My goal is to burn a 16:9 DVD from a widescreen video on a PV-GS400. I've done alot of DVD burning, but never with widescreen. Some questions I have, and any suggestions are appreciated!

I captured to an AVI file using Panasonic's MotionDV Studio. I saw no options regarding 16:9 versus 4:3. When I view the captured AVI file dimensions in Windows, it shows as 720x480, same as when I play the AVI in Sonic CinePlayer. However when I open the file in Windows Media Player, it shows a 16:9 ratio. I tried Sonic MyDVD 5.2 to burn a widescreen video, got a 4:3 video. My questions:

MotionDV appeared to capture a 4:3, but Windows Media Player displays 16:9. I'm confused! Any ideas?

Is MotionDV the right software to capture the GS400's 16:9 mode? Or should I use something else to capture?

Should Sonic MyDVD 5.2 be able to burn the video 16:9, or should I use some other software for burning 16:9?

On a budget so I don't want to spend hundreds (or thousands!) on high end DVD software. Suggestions for what I may be doing wrong are appreciated!

Well, I'm not sure about the windows software ( that's why I use a mac ) but dv is ALWAYS 720X480. It's tagged as being 16x9, recognized , I assume , by windows media player as 16x9 but it's still 4x3 because dv can't be anything else. It's just compressed and when you display it over a 16x9 monitor or projector, it stretches out to fill the screen.The 4x3 video in sonic , was it compressed ? If you want it letterboxed so it plays 16x9 over a 4x3 tele , then you must look for that option as you capture it into your editing software.Maybe panasonics' software doesn't offer that option .Try burning a dvd and see.

Aha thanks 720x480 is standard for 16:9. I'm learning. Now the trick is getting the 16:9 to DVD.

Panasonic MotionDV Studio which comes with the GS400 appears to only capture to .AVI files - but does support widescreen. After editing, you can output to .AVI, MPEG-1 or ASF. Not MPEG-2 unfortunately. And DVD authoring is not directly supported.

The Sonic MyDVD 5.2 will author DVD's. However it will not capture in Widescreen mode, but you can import a widescreen MPEG2 and apparently that is supported. Because I don't have a way to generate a widescreen MPEG2, I can't try this. :-(

I have Windows Movie Maker, but it's unclear if that supports widescreen capture either.

I'm also trying to figure out if the Onkyo DVD player in my home entertainment system is contributing to the problem. I changed the setup menu to 16:9, so hopefully there is not a bottleneck there.

It's looking like I will need some software that can do widescreen capture and output to DVD. I don't want to spend a ton. ULead VideoStudio 8 and Pinnacle Studio 9 both offer $99 packages that are supposed to support widescreen capture and output to DVD, maybe that is my only choice right now.

Try TMPGenc to convert your AVI to MPEG2, they have a free version.

I just burned a 16:9 DVD last night using Ulead VS7 and it looks very good on my 50" Toshiba HDTV. What a difference from 4:3 material! This alone justifies my upgrade to the GS400.