To summarize the situation:
– Render out your project to Animation codec (full quality, millions of colors) or similar. Yes, the file will be huge, if it were tiny the quality would suffer tremendously. Big file = higher quality (usually).
– If the goal is to create a DVD that can be played back in DVD players, pull your huge file into your DVD authoring application and author a disc. Upon output, the DVD authoring program will automatically compress the video to fit on your DVD. The result is almost always very good, unless you tweak the authoring program’s output settings incorrectly and screw it up.
– If you need the actual Quicktime file on a disc, rather than an authored DVD, then you will instead need to open your huge Animation codec file with a program that compresses video – Quicktime Pro is a high quality and cheap option. Output a Quicktime movie with h.264 compression set to highest quality with automatic keyframes. The resulting file will fit on a standard DVD with tons of room to spare.
– As Dave mentioned, don’t use After Effects to output compressed video, ever. It’s just not made for that. Get used to outputting uncompressed/Animation codec videos that are huge and need further treatment for delivery to your audience. That’s the standard workflow, so best to get used to it now.
Good Luck!
Brendan Coots
Splitvision Digital
http://www.splitvisiondigital.com