[Daniel Ludwig]

christopher,
your workflow is the problem….

DVD has 720×480 (NTSC) and 720×576 (PAL), so you can´t encode 720p-MPEG2, because it needs to be SD-Video.

export your video as selfcontained movie to your harddisc and then transcode it to SD-MPEG2 and dolby AC3 using adobe media encoder if you need to create a DVD.

if you would like to have crisp HD-video on disc you need to create a blu-ray disc, no DVD.

cheers

danny

[Daniel Ludwig]

james,
don´t burn the disc straight away – start creating a disc-image on the harddisc.

maybe you have bad media, or maybe your DVD-burner is the issue. allways use high quality brands for media like verbatim or tayo juden, don´t use best-buy low quality/low cost-media.

cheers

danny

[Daniel Ludwig]

…. more infomations needed – nothings in the christal ball.

codec? resolution? framerate of your edition-sequenz? you are going to create DVD or blu-ray?

….. and lot more. there´s no less information that you can give than you posted.

[Daniel Ludwig]

Hi Bill,
oh – good you mentioned DVD instead of Blu-ray.

first of all:
if you going the DVD-way you need to transcode your video-files to MPEG2 (SD). H264 is used if your transcoding HD-clips for blu-ray.

there was a misunderstanding, I thought you would like to create a blu-ray.

anyway it doesn´t make any sence to transcode your videos to H264, because it´s not a part of the DVD-specs and they would be re-transcoded within encore a 2nd time.

the workflow that you need to do is nearly the same as you would do with blu-ray:

export your videos as self-contained movies to your harddisc, and start transcoding the clips using any transcoder (like adobe media encoder).

IMPORTANT: you need to do a bitbudgeting, that´s a calculation which bitrate you need to use to not overfill the disc with your content.

there are several free bitbudgeting-tools available (google is your friend 😉 )

it doesn´t make sence to bring all your films into one single timeline and programm the disc with the 4 individual parts of it as long as you wont have a “play all”-button. in that case it would make sence, in all others it wont.

let´s start rocking….

cheers

danny

[Daniel Ludwig]

Bill,
the (normal) way to go is to export your videos from encore as self-contained movie to your harddisc.

then you should transcode the videos using any encoder (like adobe media encoder) to H264-video and AC-3 dolby digital audio.

when the transcoding is finished you have to import these assets into encore to start authoring.

cheers

danny

NOTE: author do not use unencoded assets like MOV or AVI.

2nd NOTE: if you need to create a motion-menu for your BD, you should encode it to MPEG2HD, but this for menus only.

[Daniel Ludwig]

jon,
can you upload your PS-Menu-File, so we can have a look at it?

cheers

danny

[Daniel Ludwig]

Bill,
before you do a trial and error, you should look at the DVD-specs.

it could handle:

720x576px (PAL) and 720x480px (NTSC). so you´ll be sticked to these picture-scales.

I would guess you´re trying to burn an DIVX AVI on a DVD, so your picture-scale is to small to fit the full screen.

that´s the reason why you could seen the black frames arround your video.

cheers

danny

[Daniel Ludwig]

as chris replied – all is looking good so far, but I would advice to use H264, as you can use lower bitrates at the same picture-quality, so you have more space for content on your BD.

if you need to have 35-38MBits with MPEG2 you can use 18-20MBit with H264 for example.

cheers

danny

[Daniel Ludwig]

Solat,
that´s one of the bad limititions of encore, you just can use dolby digital audio or PCM audio with blu-ray.

the normal DTS-file that be needed for DVD are supported withing encore but they are not valid for blu-ray, as DTS-files for BD has to be different.

so if you really needs to get DTS and dolby AC3 on your BD you need to use other (professional) tools.

I would advice DVD Logic EasyBD:

https://www.dvd-logic.com/easybd/

but it´s a bunch of things to learn – as it´s a spec-authoring-tool.

cheers

danny

[Daniel Ludwig]

NOP, wont agree with MPEG.

encore will exept MPEG2(HD) or H264 for blu-ray.

you need to set the transcoding-settings within your project-settings at the start of your project to match your H264-file, otherwise it will be transcoded again!

NOTE: all menus will allways be transcoded to MPEG2HD, so for menus you should use MPEG2 or quicktime-movies and let encore do the transcoding-job.

also be awared that HDV nativly only have 1440×1080 and no 1920×1080, that could also cause the problem, as you need to set that within your project preferences/transcoding-settings as well.

compressor H264 are 100%-BD-spec-complient and will be accepted by encore.

cheers

danny