is a higher res better or pointless from tv?

[sean madison]

if the res of a movie on tv is 352x240, would capturing in 480x480 have the "potential" to produce better quality in svcd rather than capturin in 352x240 in vcd?

[Triffid]

My guess would be that the 480 vertical would give the advantage of getting both fields than therefore help both with sharpness and motion (assuming you don't deinterlace).

For the horizontal, I guess it depends on whether you are making a standard SVCD or not, and how 'up sampling' a 352 capture looks compared to using a straight 480 capture. I guess the later would look better.

Myself, I prefer to use 352 x 288 (I'm in a PAL country) and make non standard SVCDs coz the lower resolution means a lot more bits per macroblock and gets rid of all the the blocking/pixelation in the resulting video. I still find the motion acceptable, and while I admit it is a little less sharp than the original, it's not very noticable. I'd go standard resolution with a much higher bit rate if I could, but my DVD player won't put up with that!

I hope you weren't looking for a more scientific/objective/numerically justifyable answer!