I had a wedding that I had to color correct, I used Vegas and got my results, I then had to burn this to DVD.

I rendered it using the PAL DVD Architect MPEG2 video only template and then MP3 audio.

However when I imported the project into DVD architect the project size exceeded single 4.7 GB DVDR size, to around 7.9 GB, this is before the addition of any menu system that could so drastically increase the size.

I let DVD Architect optimize the project to fit on disc, however the result after 5 hours of mastering and burning came out terrible looking.

What I don't understand is why the project inflated so much in size, the original MPEG2 file is around 3GB, the MP3 audio is 100 or so MB. The previous copy of this wedding was created in Pinnacle Studio 10 software and fit neatly on a single DVDR.

Am now re-rendering the project to NTSC DVD Architect stream video only with AC3 Stereo audio stream to see if this would be better for size because of the resolution decrease, however am not expecting miracles.

This is problematic considering rendering to MPEG2 takes hours in Vegas, (I guess because of the color corrections), then mastering to DVD takes more time in DVD Architect even though I used the templates to render from within Vegas?

I have optimized both applications using the Absolute Training for Vegas DVDs from Vaast and I still don't understand why I can't get the results I expect.

Is there something fundamentally wrong with what am doing?

Sounds to me like you are losing a lot as a result of multiple reencodings, but you need to be more specific about exactly what you are doing, so others can make recommendations. How are you getting the material from the Pinnacle DVD to Vegas ? Capture, file transfer, reencoding or what. Then how are you editing material, and what are you outputting to. All could be creating issues along the way.

Project was previously edited on Pinnacle Studio 10, to get that into Vegas it was outputted to uncompressed AVI.

The uncompressed AVI was color corrected and rendered to DVD architect PAL video only stream with MP3 audio track. This process took nearly 10 hours.

This was brought into DVD Architect, optimized to fit on disc, prepared and burned, took roughly 5 hours. The video quality plummeted massively, unacceptable to hand to client.

When brought into DVD Architect, the project size inflated to 7 GB for some reason even though the source was a shade over 4 GB. The bitrate was cut massively to fit on the 4.7 GB DVDr.

Are you sure you mean MP3? And not AC3?

Also, the render you gave to DVD Architect, was that MPEG2? If yes, you should make sure you render it at a low enough bitrate you don't need to use "Fit to disc".

I meant MP3 because I had not installed DVDA at the rendering time so did not have AC3 option. The render I provided to DVDA was MPEG.

I have nailed the problem down to the video being of low quality however ran into a new problem now.

Which I outline in this post http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/showthread.php?t=103783

Thank you for the replies.