Producing PAL Output from a NTSC platform

[MikeFromBrighton]

I'd appreciate your advice. My installation of Video Studio 2019 is set up as NTSC for North America. I need to create either PAL MP4's or PAL DVD's to send to Australia. Is it as simple as checking that one output box in preferences or is there more to it? Thank You!

[Ken Berry]

I am currently in New Zealand, but used to live in Australia. And you'll find that NTSC MP4's will play just fine there. A lot of cameras sold in Australia/New Zealand will record in NTSC, and their output will play happily on computers and TVs. The only problem will arise when you want to mix PAL and NTSC footage in the same project when editing.

And every stand-alone DVD player there will also have no trouble playing NTSC DVDs. It is usually NTSC DVD players which have trouble with PAL discs, but not vice versa.

[RobertOZ]

I fully concur with Ken, I shoot everything in NTSC format and have no problem playing the resultant DVD on my PAL DVD player

[MikeFromBrighton]

Ken and RobertOZ,

Outstanding!! Guess that rules regarding region specific players down under have been relaxed.
My North American version will play a PAL DVD five times. Then, they will reset to PAL permanently. Luckily, Region free players are relatively inexpensive now.

I'll send the DVD's out tomorrow. Thanks Again for the input! Mike

[canuck]

I don't know what DVD player you have but my NTSC player can play PAL DVD indefinitely, it has no such limit as you mention.

All DVDs created by "home" software are region free and "region" play really has nothing to do with NTSC or PAL

[Davidk]

Re-phrasing what Canuck said . .
Render to DVD with video studio creates an "all regions" disk. The region is a data element burned into the start phase area of the disk, so it read by the player on start.

The region mechanism is a construct implemented years ago by the big media companies to sell more disks - whether CD or video. It began as a copyright issue to prevent pirating, but it's become a revenue raiser most of all. They divided the world into regions and players in any particular region are usually set to play 2 types of disk - the ones marked for the local region and an "all regions" disk.

As to issues rendering project files with NTSC and PAL clips in them - I've never had an issue with that, even tho an early camera was set for NTSC and I rendered to PAL. The format configuration of render (NTSC or PAL) can be set in the share page. And when making a DVD, render the various clip components individually first, to avoid problems in disk creation.

Modern TV sets and entertainment screens will display NTSC or PAL source material, automatically. You normally do not have to set it.