A friend of mine converted some 550d footage to DV(PAL) using ImTOO - but the DV/AVI material was dark, had boosted stauration and looked like crap.

So, anyone know a good software to convert in? The only think I want changed is the format to DV and the size of the frame - not colors or brightness etc?!

Virtual Dub will do this with the addition of a freeware Quicktime plug-in. You load the camera clip, add a Lancoz resize filter and under compression select your DV codec. In my experience colour and luma levels in the resultant DV file remain the same as the original. If you are doing a lot then there is a batch add-on for VDub.