I currently shoot HDV on Canon XHA1 and edit in HDV in PPRO CS3. I encode for dvd using TMPEGenc 4.0 and burn standard def dvds. I am very happy with the output compared to SD minidv.

Today I took an edited sequence and exported back to tape HDV, and hooked up the camera to 52" series 7 lcd tv using the camera supplied cable which goes from camera hdmi to component to tv. The picture was Fabulous. Just as good as hi def tv if not better.

My question..... will going to blu-ray give me the same quality as the export to tape and watching it playback through the camera?

I obviously dont have a Blu-ray burner or player yet to try.

Heck yeah, but you should be able to encode to Blu-ray straight from Premier timeline.

Heck yeah, but you should be able to encode to Blu-ray straight from Premier timeline.

I have tried encoding from Premier (Adobe media encoder) and from After effects. Much better results on motion and transitions from TMPEG (at the advice of Tripp Woelfel). Try the free download and see if you get better results. It takes a little longer because i have to add a step somewhere, (usually in After Effects). I export lossless to QT Animation with keyframes at 30 in full 1440x1080 and then bring that into TMPEG. Much better qualaity DVD's made in Encore.

Actually I don't use Premier, I use Edius/Procoder to encode, I was just trying to save you a step, but if TMPEG is better then use that, I have never use Adobe Media, but if motion and transistions doesn't look good, probably your minimum bitrate is too low and your maximum bitrate is not high enough.

The Blu-Ray can be authored woth the same HDV file (MPEG2 1440X1080) 25Mbits... So the quality is the same... I have an Blu_ray burner and hdv and avchd camera. For my personal videos i always shoot edit and burn into High Definition... (If your video is small, like 4.7 and 8.3Gb, you could burn into a regular dvd and play into blu-ray players...

My question..... will going to blu-ray give me the same quality as the export to tape and watching it playback through the camera?

Howard... It should. I have the same kit as you and have done three BD disks thru CS3 (HDV>PP>QT, QT>Encore>BD). I did a wedding for a friend who's a former indy film maker and high-end home theater retailer and he really liked the BD. No quality complaints.

The weak link in the chain, IMO, is Adobe Media Encoder (which I used for the wedding). Many say that TMPGEnc and other products are superior to AME.

And now for something completely different... Can I ask you a favor? Can you please share your workflow using TMPGEnc? I'm assuming it's TMPGEnc XPress and not Authoring. I've been pulling my hair out, little that there is, trying to convice that TMPGEnc output is BD legal and doesn't need a transcode. I don't want to hijack the thread so if you want to send it in a message or start a new thread, that'd be great.