Still can't get the damned quality

[DjBeau]

Ok, here I am again with the same problem.
I have a camcorder, I plug it into my TV, I watch the footage and the quality is glorious. But I want to edit it on my computer.

No, here's what I do:

1 - Using my firewire I Plug my camera into my computer.

2 - Then I use Adobe Premiere to import the footage.

3 - I edit my movie and export it in DV-format (which is, as you probably know, what it was also importet in).

4 - I open Nero and choose SVCD.

5 - I drag the movie to the window indicating what will be written on the CD.

6 - I push "write CD."

7 - Automatically Nero re-encodes the DV-file into SVCD, so that it can be seen on my stand-alone DVD.

8 - Nero finishes the writing.

Now it's time to watch the movie. But... what happened to the splendid quality? It's not nearly as good as it was when I watched the footage directly from my camcorder. Where in the process did I go wrong? Please hellp me, I really like that nice quality!

DjBeau

[jkl]

7 - Automatically Nero re-encodes the DV-file into SVCD, so that it can be seen on my stand-alone DVD.

there you go! nero is crap at encoding. use TMPGEnc or cinema craft encoder and follow the convert guides to the right.

TMPGEnc guide-
http://vcdhelp.com/tmpgencsvcd.htm

[riekl]

Actually no .. don't waste time with tmpgenc or cce for something like this just use premier you shouldn't be exporting in dv format you need to export in mpeg 2 480x480 resolution. This is where your problem is. You are GOING to lose some quality going from dv format to svcd no question asked.

[jkl]

You are GOING to lose some quality going from dv format to svcd no question asked.

true, but TMPGEnc is much better at encoding than premiere. if you have the cinema craft plugin for premiere, then maybe(the plugin is not as good as the standalone). if not, use cce or tmpg.

but the choice is yours.

[linuxking]

I'm learning the same thing you are trying to do - think I'm a little further along.

I'm using the Guide by LeeBear

http://www.vcdhelp.com/forum/userguides/111846.php

You may have different sticking points - but I got stuck on getting the correct codec on my PC so I could edit the captured DV and getting the the conversion to look good.

1. Get the correct codec. I needed the Sony DV Codec cause my camcorder is a Sony. I ended up finding it in a Russia Web page - thank goodness it contained the English Translation. I wish I still had that link, I'd pass that along to you. If you go to Newbie Encoding section of this forum and advance search on me, linuxking, you should find the post someone left for me on that link.

2. The secret to making the SVCD look good is the bit rate. That's what's nice about using the DVD2SVCD program - you can control this. I ended up going with a 4800kbs rate. Why? I found through more web browsing that my DVD player can handle this rate (and I tested it). The down side is I can only fit a little over 20 minutes on a CD at this rate, but my content is home movies and I want to preserve the quality and my shots break up nicely in that length.

I don't know what programs like ULead do by default, but it really stinks in quality.