Quality for dvds at DVinfo.net

John Cambell · October 7th, 2008, 06:34 PM

My question is when outputting movies to dvds and things. Is the quality better when you are using final cut studio rather then just final cut express and idvd. I know that final cut studio comes with final cut pro and another program for making dvds, and compressor. Do these produce better quality movies??

Shaun Roemich · October 7th, 2008, 07:12 PM

Ultimately, if you know what you are doing, yes.

iDVD uses a Constant Bitrate encoder set to provide 1 hour of footage on a DVD. Compressor allows you to choose multipass VBR (variable bitrate) encoding which is higher quality at a given bit rate.

If you know how to use the tools from beginning to end (camera, capture, codec choice, edit, export, encoding) you SHOULD end up with a significantly better result. If you are flying by the seat of your pants, messing up ANY of the above steps will jeopardize your final output. Be realistic about your ability and knowledge and use the APPROPRIATE tool, which isn't ALWAYS the most expensive.

Dominik Seibold · October 8th, 2008, 04:41 AM

Btw, the best mpeg2-encoder there is is the Cinema Craft Encoder. It produces far better quality than Compressors mpeg2-encoder. There's a a plugin for FCP, but it's expensive. The cheap "basic"-version exists only for windows, but there's a simple workflow, if you have a Fusion or Parallels:
Output uncompressed QuickTime with Compressor and use that as input for CCE in Windows.
Btw, CCE is really fast, too.

October 7th, 2008, 06:34 PM	#1
John Cambell Regular Crew Join Date: May 2008 Location: Haiku Hawaii Posts: 83	Quality for dvds My question is when outputting movies to dvds and things. Is the quality better when you are using final cut studio rather then just final cut express and idvd. I know that final cut studio comes with final cut pro and another program for making dvds, and compressor. Do these produce better quality movies??

October 7th, 2008, 07:12 PM	#2
Shaun Roemich Inner Circle Join Date: Sep 2002 Location: Vancouver, British Columbia (formerly Winnipeg, Manitoba) Canada Posts: 4,088	Ultimately, if you know what you are doing, yes. iDVD uses a Constant Bitrate encoder set to provide 1 hour of footage on a DVD. Compressor allows you to choose multipass VBR (variable bitrate) encoding which is higher quality at a given bit rate. If you know how to use the tools from beginning to end (camera, capture, codec choice, edit, export, encoding) you SHOULD end up with a significantly better result. If you are flying by the seat of your pants, messing up ANY of the above steps will jeopardize your final output. Be realistic about your ability and knowledge and use the APPROPRIATE tool, which isn't ALWAYS the most expensive. __________________ Shaun C. Roemich Road Dog Media - Vancouver, BC - Videographer - Webcaster www.roaddogmedia.ca Blog: http://roaddogmedia.wordpress.com/

October 8th, 2008, 04:41 AM	#3
Dominik Seibold Major Player Join Date: May 2008 Location: Nuremberg, Germany Posts: 285	Btw, the best mpeg2-encoder there is is the Cinema Craft Encoder. It produces far better quality than Compressors mpeg2-encoder. There's a a plugin for FCP, but it's expensive. The cheap "basic"-version exists only for windows, but there's a simple workflow, if you have a Fusion or Parallels: Output uncompressed QuickTime with Compressor and use that as input for CCE in Windows. Btw, CCE is really fast, too.