Poor Video Quality after Conversion to DVD

[jmrank]

I use Pinnacle Studio to capture my home movies from my digital camcorder and edit to "DVD Quality" AVI files. The files are huge, but (from what I can see) perfect quality.

Here comes the problem... I use the accompanying product, Pinnacle Express, to create my DVDs. Express does the compression from AVI to DVD format, but when it does, I lose a considerable amount of the video quality, even when I use the "100% video quality" setting. Particularly when the lighting in the video is not very good, the DVDs look "computerey," and you can see the compression.

Does anybody have any ideas about how I can improve the quality? I've tried using a couple of different DVD-creation software packages (trial versions, and it was awhile back so I'm not even sure which ones anymore). I feel like I just need the piece that does the compression improved, but I don't really know how all that happens (in the black box...).

[guns1inger]

tmpgenc, CCE Basic or Procoder Express are all good quality encoders at a reasonable price. Each has it's own interface and configuration, so you should try out the demos and see which suits you. In order of speed, there are CCE (fastest), Procoder Express, Tmpgenc (slowest by far). Quality wise it is in the eye of the beholder, but all are very good.

[DarrellS]

I own Pinnacle Studio 8 and although I've never tried to make a DVD using the software, I've made a few AVI files that looked like crap. Studio seems to ignore the codec settings that you choose and use their own. It will give you an estimate of 800 MB for the finished file and then spit out an AVI that is 60 MB and looks as bad as any ASF file I've ever seen.
Studio 8 is only able to use a handfull of codecs and isn't compatible with most modern codecs like DivX and XviD. If I need to use Studio to join some clips, I'll use a lossless compression and then compress with a reliable tool like VirtualDub unless I'm making a DVD, then I'll just use the uncomressed file to make the DVD with.

I use VSO DivXtoDVD to convert the video file to DVD format and TDA to author and burn the DVD.