DVD: Need to improve resolution

paul85 · Post by **paul85** » Sun Jun 03, 2007 9:03 am

I used my Panasonic DVD burner to copy a DVR copy of a television program off of ComCast. The resolution I used was SP or EP. The program was 90 minutes long. The capacity on the blank DVD was 2 hrs. @ that resolution. Then, I took the DVD to my computer in order to edit it (remove commercials, mainly). I used Video Studio 9 to do the editing, and then burned the result onto a blank DVD-R.
When I played it on my television through the Panasonic player, the edited version was quite blurry. It did not retain the crispness that was formerly there.
Is there a way I can burn my edited version from Video Studio 9 with greater resolution?

Thanks in advance.

Paul

Post by **jparnold** » Mon Jun 04, 2007 12:24 pm

Are you comparing the quality of the edited video to the quality of the original broadcast? - it won't be the same. Did you burn the DVD (using the Panasonic burner) at EP or SP? - there is a noticeable difference. If the capacity of a blank DVD was 2 hours then you have not burnt the DVD at it's highest quality and as such you will loose some resolution (quality).
Does the Panasonic unit have a hard drive and if so did you capture the original broadcast to hard disk (in the Panasonic unit) and then copy (burn) to DVD from the hard drive?
Also how did you load the video DVD into VS? Did you 'capture' the video using 'import video from DVD'?

DVDDoug · Post by **DVDDoug** » Mon Jun 04, 2007 7:46 pm

There are a couple of things you can try:

When you use Video Studio's Import DVD function, the actual MPEG data should be idental to the DVD. Then, depending on how much editing & processing you are doing, it is possible to "re-package" that data on a new DVD without affecting the video quality.

Check the box that says SmartRender (under Project Preferences.. This will prevent re-rendering* except where required. For example, if you join two clips (with identical properties) with a crossfade-transition, the video will be re-rendered only during the crossfade. Some people report that SmartRender causes problems (such as "lip-sync" errors when working with MPEGs, so you will have to experiment with your particular MPEGs.

And, check the box that says Do Not Convert Compliant MPEG files. This usually works, but occasionaly Video Studio might not agree that the MPEGs are DVD-compliant. So again, you will have to experiment. And again, all of the clips will need identical properties. If one video was recorded at EP, and the other at SP, at least one of the clips will have to be re-coded.

* MPEG is lossy compression. Data is thrown-away during compression. Most "real editing" (except for cutting & hard-splicing) requres the video to be de-coded and re-coded. There is some quality loss due to the 2nd encode. (And in general, MPEG editing can just be a pain.)

GeorgeW · Post by **GeorgeW** » Mon Jun 04, 2007 8:39 pm

Keep in mind that if you go to the Authoring Module with a VS Timeline, then the entire timeline will be re-encoded.

However, if you import the mpegs directly in the DVD Authoring module, then you can avoid re-encoding (if you haven't applied edits other than straight cuts).

Regards,
George