Where am I going wrong..poor VCD quality

[kingsausage]

I use a Sony digital Camcorder and Adobe Premier to suck in some video.

It comes in as an AVI and I use TMPGEnc to convert it to NTSC MPEG and the MPEG seems look look just fine when I play it in my WMP.

I then use Nero 5.5 with a Plextor drive to make a VCD on CD-RW disks.

When I play it through a DVD player (I've tried multiple different DVD players)..it looks like garbage. I've tried multiple different TMPGEnc templates for the conversion and multiple different settings in Nero, and I've had different quality results...but all crappy.

The main issue seems to be general blockiness and blurred video when watched on a normal TV.

I was expecting "VHS like quality" from my VCDs, and I'm not even close. I've read and tried everything I can from the guides and scanned the forums for something similar, no luck.

Is there something fundamental I'm missing to make a decent looking VCD disk to watch on a normal TV? I don't know if its a problem with my MPEG conversion or when I burn..or both.

At this point, I've spent well over $1000 to buy the camcorder, firewire card, burner, etc etc allll so I could make neat-o VCD disks and I've got about 25 VCD coasters and a wife with a smug "I told you so" look on her face.

[y2flyy]

i also had poor quality when i first strated making vcds
but use some templetes from vcdhelp
i recommend sefy sevcd templete
its perfect for me
and great quality
Y2Flyy

[EricB]

First of all, stop making coasters. Get some RW disks so you can experiment and get it right.

DV video works particularly well with SVCDs because both are interlaced. Some of the blurriness may come from the normal compromise of converting interlaced to non-interlaced. Bottom line: if your player will support SVCD, then make those. With the standard TMPGenc template for SVCD, it is usually pretty hard to tell the disk from broadcast TV.

If you must use VCD then use a decent bit rate (XVCD) of say 1800 - 2000. Experiment with the different deinterlacing methods that are available in TMPGenc. Again, I just use the standard template and boost the bitrate. Make sure your motion search estimate is set to Slow / High quality.

[Anonymous65]

First, remember that a 352x240 pixel window on your PC monitor is like looking at a postage stamp. It is NOT the same as looking at it on a 32 inch TV set. If you play the file on your PC in full screen, lets say you have a 17 inch monitor, and play the file on a DVD player and look at a 21 inch TV, the image quality looks pretty much the same (step 5 feet back). However, do not compare a postage stamp on a PC monitor with a full screen TV set.
Also, to make a VCD look "like" a VHS tape, you need to get a commercially produced VCD. Home made VCD's are usually pretty bad.

[kingsausage]

Thanks fellas.

It appears that my issue is in the conversion and not in the burning.

I will hunt for some of these templates and continue the battle.

I was making VCDs because the DVD players I were trying didn't support SVCD.

I find it helps to set your screen size to the MAX, save as mpeg, and set your bitrate as high as it can go. You can always edit down in size but but you you got to start with the best files you can get. Sometimes a diffrent brand of disk can help as well.

[ktnwin]

Follow EricB to make XVCD (higher bitrate), you will be amazed.
That's all I am making these days. My friends thought I made DVDs !!!