DVD playback problems
 

I created a DVD of a FCP project via Compressor using one of the Compressor presets. The DVD plays back fine on my laptop but on (an admittedly cheap) DVD player all the slow motion effects are horribly juddery. Does anyone know why and if there is a solution?

Also, though I'm pleased with the quality of the compression Compressor gives, the most noticeable change for me from the original is washed out colours which are of high importance in the film. Can this be mitigated?

Cheers,

Geoff

what are your sequence/compressor settings etc etc? do you render pro res?

Brian,

I use the PAL preset on FCP (25fps, 4:3 aspect ratio render in 8-bit YUV). I exported the film to QT Movie (using 'current settings') then used this in Compressor and used the MPEG-2 6.2Mbps 90 minutes preset (not mutiplexed, audio exported separately). I then combined both in Toast to burn the DVD - don't have DVD Studio Pro. Didn't use Prores as when I tried this it took ages, created a massive file and the resulting QT file looked no different from using current settings (DV-PAL I guess). Quite new to all this!!

Geoff

i know rendering transitions/color correction/slow motion in pro res will do a better job with HDV, but not sure about DV... files should not be too huge rendering pro res, as it just affects the renders... i also un-check frame blending in the motion tab for slow motion and it looks better *on certain material*.
maybe try rendering out the sequence directly with compressor as it may do a better job than the QT to compressor route with transitions, CC, etc.
also, the differences between computer monitors and TVs are large: what looks 'color corrected' on my computer rarely looks 'correct' on a TV, so i do A-B tests to spot check the quality between the two. not sure about footage that plays fine on computer and is 'juddery' on a cheap dvd player... maybe it has problems with the bit rate... i'm not too schooled on that topic!!!
a decent way to get in the CC ballpark is to used the 'auto' white, black and mid buttons in 3 way CC, and then use the eyedroppers if there are obvious whites and blacks. mids are harder to find, and if you find a good white and black, it seems to be ok to not attempt the mid.. i know in photoshop one can duplicate the image, leave it on top of the original, invert it (not the rotation!!!) and switch the blending mode to 'difference'. the resulting image will show any perfect grey mids as black. mark a spot as close to 99% grayscale as possible, hide/delete the duplicate image and sample that spot with the mid eyedropper and it 'should' remove any color cast... have not tried this in FCP CC though...

Thanks Brian - very useful advice. I'll try Pro res again. Can't do it direct to Compressor as it crashes FCP every time I launch it!! (i'd already turned frame blendinq off as this was affecting transitions in FCP as it was)

The colour problem is odd and not to do with monitors as I compared the QT file and m2v file together on my laptop and the m2v file is definitely a bit washed out. Maybe some boosting of colours in Compressor will help... must admit CC is not something I've done much of.