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720p to DVD – Interlaced or Progressive?
If I take a 720 60p file into Compressor, the auto settings default to Lower Field First rather than Progressive. Does anyone know why that is? Is it better to produce an interlaced DVD, even though the source video is Progressive? If I change the Compressor setting to Progresive, I get a slightly sharper, crisper DVD, but a couple of my DVE transitions don’t play as smoothly as they do on the interlaced DVD.
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16 Replies
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If your footage was @ 23.98 fps you could make a 23.98 progressive SD-DVD, but 720p 59.94 (60) corresponds neatly to 29.97 fps, which is interlaced in SD.
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Thanks guys. So, if I understand correctly, if I shoot & Edit in 60p, I should make an interlaced DVD. If I shoot & edit in 30p, I should do a Progressive DVD.
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So, I guess Compressor is pretty smart after all.
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Yeah, it’s pretty smart, but I find that some 720p59.94 material looks awful using the standard Compressor DVD settings. It gets all blocky and jaggie on high contrast diagonal lines. I have no idea what Compressor is doing to get that result, but it’s very ugly.
It looks much better when I specify Progressive in the video format section. Compressor then makes 30p.
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In my case, using the Progressive setting yielded superior results with the exception of a couple of jittery DVE transitions. Those smooth out if I use the interlaced setting, but the image is not as crisp.
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I could be wrong about this but I don’t think a 30p DVD is within the DVD spec… I think only 24p (23.98) and 29.97 (interlaced) are valid for NTSC.
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“It’ll be just as progressive as a 24p DVD… which means a frame is actually composed of two fields. ”
Huh? If a frame is composed of two fields, it’s not progressive…right?
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I’ll display my ignorance on this. I think that 23.976p is definitely part of the DVD spec, that Compressor can make true progressive 23.976 files, and that DVD players will display that as progressive frames on the proper progressive monitors. Am I wrong about that? If so, can you explain?
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[Tom Brooks] “I think that 23.976p is definitely part of the DVD spec”
You are correct. Graeme’s article can explain things better than I can. The following excerpt was written in 2005 but is still true today:
“The advantages are that it gets you nearer the look of film, and, if you remove the extra frames and edit in a 23.98p timeline, you can make a 24p DVD (See pages 45 and 90 of the DVD Studio Pro 3 manual for full details on making a 24p DVD) which will look better than the same video as a “normal” 29.97 DVD because less frames of video have to be fit on the disc and hence a higher bit rate can be used for the remaining frames.”
https://www.kenstone.net/fcp_homepage/beyond_dv_nattress.html
– Don
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23.98 Progressive DVD’s are definitely within spec. I make them all the time.
I have never tried to make a 30p DVD. I didn’t even think it was possible, so I will defer to Dave.
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