HDV-project to DVD

[jpjdenmark]

I have just finsihed my first project on my S-2000 with materiel from my new Panasonic HD-camera. The finished project is 22 min. long. I tried to make AVCHD on a DVD, but ufortunately my Sony Blu-Ray player would not play it, (the Blu-Ray-player is marked AVCHD-compatibel.)

In my SD-days I used to play the finished project throug Firewire to a HDD/DVD-recorder. This is faster than using the arabesk, and the arabesk-DVD's plays only on some DVD-players, not all.

How do I make the best conversion of my HDV-project to DVD. I tried to play analog til the HDD/DVD-recorder. It worked - but the result was a bit pale, watchable but not as good as SD throug Firewire. There was also several jerks, the picture frozed for a very short time, (buffer-overrun?).

Then I tried to use the arabesk to burn the project on a DVD in DVD-quality. The rendering took about 4 hours! - an the result was not very useful. The DVD could be played in three different DVD-players, and on my PC - the good news was, that color on saturation was very fine - the bad news, that all movements was ekstremely jerky, so something went wrong with the conversion. The jerky movements also appeared, when I played the DVD on the S-2000 itself.

The interesting part: the background scene on the DVD-menu is perfect - with no jerks.

Do I have to convert all my scenes from my new camera into a SD-project before editing, to get an good DVD? This is very time consuming.

[BobFoster]

Not all AVCHD players will play back Cassie AVCHD disc, especially Sony Blu-ray players marked "AVCHD". Take your AVCHD disc to a local electronics store and try it on different models. There are some threads on here discussing various makes and models that work. i.e. not too practical for distribution to customers at this point.

[Jeanton]

Hi, I don't have much experience with Blue-Ray burning because I don't own one but I do have experience in burning DVD's.
Even if you have only 22 mins to burn to a DVD I would set the quality to Normal for the most compatibility in play back.
When set to high quality you will have trouble playing them in some players.
Most important is to set the render to intensive - I found the quality to be as good as the original.

[jpjdenmark]

Thank you for answers. I will put aside my AVCHD-ambition for a while and concentrate of creating the best possible DVD from my HDV-project.

Tried once more to make a DVD from my HDV-project using the arabesk. Tried different settings. The result is the same: The DVD can be played, and the background scene in the menu runs smoothly and in very good quality. But the film looks like the jitter-effect has been used on the whole film - perhaps 12 pictures/second? Sound is OK. Has anyone succeded in creating af good DVD from HDV-material using the arabesk, and can anyone explain, why the backgroundpicture in my DVD-menu is OK, when the film is not??

I know how to convert scenens from HDV to DV using the clipboard - but is there a way to convert a whole storyboard?

[TimKennelly]

There is definitely a problem with the interrnal HDV to DV downconvert. It does not matter if you use Arabesk straight with an HDV Project or use Clipboard to manually downconvert.

The awkward and time consuming method that works is to export the HDV Project out to digital tape in HDV format via firewire (Create in the Finish Menu which is required for this takes foooooorever, but works).

Then using the external cam's capability to downconvert the HDV to DV on the fly to a DV Project will result in a superior end product that you can Split into Chapters for DVD use and put on the Storyboard and then Add Film into Arabesk for authoring a DVD.

Tim

[craigpeer]

Then I tried to use the arabesk to burn the project on a DVD in DVD-quality. The rendering took about 4 hours! - an the result was not very useful. The DVD could be played in three different DVD-players, and on my PC - the good news was, that color on saturation was very fine - the bad news, that all movements was ekstremely jerky, so something went wrong with the conversion. The jerky movements also appeared, when I played the DVD on the S-2000 itself.

One thing I have noticed when using the camera to down convert an HDV video to SD and burning a DVD is there are more motion artifacts playing the SD DVD than either the HDV footage or a AVCHD Blu Ray. And I think there are more motion artifacts than when I used to downconvert HDV to SD on my previous Renommee Plus. It still looks acceptably good though.

On the other hand, the AVCHD video burned on Blu Ray disks looks incredible even blown up to ridiculously large screen sizes ( In my case - 10 feet diagonal with a SIM2 projector ). So, if you are attempting to burn Blu rays for your own personal use, buy a Blu Ray player that works and sell the Sony.

[jpjdenmark]

There is definitely a problem with the interrnal HDV to DV downconvert. It does not matter if you use Arabesk straight with an HDV Project or use Clipboard to manually downconvert.

The awkward and time consuming method that works is to export the HDV Project out to digital tape in HDV format via firewire (Create in the Finish Menu which is required for this takes foooooorever, but works).

Then using the external cam's capability to downconvert the HDV to DV on the fly to a DV Project will result in a superior end product that you can Split into Chapters for DVD use and put on the Storyboard and then Add Film into Arabesk for authoring a DVD.

Tim

Thank you for your interest in my problem. Casablaca is a very interesting world to explore - I started in 2000, and I found it a very easy to work with. That was then - this is now! I did not have same experience about downconverting as yuo did. When I used the clipboard, the result was fine without jitter. It took very long time, but it worked. The arabesk-downconversion produced a very disturbing jitter, which most obviously be an error. If there only was a way to downconvert a storyboard instead of scenes, that would help.

Unfortunately my camera can't downconvert. So it seems that to produce a DVD, I have to choose between clipboard downconversion (the slow solution) or to go analog.

If I want to finish my project in HDV as well as DV quality, I will have to edit the project two times. Or?
Jørgen

[TimKennelly]

The Clipboard issue I mentioned is NTSC only I believe, are you using the PAL version?

[jpjdenmark]

The Clipboard issue I mentioned is NTSC only I believe, are you using the PAL version?

Yes, I use PAL