DVD studio question
 

Hello - I'm new to this site and it came highly recommended as the place to go for questions... so here's mine....

I have the latest FCP and edited a clip and inserted it into the exsisting video. I used Compressor and used that in DVD studio pro to build a menu. When I edited it in FCP, everything looked fine.

When I playback the burned copy, (or even if I watch it in simulate mode) I see digital 'spots' at the begining of my edits. It's too noticable for air, and looks like when an old VHS tape when you mess with the tracking. It only happens twice, at two main edits and goes back to normal after a few seconds. Anyone know what caused this and how to fix?

Have you tried re-exporting out of Compressor? Maybe something went wrong the first time round?

Try it all again, and if the same problems pop up, let us know, and we'll try and help...

A friend of mine recently went through very similar experiences and was pulling his hair out trying to find solutions. He rendered and exported mulitple times and although the digital 'spotting' was always in slightly different locations from version to version, they were always there and extremely distracting.

After approaching the problem from a variety of angles by addressing the use of his applications, and not being able to solve it, we began looking at his general computing use and OS maintenance.

In the end, I found that he had spent some of the last several weeks running a variety of installs and de-installations (some of which was from questionable sources and notably buggy), tinkering in and around system folders, and only having his system on when it was in use - hence not allowing the Unix based nightly and weekly self maintenance processes to run, (or at least using third party solutions to run them on command.)

After running some system diagnostics, we discovered his systems to be running with an alarmingly high degree of file fragmentation.

Theoretically, I suppose it is possible that due to the extreme fragmentation, the data input was lagging behind the data output for either the compression or the 'burn' (virtual or otherwise) and was creating errors or digital dropout on the end product.

After cleaning up his system and optimizing his files, his next attempt produced a perfect DVD.

I'm not sure if that is the same problem in your case, but it worked in his case.

Good luck.

-Jon

I had digital artifacting for a long time in DVDSP, I realized that in my haste to save time compressing in compressor, I was choosing single pass, once I went to 2 pass my problem went away.

I cant confirm Jonathans method because I verify and clean my computers on a regular basis.

Even if it is a small clip you want to put in DVDSP, running through compressor first is a good idea.