Newbie question for creating a DVD

[DaBooch]

G'day everyone. I need some opinions on best practice methods for authoring a DVD. Here's my scenario. I have an older Sony Digital Video Camera. The kind that uses Digital 8 Tape. Each tape records an hour of video. I want to fit that 1 hour on one 4.7GB DVD. Currently when I capture, I capture into AVI format and the one hour AVI is 13GB in size. I can convert the AVI to a different format (DVD/SVCD etc) at 4.7 GB and then burn to a DVD. No issues there. What I am interested in is if anyone out there has another method or favourite software that they use to do this (ease of use/no significant quality loss/etc). What software are you using to capture and into what format. What are you using to convert and what format are you converting into. I have lots of processing power in my computer and over 4TB of HDD space so I'm not concerned about hardware. Anyone willing to share their best practice procedures on how to do this. Many thanks!!!

[edDV]

Do you have any existing editing/DVD authoring software?

Process would be capture to DV-AVI. -- done

edit

Encode to 720x480i 29.97 MPeg2 at Lower Field First, CBR >8000Kbps (9500Kbps with compressed AC3 or MP2 audio)

Import the MPeg2 and audio files into the DVD Authoring program as assets.

Author the DVD

Burn the DVD

[DaBooch]

Hi edDV. Thanks for the quick response. I have a few editing/authoring software that I've bought over the years...Nero, Pinnacle, Roxio, TMPGEnc and ULead.

So your advice would be to capture to DV-AVI (BTW...any preference on CODECs?)

You said Encode to 720x480i 29.97 MPeg2 at Lower Field First, CBR >8000Kbps (9500Kbps with compressed AC3 or MP2 audio)...what are you using to do this?

What do you suggest to author? What are you using? Thanks again.

[edDV]

Hi edDV. Thanks for the quick response. I have a few editing/authoring software that I've bought over the years...Nero, Pinnacle, Roxio, TMPGEnc and ULead.

So your advice would be to capture to DV-AVI (BTW...any preference on CODECs?)

You said Encode to 720x480i 29.97 MPeg2 at Lower Field First, CBR >8000Kbps (9500Kbps with compressed AC3 or MP2 audio)...what are you using to do this?

What do you suggest to author? What are you using? Thanks again.

I think you said you already captured DV. If not try free WinDV to capture to a DV-AVI file (13GB/hr.)

Your NeroVision or Pinnacle Studio should be able to cut edit and export DV without loss. They would use DirectShow or internal codecs to monitor during editing but the export file should still be camera original first generation unless you apply filters or effects.

Then use TMPGEnc to encode and author your DVD.

There are many other ways to do it. I was trying to reference your existing software.

If you want to start fresh, Vegas Movie Studio Platinum is a good choice.

[DaBooch]

Many thanks edDV. That's the help I was hoping to find.