transcoding/encoding ?s

[kjhawkm]

Here is a description of my current project:

My main hobby is djing, and I decided to make a 5.1 surround sound mix. I've got that part done...then I thought, why not add some video to it and make it a full fledged DVD. Well I decided to rip scenes for 2001:A Space Odyssey and edit them to go with the mix. I used ffmpegx to rip the DVD VOBs to Mpeg-4 H.264 at a hight bitrate. These turned out very well. I couldnt distinguish these from the original DVD. There were no visible artifacts at all.

I painstakingly ( I have an old dual 450 mghz G4) arranged these clips in Final Cut Express, then exported the final movie last night to just a vanilla Mpeg-4 .mov with the best quality on. After roughly 20 hrs of exporting for a 38 minute movie it was finished. But with noticable artifacts.

Here is my delima:

1) I want to export this movie and then burn it to DVD. So I want to have the highest quality source file before it goes through another round of encoding (mpeg-2) for the DVD.
2) I want it to remain in anamorphic widescreen. I edited the files at 720x480 and you could tell they were squished. So I figured once i send them to DVD studio Pro, I can mark them as anamorhic and they will play properly on my widescreen TV.
3) After importing the 24fps files into Final Cut Express and then exporting and reencoding into Mpeg-2...will a DVD player be able to recognize the source footage as 24 fps progressive with 3:2 pulldown?

but my highest priorty is number one....so should I:
A) export the FInal Cut Express Video as 1) an FCP movie, or 2) as a quicktime file?
B)if quicktime file, should I select DV, or mpeg-4 h.264? What will give me the highest quality before I send this file to the compressor for mpeg-2?

thanks in advance for any advice.

[qshartle]

I dabble in DJing also. And yes, adding video is a sweet thing to do.

I would save your file in DV if at all possible, then use that to be your master for mpeg2. I forget if Toast can accept FCP files or not, but if it can, go straight from the FCP file to DVD.


Shartle

PS: what do you mix?