• DVD Authoring

  30 minutes of ProRes to DVD – Downconvert first?

  Posted by Paul Harrill on February 28, 2008 at 4:21 pm

  HI all,

  I’ve searched the forums and archives on this and can’t seem to find an answer. Apologies in advance if this has been answered elsewhere.

  I am finishing up a 30 minute show and am needing to author some (standard def) DVDs. Everything was shot/edited on DVCProHD 24p, finished in Color, and output from Color using Apple’s ProRes 422 (HQ) format.

  When I export a QuickTime of the show and compress it using Compressor the results have been ok, except in the darker footage (e.g., nighttime bedroom scenes). This footage looks very blocky. However, the original footage isn’t blocky in FCP, and the same goes for the Color output in ProRes.

  This leads me to believe it’s my compression settings.

  As I said, I’ve been doing a self-contained QT out of FCP. Then dropping that into Compressor. Settings I’ve used in my tests:

  – 90 min best / VBR two pass best / 6.8 to 8.0
  – 90 min best / CBR 8.0

  When I use Compressor’s “Noise Reduction” filter (using the default settings) it just makes things very blurry, which is worse than the blockiness.

  Any ideas? Should I downconvert from ProRes to something else first?

  As I said, I’m trying to get the best looking DVD I can, preferably optimized for 16:9. Since it’s a 30 minute show I figure I can crank up the bitrate (but know I can only go so far).

  Thanks for any assistance.

  Paul

  Noah Kadner replied 18 years, 2 months ago 2 Members · 1 Reply
• 1 Reply

• 

  Noah Kadner

  February 29, 2008 at 1:31 am

  I go to ProRes 16:9 SD first and then use that as my master for MPEG-2.

  Noah

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