What kind of quality comes from a DV cam?

[David9799]

Is it DVD or less?

[thecoalman]

Depends on many things, is the question are you going to get hollywood quality DVD then the answer is no but it's close. Depends on the cam too, you can spend $300 or $20,000. The quality of a DVD is relative to it's source and your video settings. There's many variables.

Here's a link that will give you some better insight into video sources in general. http://www.digitalfaq.com/understandsource.htm

[David9799]

I have a Sony HC30 i was just wondering is it really worth taking DV from the cam and then converting it to DVD.

If i can't get DVD quality then what can i take the video down to without loosing any quality? If that makes sense lol

[thecoalman]

If that is a digital cam the you can get about 1 1/2 to 2 hours of video of almost the exact same quality on DVD that you see when you play it from your cam.

[David9799]

Yes it's digital it's not very old only a few months.

I just want to know what can i compress it down to without loosing any quality. I've been just compressing it down to DVD standard with mainconcepts mpeg encoder.

[thecoalman]

Do some experimenting, I usually go about 6000 vbr and see little quality loss. Might want to use CBR if there's a lot of action.

[David9799]

Do some experimenting, I usually go about 6000 vbr and see little quality loss. Might want to use CBR if there's a lot of action.

6000? Is that 6000kbps?

[thecoalman]

Yes 6000 kbps, you can go lower. how about 434 kbps https://www.videohelp.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=1039136

[David9799]

thanks for the help!

What program do you use use if i can ask?

[thecoalman]

Ulead Media Studio Pro for editng and Ulead DVD Workshop for authoring.

[David9799]

is that what you use to encode the video to?

[Tommyknocker]

is that what you use to encode the video to?

The best quality to transfer from your camera is DV. The is an AVI format, often called DV AVI. To put this on a DVD, you must encode it to a MPEG-2 DVD format. Also the sound must have a certain format as well. Certain programs can do it automatically, like several Ulead applications. To gain more optons and control, you will have to research the Convert and Author guides.

[thecoalman]

is that what you use to encode the video to?

I can use either, generally I drop my AVI's in Media Studio MSP, do my edits then encode it to DVD compliant mpg in MSP. I put my mpg in DVD Workshop for authoring to disc, it doesn't have to be rerendered because it's already compliant. Edit: I almost forgot I use AC3 audio which compesses very well leaving me more room for video.

If your referring to the 434 kbps that was just a little test I did if you got to the link you'll see what I mean.

[guns1inger]

I use mainconcept for encoding my DV source for DVD. I use 2-pass VBR with high/average/low settings of 8400/6000/4200. This gives me an average bitrate of 5995 - 5996 every time. As I edit in Vegas and have the AC-3 plugin, I always encode audio to at least 2-channel AC-3.

I'd have to disagree with coalman - if you have a lot of action, I'd go VBR to make sure the high action scenes get enough bitrate without wasting it on scenes that don't need as much.

[Thomas Anderson]

I've got a Sony HC18E, and originally I had problems trying to use the USB to capture, but I bought a firewire port and now I use WinDV to transfer the files to my PC and TMPGEnc XPress to convert the video for DVD. It depends how much video I want on the disc, but I sometimes just use CBR 8000kbps with LPCM 1536kbps audio. This means I can only fit about 65 minutes per disc, but that's enough for a full tape of film.

If I want to get more on the disc, 90 - 120 minutes, I use VBR 2-pass with bitrate 8000/5000/0kbps with 384kbps MP2. That can give more than 100 minutes of good quality video.

[jimmalenko]

I'd have to disagree with coalman - if you have a lot of action, I'd go VBR to make sure the high action scenes get enough bitrate without wasting it on scenes that don't need as much.

I was thinking the same thing.

There will be many sticklers who will say that you will lose quality etc etc, and to the letter of the law, they are probably correct. Whether it is noticeable or not is in the eye of the beerholder though. The reality of the situation is that you should get very acceptable results pulling video off a camera into DV and encoding to MPEG, provided your bitrates are appropriate. Don't forget that there's a number of filters you can play around with to really get the most out of your source also. I would keep the full D1 resolution where possible and only contemplate changing this when the amount of time you wish to put on a DVD exceeds about 2 hours.

I use TMPGEnc, with min 2000 and max 8000, ave whatever it needs to be according to Videohelp's Bitrate Calculator. Audio is not a massive priority with me as I don't have surround sound or anything so there's only so much value I can get out of my TV. Normally 224kbps MP2 does the job for home video and TV caps.