Help w/ Sharpening AfterEffects video + Understanding i vs p
 

So I kinda get the whole idea behind rendering stuff out with field dominance set, and importing into NLE with the same, but I think I need some help to definitevly understand what I should be doing to get a nice, sharp, video/animation.

Background:
We're editing stuff at work on Avid (shot p2 DVCProHD 1080i), and we import an animation from After Effects, and we get interpolation and interlacing problems. We do a little searching and we come to the conclusion that DVCProHD is 1080i, and that 1080i is always Upper/Odd Fields First. Right? We screwed around with our after effects project and tried so many things that I'm still confused... So I want to get a standard list of rules to operate by/be aware of... prompting a series of tests...

So I create a test, with 2 photoshop circles, one with project settings at 1080p SqPx, one set at DVCProHD 1.5px. I stick these circles on an AE composition (HDTV 1920x1080p SqPx) and I animate these across the screen. I tell AE to intepret the layers from the DVCProHD import as UpperField.

The first time I render w/o setting field dominance, and upon importing into Avid w/o setting dominance, I get the same interpolation problem as my main animation had; no on my NLE monitor, but on my output via Avid Mojo to LCD.

Second time, I change AE's render to Upper/Odd field dominance. Import into Avid with same setting, and viola, no more interpolation problem on LCD, but text appears with jagged, interlace type edges.

I saw someone online suggest trying AE's deinterlace effect, which seems to just blur things. Now, this appears to have worked in eliminating jagged edges from video clips in our main project, but here in my test animation, it didn't eliminate the interlace edges , only made everything slightly more blurry.

What am I missing here? (additionally things just appear pix-elated)



How do you guys deal with this? What do you specifically set things at for renders and imports, and if you don't mind, why? <-- I'm kinda thinking I'm insane because I didn't feel like I had much to worry about before, but now I feel hopeless.

Appreciate it.