DVD quality

[granfer]

---- as three short planks,that's me! And a dyed in the wool film man, although I have used a Hi8 camcorder for personal use for some years, with what I would describe as acceptable results using tape (camera originals and SVHS) as Storage media, and REAL (analogue) TV as the viewing platform. I have also captured both 8mm formats to computer, using my Hi8 camera (frame by frame) and edited using Studio 10 (and later, 12) with some difficulty, writing to DVD using Studio. Up to that point I have been happy, but not over-impressed, with the results.
But now I' in a quandary. Because of its compact size I borrowed my daughter's MiniDV camera for a recent holiday to Brazil, and on my return downloaded 3 1/2 hours of tape to Studio 14 (much more reliable than 10 or 12), cleaned out all the rubbish and burned the remainder (just under 3 hours) to disc using Studio. The quality of the result was not particularly brilliant., so I compared it with the original .AVI capture files (using the same computer, Media Player and monitor for both). I have to say I was VERY impressed with the detail and general quality of the .AVI files captured from the DV tapes of what is a cheap and cheerful camera (Sharp Viewcam VL1 series), but the loss due to compression/disc etc was not impressive, especially when compared on a general basis on a TV screen via a DVD player with Analogue from my Hi8 via an SVHS tape.
My question is..... is it the workflow, DV to Studio 14 to disc that is the problem? Or is there a better, simple way? Or am I expecting too much?

[fraught]

Burning 3 hours to DVD will force Studio 14 to compress the image to fit, as a 4.7GB disc can only fit somewhere in the range of 74 minutes of uncompressed video.

Try splitting your 3 hour epic into bite sized chunks.

[granfer]

Thank you. As I said...... as 3 short planks!!
So I did what I have always told my ex-customers to do...."read the Manual". Studio actually suggests "up to 60 mins on a normal DVD, or 120 mins on a dual layer DVD, disc". With that in mind, results are now acceptable (bearing in mind it IS digital).
However, I also needed to experiment in order to understand the workings of the Studio "Diskometer" and its indications, and I discovered that leaving it up to the program to decide on "Quality" was a bad mistake...... the "Automatic quality" setting brought up a reading of 54% and "Best Quality" 100% for the same file and disc selection. The results reflected these estimates.
Thanks again! I've already learnt far more, prompted by you, in the last day than I had in the previous two weeks.

[fraught]

LOL... no problem! I use Studio 14 Ultimate, so if you have any queries, let me know.

[Dave Watterson]

What a great example of help given and graciously received!

This exchange simply hardens my belief that any and all "AUTOMATIC" settings should be treated with extreme caution.

On DVD players, television sets and video projectors "automatic" frequently results in a distorted image ratio.

On cameras "automatic" is usually acceptable on good days with decent light and normal subjects. But film makers often shoot on bad days, with artistic lighting and unusual subjects.

On sound recording systems "automatic" seems designed for limited bandwidth playback down telephones or through cheap radios and often smooths out everything to a monotonous level ... and is badly fooled by intentional silence or deliberate explosive overloads.

In editing systems "automatic" often serves the needs of people who want to pop their movie straight onto YouTube not those who hope to project a 3 metre wide image.

Am I alone in this cynicism?

- Doubtful Dave

[tom hardwick]

Granfer, you can fit 3 hours onto a DVD and I've done so quite often, but it's been tripod footage of lecturers at lecterns, so there's very little change frame to frame. As such it looks pretty good, especially considering it's 3 one hour tapes (say £4.20) and 40 gb of avi all compressed down to 4.3 gb and held on a 20p disc.

And it sounds like you've found the answer - don't compress your timeline so much. Most people can't tell the difference between the original MiniDV footage and a DVD encoded at 6 mbps - and this gives you 90 mins on a DVD.

tom.