Ulead MF2 encoding produces "jumpy" video

[summit15]

If anyone has any ideas I would be eternally grateful!

First a short history of what I am doing:

I have a Canon Mini DV camera and a Sony Vaio computer. I import (firewire) the DV into the computer via some Sony software that seems to work fine. Its now in DV AVI format on my hard drive.

I go to Windows Movie Maker 2 and open the AVI file. I like that software because its scene detection actually gives you the time and date the video was shot. I don't know if Uleads software does that or not. I have then essentially been taking the scenes that belong together and creating a new movie in movie maker. The only real editing done is a fade in at the beginning of the movie and a fade out at the end. (I say this because is may or may not be important later). I then save the file in Movie Maker as a DV AVI file again.

I then go into Movie Factory 2 (I'm still using the trial version which actually expired today!) I take all the seperate DV AVI files that I have made in Movie maker and line them up to create my DVD.

I alter the settings in MF2 to use CBR and somewhere between 7000 and 8000 bitrate. I have tried different rates hoping for a fix to my soon be described problem. I also turn to the quality up to max which I believe is 50?

One other thing. I usually put in several slideshows, so I have turned on the "anti-flicker" thing. I push output and flim-flam, 5 hours later I have myself a DVD.

Here is the issue and I appreciate your patience in getting here.

When I then watch the DVD, the picture is mostly, but not always, is, for lack of a better word, "jumpy" or flickery. The images are sharp and the sound is fine, but when you watch it, you get a headache from the flickering. Here's the wierd part... if I have a scene change, inside of the movie (like the camera gets turned off then back on again) the picture becomes crystal clear and the most beautiful thing you have ever saw. However, when the next movie starts playing, the flickering comes back.

I have read way too much trying to find out what is going on. So I probably don't know what I am talking about, but it seems like maybe the field order gets screwed up or something. Like the interlacing is backwards. Is that possible?

Does anyone have an idea of what the issue could be. I threw in all the steps in thinking that maybe I'm doing too much to the DV AVI before the encoding or that the fade-in is messing with Ulead's encoding process, or possibly the "anti-flickering" thing that Ulead offers to help on the slideshows is killing my video. I have no idea.

Thaks for anything!

summit15

[Specialist]

This problem description may be the result of a field order issue.

Does the Microsoft Movie Maker 2 software give you the option to select proper field order (as do ULEAD VideoStudio 7 and ULEAD MediaStudio Pro)?

If your final video renders out as a frame-based video, then that would explain the flickering that you describe.

Jerry Jones
http://www.jonesgroup.net