hdv to dvd

[Mark Webb]

what is the best way of exporting a hdv timeline in cs5 to dvd to retain high quality?

I have tried dynamic link from cs5 to encore and transcoded then authored a dvd but i wasnt that impressed with the quality it seemed softer and not detailed enough what settings should i use?

I then tried export from cs5 to dvd mpeg 2 pass vbr set quality to 5 bitrate about 8 then import that in encore (no transcoding) and automatic transcode audio then authored another dvd and the quality seemed a little sharper but there was no sound what was i doing wrong?

[Mitch Hunt]

Here is the best workflow I have found for producing quality HDV to DVD in Premiere Pro CS5:

1. Create a new SD sequence in Premiere. If you're in NTSC land (North America, Japan and some other areas) this needs to be 720x480. In PAL (most of Asia, Africa, Australia, New Zealand, and most of Western Europe), 720x576. Match the frame rate to that of your source footage (if it's a standard frame rate such as 60i or 24p NTSC or 50i PAL). Turn on "Maximum Render Quality".

2. Nest the finished HDV sequence into the SD sequence you just created.

3. Right click the nested sequence and choose "Scale to Frame Size".

I usually export directly from Premiere.

I recommend the following export settings using MPEG2-DVD: 2 pass VBR, target 6 mbps, max 8 mbps. You may need to adjust the bitrate, depending on the length of your video. Again, match the frame rate to that of your source footage. Important! Make sure that "Maximum Render Quality" is turned ON. Then go to the Multiplexer tab and select "None". Then to the Audio tab, select Dolby Digital as the audio format and use a Bitrate of 224 or so.

Your video and audio will be in separate files; insert both of them into a timeline in Encore.

For previous versions of Premiere, I recommend Dan Isaacs' HD2SD. Here is a tutorial by videographer Jeff Bullune.

[Mitja Popovski]

for highest quality DVD you need to use lancosz resize filter through virtualdub or if you can afford it - cinema craft encoder( it digests .mov, .mp4, cineform .avi) and then convert straigt to mpeg-2. There is no editing softvare that does the quality like hollywood DVD titles. Very good, but expensive is cinema craft encoder. Premiere or. vegas editors( and most others) can do only very average job.

[Mark Webb]

Thanks Mitch i might try that

Mitja cinema craft encoder method sounds interesting but yes it is a bit expensive for my needs

[Robert Young]

Grass Valley ProCoder 3 does a great job for DVD transcode, costs much less than Cinema Craft, and rates nearly as high re final image quality.

[Mark Webb]

Mitch i have tried your workflow and i could really notice the difference colours were brighter the image was more crisp and clean simply brilliant!!!

thanks again for the advice

[Mark Webb]

robert does ProCoder 3 work with win7 64? im not sure but it may have compatibility issues

[Bill Engeler]

Procoder 3 works fine on my Win 7 x64 system. It's too bad that it can't link directly to PPro. Someone did try develop a frameserver for CS4 that worked with it (was it debugmode?), but it was unusably slow.

[Mark Webb]

I think cs5 does a great job when down sizing from hd to sd and the results were good i did select deinterlace but the question is when Creating a new SD sequence for sd (pal land here) should i choose lower field first or deinterlace like i did before nesting the hd to sd?

[Taky Cheung]

Agree on Procoder 3. It's MPEG-2 DVD output is just hollywood like. You can still get great quality in low bitrate. I don't know about CS5, but the MainConcept MPEG engine in Cs3/4 is just horrible. Only get acceptable output in high bit rate.

I also setup WatchFolder to encode DVD compliant MPEG-2 file in 4 different bit rates. Then mix and match them to fill the DVD. Say like, for the highlights video, its' a frequently watched video, I picked a higher data rate file. For ceremony, there's not much motion and less watch, I picked a lower data rate format.

The way I setup the watch folder is, I create those folders. Then add shortcuts to these watch folders in Windows "Send To" menu. So when I need to transcode files, I hold the Windows Key and press the Alt Key once, while still holding the window key, right click on the AVI file, send select "Send to". In that case, a short cut of the AVI file will be copied to the Watch folder that triggers Procoder to start converting. Very convenience.

[Robert Young]

Originally Posted by Mark Webb

robert does ProCoder 3 work with win7 64? im not sure but it may have compatibility issues

ProCoder 3 has an update (not recent at all) that I believe originally fixed compatability problems with Vista 64.
Using the updated version on my Win7 64 machine, I've had no problems.

[Bill Engeler]

<<Creating a new SD sequence for sd (pal land here) should i choose lower field first or deinterlace like i did before nesting the hd to sd?>>

Mark, since you're going to DVD, it's better to use the same frame settings as the source, in your case interlaced. DVDs are usually interlaced, so it's no help to ask Premiere to de-interlace for you. Of course, if you shot progressive, keep those setings.

[Jay Jelliff]

Originally Posted by Taky Cheung

Agree on Procoder 3. It's MPEG-2 DVD output is just hollywood like. .

I'll second that. Hard to tell a DVD from a Blu ray when transcoded with Procoder.

[Taky Cheung]

There were a few moments I was watching the DVD and I thought it was bluray..