Video Import Specifications

SamanthaWI · Post by **SamanthaWI** » Mon Jan 09, 2006 7:33 pm

After I burn my project to DVD the Video looks really bad. I have tried buring a DVD with Mpeg-2, Quicktime and Windows Media Video. It plays fine in the "Finish" section of the program but once on disk it plays really slow and choppy at times. The only Video that looks good is AVI but due to the 2GB limit I am unable to export a longer format video in AVI format. I am exporting my movies via an Avid Adrenaline. Do you have any siggestions/recomendations, etc.... either settings during export from form NLE or on the import to Workshop 2. Please help.

Thank You,
Samantha

DVDDoug · Post by **DVDDoug** » Mon Jan 09, 2006 8:17 pm

You can prevent re-coding of an MPEG-2 file by unchecking Convert To Disc Template on the Edit Video tab.

...with Mpeg-2, Quicktime and Windows Media Video.

These are all "lossy" conmpression schemes. Converting from one to another, or recoding MPEG-2 will always degrade video quality to some extent.

If you're doing any editing, you should avoid editing these compressed formats. I haven't tried Quicktime or Windows Media formats, but I have had lots of problems editing MPEGs. I had to buy a special-purpose MPEG editor!

AVI/DV is much less lossy. So, it's generally better to capture & edit in the AVI/DV format, and then convert to the MPEG-2 DVD format as the last step.

...due to the 2GB limit...

Are you using Windows 98? Windows 2000 or XP (with the NTFS file system) do not have this limit.

An MPEG-2 file that fills-up a single-layer DVD is 4.35GB... So, even working with MPEGs, the 2GB limit will be a problem. If you're going to spend the money for a DVD burner, DVD Workshop, and additional video editing software, you really should upgrade your operating system. If you have a lot of important data on your hard drive, the safest way to upgrade is to get a new hard drive, and don't muck with the old one... Or, do what I did... get a whole new system dedicated to A/V editing!