create high quality dvd

[happyjays123]

I need to burn a professional quality DVD of a slideshow. I've used LQ graphics photo to movie software to create the slideshow and after many hours of waiting while yet another version renders, I finally have really crisp versions in both wmv and quicktime format. However, whenever I burn to DVD it loses quality. i've used DVD styler, windows DVD maker and express burn but none are as crisp as the original file. Not sure if this is to do with the settings I'm using, the software or whether it's even possible (does it need to be blu-ray?)

I would prefer to have a menu screen but it's not essential - the film quality is the most important.

The settings I can remember for rendering the wmv file were
HD 1080p
PAL
frame rate 25
Can't get to my pc at the moment to list any other settings, but it was as suggested by the software's 'help'.

I've been guessing at what settings to use to create the DVD -the same as above would make sense but they're not always available. Tried so many different permutations i think I'm beginning to repeat myself. And run out of discs.

Any help would be much appreciated.

Thanks.

[Baldrick]

DVD-Video is only 720x480/576 so you can't really get any HIGH quality or CRISP quality. It's usually just better to burn jpg stills on a cdr/dvdr but you wont get any slideshow then.

But you can try convert your video with AVStoDVD and use highest possible quality/bitrate and see how it looks like.

[dragonkeeper]

I agree With Baldrick. Also note that your process of creating the DVD is going to inherently causes a drop in quality. DVD only supports the use of mpeg-2 video, you start off with one video format and allow your application to convert the video to the proper format. Conversion of one video format to another format always results in a perceived drop in quality. Add to this you are most likely going from a high quality source to a sub-par format and the quality loss is even greater.

I would look at crteating a blu-Ray disk is quality is essential, or if you don't have a BD burner look at BD9 or BD5 or AVCHD. But be aware that all BD players do not support these formats.

If you must have DVD, then do as Baldrick suggested use AVStoDVD using the HCenc encoder.

[t0nee1]

For standard DVD quality, the DVDSlideshowGui proggie works pretty darn good..IIRC that is..
Actually it looks like it outputs to higher quality now " BluRay, 720p, 1080p."..So yeah, agree with dk and create a BR disk..

[happyjays123]

Thanks - the DVD / HD thing makes a bit more sense now. Think I'll have to stick with DVD as the recipients won't always have Blu-Ray players. Managed to get fairly good quality DVDs which I'm sure will look fine unless viewed back to back with an HD version.

[dragonkeeper]

Thanks - the DVD / HD thing makes a bit more sense now. Think I'll have to stick with DVD as the recipients won't always have Blu-Ray players. Managed to get fairly good quality DVDs which I'm sure will look fine unless viewed back to back with an HD version.

Congrats