[Andrew Seely]

On their submissions sites, they ask for PAL dvd screeners.

[Andrew Seely]

Thanks guys.

The dvd came out great at 23.98 fps and the sound is perfectly synched. I guess that just means the 23.98 to 29.97 conversion messed up my video/sound synch.

Glad to know that 23.98 fps will play just fine on stand alone SD NTSC DVD players.

[Andrew Seely]

No, not in Ventura. Los Angeles

Thanks for the help. I agree with you. Doing it is the best way to learn it.

[Andrew Seely]

Thanks John. I will burn the dvd at the same settings, but without the frame rate conversion. Will post back again in a few days after the dvd is burned to let you know if it worked. Please if you have time, check the post because I may still need help.

I am not sure about the sound being recorded at 24fps. All I know is we shot on S16mm at 24fps and recorded sound separately on a fostex. Then, we digitized the footage to hdcam 23.98. So, my fcp sequence is 23.98fps.

My post-production sound guy delivered me the sound as two tracks (stereo). he used protools and output it as one large track that I dropped into my 23.98 fcp timeline and synched up perfectly with the footage using a 2 pop and tail pop. Worked great.

The sound being out of synch only happens when I do the conversion to 29.97 fps (I was told north american dvd players could only play SD NTSC 29.97fps). In fcp and when I make quicktimes using the 1920×1080 HD 16:9 23.98 fps sequence/film, the resulting qt file is still perfectly synched.

Hopefully, when I make the next dvd keeping it at 23.98 fps, there will be no sound problem and it will play on all my dvd players. Ill let you know.

[Andrew Seely]

Eric,

Thanks for the help.

You are right. I spent the better part of yesterday and yesterday night playing with compressor, reading all types of forums on it, etc. Trial and error is definitely the way to go. I finally started, what I hope to be, a nice mpeg-2/ac3 compression of my project this morning. Everything is starting to make sense in compressor…meaning both how to use the program as well was what all the specs and options mean and do (their purposes).

The one thing I did differently than your recommendation (I submitted the compressor project before you posted or I might not have done this) was change the GOP size from 15 to 7. I left the GOP closed (this was the default option) and with the default structure. The reason I switched it from 15 to 7 was because I have numerous fades to/from black as well as numerous cross dissolves in my film. From my research, it seems a smaller GOP size works better for these parts…but in turn a larger GOP size works for other parts. I hope it turns out all right and this change wasn’t a critical error. I guess if it comes out all screwed up looking, I will try to compress again at the 15 GOP size.

For great compression, I guess you need that cinema craft encoder mp compressor plug-in so that you can have a variable GOP size so that during dissolves and transitions the size goes down and the rest of the time the size remains higher. I just don’t have the $800 to buy it.

Once again, thanks Eric. You’ve been a huge help. As you can tell, my school doesn’t focus on tech and post-production as much as it should, but it is good about focusing on pre-production and production creativity and strategy. Learning compressor and dvd studio pro outside of class is definitely a must and better than not learning it at all.

[Andrew Seely]

Eric,
Aahahahhaha. Yes, I figured out something else obvious. I can control the presets now. I just had to add it to the project, then hit the inspector button at the top…then just hit the gear buttons to the right of the spec. options. Finally, I’m figuring some stuff out through frustrating trial and error.
Well, know that I know how to adjust them…what should I adjust them to (this relates to the questions I’ve asked in the posted response preceding this one)?
Thanks again for your help.

[Andrew Seely]

Eric,

I am an idiot. I haven’t used compressor much at all as you can tell. I see what is going on. The icons seen in inspector in your downloadable compressor preview become active after you choose specific encoding settings, not when you have chosen the qt file to encode.

I can’t seem to control the encoder, frame controller or anything. I really am a compressor newbie. I apologize for my lack of knowledge with this program. It’s quite embarassing.

I choose a preset from the left “settings” tab. I choose the “dvd folder” and then the “dvd best quality 90 min. folder”. Then, when I click on the dolby digital professional 2.0 or the mpeg-2 6.2mbps 2-pass presets, I see all the stuff in inspector and can view all the specs of the presets, but can’t change the specs to match what you suggested in your last post. How can I choose the mpeg 2 format, 90 minute 2 pass but then change it’s specs to what I want?

When I figure out how to change the specs in the inspector box:
Under encoder/video format, should I change the frame rate from 23.98 to 29.97? How about the video format? In quality, what avg. bitrate and max bitrate do you suggest?

You have answered what I should do under the frame control section. Should I do anything under the geometry section? Mess with the frame size?

Also, do you suggest making a self-contained qt at current settings and then bringing it into compressor, a reference qt at current settings and then bringing it into compressor, or going straight to compressor from fcp?

Sorry about all the questions. I really do appreciate your help.

[Andrew Seely]

Eric,

Thanks for your help and downloadable diagram. I have the newest version of compressor (3.0.5) and don’t seem to have the same setup as your diagram shows in the inspector. I have a bunch of setting presets to the left of the inspector box to choose from. I chose 90 minute best quality which applied a mpeg-2 6.2mbps 2-pass to the video and a dolby digital professional 2.0 conversion to the audio.
I am now compressing/converting and hoping for the best.

Will the footage in the preview window to the right of the inspector box be of very poor quality or is it a good example of what I can expect my footage to look like on dvd?

[Andrew Seely]

Eric,

Thanks for the response.

I understand that compressor will convert the quicktime file into two separate files: a video mpeg-2 and an audio ac-3…that I can then bring into dvd studio pro and create a dvd from.

But will compressor change my fps from 23.98 to 29.97?

I was told that to create a standard definition NTSC dvd that will play on stand alone dvd players, the movie had to be at 29.97 fps. So, is compressor changing the video to mpeg-2 and 29.97 fps, or changing it to mpeg-2 and leaving it at 23.98 fps?

[Andrew Seely]

Thanks Walter. You’ve been a big help.