Blocky artifacts. See attached pic.

rwalker66 · Post by **rwalker66** » Sat Nov 15, 2008 1:14 am

The HDV format video captured from my Canon HV30 camcorder looks great on the computer, but the final output to DVD looks terrible, as you can see in the attached pic. There is blockiness everywhere and other noise. Any idea what is causing this and how to prevent it? I have tried everything from changing the compression to switching the field order from "frame based, no fields" to "upper field first" and nothing seems to make a difference. This is a DVD I am making for my family and it is very important I don't give them something of bad quality. They are counting on me for this. Please, any help you can provide would be greatly appreciated.

randazzo · Post by **randazzo** » Sat Nov 15, 2008 5:54 am

What are the properties of your input and output video-file?

rwalker66 · Post by **rwalker66** » Sat Nov 15, 2008 3:46 pm

When I right click on "media clip properties" for the video it says this:

skier-hughes · Post by **skier-hughes** » Sat Nov 15, 2008 4:35 pm

That is your input file?
What are you making?
A Hi Def dvd on a std disc?
A Hi Def dvd on BluRay?
A standard def dvd?
What are the output properties?

YOur image looks like it is suffering from too much compression.

randazzo · Post by **randazzo** » Sat Nov 15, 2008 5:23 pm

With your input file is nothing wrong. More interesting are the specs of your output file. Be sure to choose Mpeg2 instead of Mpeg1 for example.

A constant bit-rate around 7000-8000 gives a great result. But that depends on the amount of material you want to fit on one DVD-disc. Otherwise you could choose for the two step variable bit rate 8000.

Field order is also important but the blockiness you're experiencing seems more like compression artefacts.

rwalker66 · Post by **rwalker66** » Sat Nov 15, 2008 6:29 pm

randazzo wrote:With your input file is nothing wrong. More interesting are the specs of your output file. Be sure to choose Mpeg2 instead of Mpeg1 for example.

A constant bit-rate around 7000-8000 gives a great result. But that depends on the amount of material you want to fit on one DVD-disc. Otherwise you could choose for the two step variable bit rate 8000.

Field order is also important but the blockiness you're experiencing seems more like compression artefacts.

Yes, they seem like compression artifacts. How can I eliminate them? What changes can I make?

I raised the bit rate to constant and tried 8000 and the maximum of 9800. Both times I got the below craziness on the DVD output picture. This is even worse than before. What is going on?

I even uninstalled and reinstalled DVD Moviefactory 6 Plus.

rwalker66 · Post by **rwalker66** » Sat Nov 15, 2008 6:40 pm

skier-hughes wrote:That is your input file?
What are you making?
A Hi Def dvd on a std disc?
A Hi Def dvd on BluRay?
A standard def dvd?
What are the output properties?

YOur image looks like it is suffering from too much compression.

That was the properties of the clip in the media list.
I am putting HDV footage from my camcorder to a SD DVD.
I'm not sure how to check output properties if you could tell me how to do that.
How would I get rid of the extreme compression?
Thanks

sjj1805 · Post by **sjj1805** » Sun Nov 16, 2008 1:47 am

rwalker66 · Post by **rwalker66** » Sun Nov 16, 2008 3:49 am

Here are the settings. Let me know if these are correct for 16:9 HDV to SD DVD. It looks like my only problem in the final output is too much compression, which is causing compression artifacts. I left compression at 90%, which is the default. Anything else I can do?

randazzo · Post by **randazzo** » Sun Nov 16, 2008 5:18 am

We need to know the properties from the video file you've saved from VS.

The last posts show the settings within Moviefactory. MF won't be able to change a low res video file into a high resolution mpeg.

Right click on your OUTPUT file in the library manager in VS. Or in the video track. Just like you did with your input file.

rwalker66 · Post by **rwalker66** » Sun Nov 16, 2008 5:28 am

randazzo wrote:We need to know the properties from the video file you've saved from VS.

The last posts show the settings within Moviefactory. MF won't be able to change a low res video file into a high resolution mpeg.

Right click on your OUTPUT file in the library manager in VS. Or in the video track. Just like you did with your input file.

I don't have VS.
I capture and edit with DVD MF.
The video file properties from the capture are in an earlier post in this thread. 1440x1080 HDV. It's a high res video file.

randazzo · Post by **randazzo** » Sun Nov 16, 2008 5:55 am

You wrote "it looks great" on your computer. What exactly looks great on your computer? Your Canon hooked up to your pc? The imported video file or the final VOB files?

What is the source from the earlier jpeg in this thread?

skier-hughes · Post by **skier-hughes** » Sun Nov 16, 2008 11:32 am

Your second picture shows a field order problem, this is different to your blockiness, compression problem.
Your settings shows frame based as your output, did you record in progressive?
If so, this is 25p which is different to the 29.97 you have listed.

rwalker66 · Post by **rwalker66** » Sun Nov 16, 2008 4:23 pm

randazzo wrote:You wrote "it looks great" on your computer. What exactly looks great on your computer? Your Canon hooked up to your pc? The imported video file or the final VOB files?

What is the source from the earlier jpeg in this thread?

The JPEG is a picture I took of my HDTV screen with my camera of the DVD output.

What I meant when I said "it looks great" is that when I hook the camcorder up to the HDTV it looks great. When I import the captured video into DVD MF it looks great. When I'm editing it in DVD MF it looks great. It looks great everywhere except on the final output, I guess that would be the VOB files.

randazzo · Post by **randazzo** » Sun Nov 16, 2008 6:46 pm

Ok. Must be frustrating.

When we look at the last picture you've posted. Aside from the "tooth comb" effect we see, which is an effect of a wrong field order. Does that file produce a good image regarding the blockiness? Is the blockiness gone with that one?

BTW if you apply VBR conversion the two pass encode gives a better quality. You could also choose for a constant bit rate. This will give the best result.