VHS-to-DVD Transfer for Asia
 

Haven't been here in a while, and am running back in need of help, please.

I'm in NJ and someone's asked me to transfer excerpts of VHS footage to DVD for use "...in Asia.". That's all I know so far. I don't know what country(s) he'll be visiting.

I'm presuming the source footage is NTSC. (I'll learn if that's true within a day or 2).
Meanwhile, a review of Encore Help shows this claim:
"You can allow all regions to play your DVD, or only a select number of them. Region coding only works on replicated DVDs. Projects written directly to DVD-R will have all regions enabled."
If my understanding of that is correct, then, because this will be a new project, my concern over region coding seems moot.
I suspect a region-free DVD created this way will work anywhere. (That would be a benefit for the customer, in case he needs to use this DVD in other countries/regions).

My plan at present is to:
1) capture the footage into an NTSC project via PPro 2.0,
2) edit per client preferences,
3) output as an .avi,
4) build necessary, but simple, menu(s) in either PPro, Encore, and/or Photoshop,
4) import the .avi and menu(s) to Encore,
5) build and burn the final DVD from Encore.

But, I'm confused about the NTSC/PAL issue. Does PAL need to be a consideration in completing this project? Do I even have to be concerned about it, i.e. if the source footage is NTSC, and I output it to a region-free DVD, must I also do something else/make some other setting to accommodate PAL standards? (In case you can't tell, I've never had to consider this before).

I'm wondering if I must make certain initial project settings in PPro 2.0. What should they be for this project:
DV-NTSC/Standard 48Hz?
DV-PAL/Standard 32HZ?
DV-PAL/Standard 48Hz?
Something else?
(It's my understanding that initial project setting relates more to capture, the "interim" processing of the project and how it is handled, than to the incoming/source footage. But what about the output? Is that all handled by Encore during the DVD build)?

If it helps any, this is to be used to supplement a presentation of some micro-surgery procedures at a medical conference, so it's likely to be projected. (Does that require special processing/considerations)?

I'm running the entire CS2 suite on XP, with experience and knowledge far from being a Master...more like an experienced apprentice or beginner journeyman.

Input from knowledgeable/experienced folks invited.

Thanks.

Your suspicion confirmed
 

Beyond the region code, you will need to consider the TV standard as well, because while some DVD players won't care about the standard (for example most Philips players here in the States will spit out NTSC even if I play a PAL disk - but the disk MUST be region-free or written for region one), most will only play the one made for. Same applies overseas.

If this is going to be projected from a computer, I would do a high quality Windows Media file. You may also consider MPEG-1 which is really the most universally supported video but it's fairly low quality by the standard specs).

If you know for sure it has to be projected from a DVD player, you have to find out what TV standard they use in the country. Short of that, make one PAL and one NTSC disks 'just in case'.

BUT! Don't even think about using anything Adobe for the NTSC to PAL transcode if you want quality. And again, since your source material is VHS (low quality) to start with... it might not be an issue.