Quality slipping!

[flvideo]

Quality seems to be slipping. I make DVD Masters all year long and at the end of the year I take races of different classes from the master and make another Master for that class. The video, when I dump it into my Renommee , doesn't seem as sharp as it was. Any ideas? Have I a setting that changed. One thing that could make a difference is I used diferent H/D's. I just go where I have the room. I guess I didn't look at that as I grabbed each race. All the video was shot with the same cameras. Thanks in advance. Bob...

[Martyn]

Do I understand that you are taking the video from the DVD to re-edit? If so the quality loss is when you actually make the DVD. You are effectively converting DV down to mpeg (otherwise you would only fit around 15 minutes of DV quality onto a DVD). To maintain original quality you need to copy to DV tape or for short films use Disk Transfer to a DVD.

[flvideo]

Hey Martyn. I guess I didn't make myself clear. I shoot my video on MINI-dv I dump that into my Renommee, edit it adding graphic and transitions from some times as many as 5 cameras. I have a program each week that is about 1:30 To 2:00 hours long. I then Burn a DVD master of this edited footage. I make DVD copys from this master to sell. At the end of each year I dump selected bits of my Master back in to the Renommee and Compile those bits into another master of Just one class of race cars. I then use this master to make copys of those races of that class to agin sell. I have been doing this same thing for years and the quality while it isn't pristeen ESPN quality has been more than sufficient for my purposes. As an example I have one class that I just finished last night that has 4 DVD's filled with just their class. For reasons unknown to me the quality seems to have slipped a little. I hope thats clear. I sometimes don't splain things too good. LOL! Bob...

[CliffHawkins]

When you say you use your master to dump footage back into your editor is it a DVD master or a Mini-Dv tape master?

[flvideo]

DVD master. Bob..

[CliffHawkins]

Bob:

When you make a DVD, Arabesk compresses the video file in the processes of making a DVD. All DVD's have compressed files. In the compressing prosess you loose some quality. When you reload the film from a DVD your video will not be as sharp as reloading from a Mini-DV tape which hold the original file size when you record to it.

[ChrisStone]

Bob, a good analogy is this; take a VHS tape and make a copy of it, then make a copy of the copy. Each version suffers an additional loss of quality.

You might consider sending your completed projects out to dv tape for your masters. Then when you want to do a compilation of several races you can bring the edited and virtually lossless footage back into your system to re-edit. Your Arabesk created DVD will then be a first generation disk and look as good as all the others.

Hope that make sense.

[flvideo]

Well that sucks! I have been Making DVD masters for several yars and I guess I never realized Arabesk was compressing it. That makes sense. Is there a way to not compress ithe video? The DVD probably wouldn't hold 120 minutes in that case. It may very well be time for me to find another editing platform. If I had to keep my masters on DV tape I think 83 minute is the largest I can get and the tape is really thin. I guess I'd better rethink my whole deal. That throws a kink in my operation just for the fact that all my programs are any where from 1 hour 30 minutes to 2 hours. Bob..

[flvideo]

Another dumb question!! What am I to do with my Dupliactors? I can't feed them with DV tape. Bob..

[CliffHawkins]

Bob:

Any platform that you burn a film to DVD will compress the files. One option might be to buy 80 minute Mini-DV tapes and record you film on it in LP which should cover 120 minutes. Using a tape for master is the best way to go.