downsampling from 1980 x 1020 to 720 x 480

[JimDodds]

Using VideoStudio X9 64 bit with Windows 10 64 bit and working in 16 x 9, with some MP4 1920 x 1080 video as my base. When I make my DVD, which defaults to 720 x 480, things look really fuzzy compared to my original files, especially my overlays, and the pan motions go click-click-click rather than smoothly. I made my DVD directly in the Share section, so I was wondering if there is some heavy compression involved when you do this. Would I get better looking results by saving an ISO file and using a separate DVD authoring program?

Thanks,
Jim Dodds

[canuck]

When going from 1920x1080 video to 720x480 (the DVD standard) you will obviously lose a lot of quality.
How much quality you lose may depend on your bitrate (should be around 8000 for best quality). Since a standard DVD can only hold about 60 minutes of best quality video, any longer will reduce quality since you have to reduce the bitrate to make the video fit on the DVD.

[Davidk]

If you are making the disk for yourself, or distribution eg to friends or family elsewhere, then there are alternatives to DVD which will maintain the hi-resolution of the clips in the result. Change the share resolution to what your clips are and choose a suitable result format. For example:
- choose properties to suit the clips, eg blu-ray or mobile, and select save as project properties, then render render to a suitable computer file. Alternatively, just choose the computer file option and MPEG-4 format. In either case, store the result somewhere on your PC. When finished, you can distribute it elsewhere using an on-line file store eg dropbox or onedrive. Merely up-load the rendered file to that location and when finished, copy the location (eg, your public folder) weblink and put it and the filename in an email to the intended recipient. They can download it at their convenience.
OR
- render to a Blu-ray disk, which will provide capacity in 25Gb lots for Hi-res video files. If more than 1 is needed, save the image as an iso file and afterwards burn several disks from it using the tools available in VS. You could use AVCHD format and standard DVD blanks, however the play time is drastically reduced.

For burning Blu-ray, you do need 1) a PC with a blu-ray burn capability, 2) Blu-ray disk blanks, and your recipients need to have blu-ray players in their entertainment or computer systems. For burning AVCHD, a standard PC burner and DVD blanks are suitable, but in both these cases, they can only be read/played on a blu-ray player.

Davidk

[lata]

Hi Jim

First go to Settings – Preferences – Edit Tab change the “Resample Quality” to Best, this should improve the render quality.

Please provide details of your original video files.
Right click a video on the timeline and choose properties what are they? This will help in determining the final output settings.
Your project properties should be the same as video properties, to check view settings - project properties

Create a video file before burning a disc from Share choosing appropriate settings.

First I would render to same as your video files settings, this will create a HD video of your project, which could be used to burn a Bluray Disc. Play this file to test quality.

If you wish to create a DVD then use the new video file and convert / render to Mpeg2
Share – (MPEG-2 (720 x 480, 16:9, 50i, 8Mbps)) – Play this file to check quality.

Use that Mpeg2 file to burn the DVD, you can first choose to burn a Disc Image ISO, Play that to check quality.
Then Tools – Burn from Disc image to burn the iso to disc.
This process burns the file to disc without further render, so quality should be same as video used.

[Ken Berry]

Share – (MPEG-2 (720 x 480, 16:9, 50i, 8Mbps)) – Play this file to check quality.

A minor correction, Trevor: since the clip is to be 720 x 480, and thus NTSC, the frame rate should be 60i (or 30 fps interlaced).