My U.S. friend wants to make a Brazilian compatible DVD

[Heff]

My friend who resides in the U.S. has a Kodak Easyshare DX4530. It takes pictures and can make movies and he has a 1Gb flash memory. Anyway he has a girlfriend in Brazil and wants to make videos and pictures that will be playable on her DVd player. So he asked what DVD burner to get and I suggested the BenQ 1620. I'm assuming the burner doesn't enter into the equation on making this playable on a Brazilian DVD player. His camera imports movies thru a USB 2.0 (doesn't have firewire) and is in .mov format. So questions are:

1) I'm right in that the hardware burner should not effect the authoring DVDs region code?

2) I read that Brazil uses PAL, but that most play NTSC. Is this correct? and Most authoring software sets the region to "all regions", correct?

3) What software would be the easiest to convert the .mov to mpg?

4) Can he make a DVD that will play both movies and a picture slide show?

Questions 1 & 2 are most important? TIA

[MOVIEGEEK]

Region and TV standard(PAL/NTSC) is set by video software not hardware,don't worry about region coding.It's better to encode and author in the correct standard for a country than wonder if it will play.
A:
1.Writing DVDR's=no.
2.PAL and yes authoring programs use 0(all regions).
3. TDA or Ulead DVD MovieFactory.
4. Yes,use Ulead DVD MovieFactory or Sonic MyDVD.

[Heff]

So Brazil DVD players will not play NTSC formated video? Also I don't think TDA will convert .mov file to mpg, but TMPGenc Express 3.0 would.

[MOVIEGEEK]

We don't know what your friends DVD player will play,as I said earlier it's better to encode in the proper standard for that country.
Ulead DVD MovieFactory or Sonic MyDVD can do all you want(support .mov,encode to PAL,slideshow,etc).

[Fred©]

Hi man,

I am brazilian, live in Brazil, earn some money when convert VHS into DVD and ALL movies I convert are to NTSC DVDs.
That's because here, we have PAL-M (not PAL only, so I never found a REAL GOOD PAL-M capture software, except for powerVCR which came with my TV capture card, but is a piece of shit, when I need to capture in MPEG-2 DVD profile) TV standard, but most video camera and accessories are imported... so ALL new TV are tri-norma (I can translate as tri-band). They play NTSC, PAL-M and PAL-N (Argentina TV standard, because we export TV to them)...
The same with our DVD players... ALL play NTSC!!!
Actually, when someone gives me a PAL-M video tape (those captured from TV shows) I really suffer!!!!
Do your best job and show your friend's girlfriend some fun!!!

Fred©

[Cunhambebe]

1) I'm right in that the hardware burner should not effect the authoring DVDs region code?

2) I read that Brazil uses PAL, but that most play NTSC. Is this correct? and Most authoring software sets the region to "all regions", correct?

3) What software would be the easiest to convert the .mov to mpg?

4) Can he make a DVD that will play both movies and a picture slide show?

Questions 1 & 2 are most important? TIA

Here are the ansers for your most important questions:
1. Your hardware burner it's a home burner, so it will always burn a region free DVD (anyway, just to let you know, Brazil is region 4). Regions have nothing to do with systems such as PAL or NTSC (please someone corrects me if I'm wrong).
2. Brazil uses PAL-M which is PAL at 30 fps (very close to NTSC, but anyway, it's PAL-M and not the single PAL). If I'm not mistaken, Brazil chose this system as part of a commercial agreement with Germany in the early 70's).
Notes:
a - All Brazilian DVDs are only NTSC (there's not even a single PAL-M DVD) due to the fact that all Hollywood studios and producers throughout the world release their movies/videos/DVDs in Brazil as NTSC. Most Brazilian DVDs play both region 4 and also Region 1; some of them are able to play all regions (Philips; Gradiente - a local brand for JVC).
b - PAL-M is the National System for Broadcasting. You may ask yourself how we use both systems... All Brazilian TV sets are sold nowadays with both systems: NTSC and PAL-M (you can choose which one you want or configure the TV as automatic). So playing NTSC DVDs it's not a problem at all.

Please do whatever you want in NTSC and burn your region free DVD.

[Zetti]

Hi man,

I am brazilian, live in Brazil, earn some money when convert VHS into DVD and ALL movies I convert are to NTSC DVDs.
That's because here, we have PAL-M (not PAL only, so I never found a REAL GOOD PAL-M capture software, except for powerVCR which came with my TV capture card, but is a piece of shit, when I need to capture in MPEG-2 DVD profile) TV standard, but most video camera and accessories are imported... so ALL new TV are tri-norma (I can translate as tri-band). They play NTSC, PAL-M and PAL-N (Argentina TV standard, because we export TV to them)...
The same with our DVD players... ALL play NTSC!!!
Actually, when someone gives me a PAL-M video tape (those captured from TV shows) I really suffer!!!!
Do your best job and show your friend's girlfriend some fun!!!

Fred©

@Fred,

To capture PAL-M tapes what I do is to use a hardware converter linked between the VCR and the capture card, I use one of the TRANSCORTEC models, check their site, it costs around $ 100.

Anyway, it's also important to mention that, if your card can capture in PAL-M, you have no trouble anymore, a PAL-M MPEG2 stream is equal to a NTSC MPEG2 stream, the diference is in the broadcast system, once they're in your HD, they're the same. Note that your authoring software will accpet the PAL-M stream as if it were NTSC.
So, a good deal would be to buy the Pinnacle PCTV Deluxe that gets PAL-M, as any ATI card.

Have fun,

Zetti