optionally hold
- multiple video streams - known as angles,
- multiple audio tracks - different languages or formats (DTS/Dolby Digital/MPEG/PCM), and
- multiple subtitles - in different languages.

There can be several titles on a DVD, named VTS_01, VTS_02, VTS_03 etc.

Since a VOB can be quite large they are split into individual files each less than 1 GB in size. E.g. if VTS_01 is more than 3 GB it is split into files named:
VTS_01_0.VOB
VTS_01_1.VOB
VTS_01_2.VOB
VTS_01_3.VOB


Note 4:
QuickTime can also read .vob files directly from the DVD, however the DVD drive will spin contantly during the export so in order to spare it it is better first to extract the DVD to the harddisk. Having the DVD moved to harddisk has additional advantages in that multiple VOB files are concatenated into one file.


Note 5:
Due to a bug in QuickTime 7.0.3 the Movie to iPod (320x240) export setting do not work when video is MPEG-2. What happens is that QuickTime will start exporting the movie and update the status until it reached 17%. At this point QuickTime will chrash. Once Apple has fixed this issue you don't have to manually set all the correct options as described in note 6. Then you can simply select the Movie to iPod (320x240) option directly.


Note 6:
Video Settings
MPEG4
H.264
Bitrate: 622 kbps (Note 7)
Pictures: Same as source
Sync: Same as pictures
320 x 240 if 4:3 or 320 x 180 if 16:9
Advanced
Deselect Main
Select Baseline
Select fastest (Highest quality setting incompatible with iPod)

Audio Settings
AAC-LC (Music)
128 kbps
Optimal
44.1 kHz
Stereo

Click OK to accept advanced settings

Click OK to accept settings


Note 7:
A video rate of 622 kbps results in 750 kbps when audio is 128 kbps and is the setting used by QuickTime when selecting the internal Movie to iPod export option. Some argue that the iPod can handle 768 kbps video + 160 kbps audio. This has not been verified, but if true the video bitrate can be raised to say 750 kbps. However the quality difference between a video rate of 622 kbps and 750 kbps is marginal and at 750 kbps there is a risk of the stuttering pictures due to peaks in the video bitrate. Short videos in iTunes Music Store use 622 kbps video rate (Michael Jackson Billie Jean and Bad, Pixar For the Birds). Longer videos used 570 kbps video rate (Michael Jackson Thriller, ABC - Lost).

Edit: Corrected export time by QuickTime.