[Pat Adams]

Got it! Your advice also made me realize I was doing something else wrong, but all in all, I’m much more satisfied with my results and happy now that I more or less understand the “why” of my problem.

Many thanks!

ETA:

If I have some clips in my movie that are 1920x1080p, e.g. and others only 720×402, I assume I should render according to the smallest size, but will the 1080 clips look worse this way, or will there be no change in the quality of the rendered video?

[Pat Adams]

I thought a vid could be rendered however one likes if the source and project were the same. I see I was wrong.

I did just as you suggest and rendered at 720×402. It looks pretty good but far from perfect so am I correct in assuming that considering the source video I’ll never get great results?

I’ve added “Sharpen” from Media FX to all clips and that helped as well.

Thank you for your patience in replying. The technical side of Vegas is going to take some time to learn.

I’m sure I’ll be back with more questions.

[Pat Adams]

The source video (.mp4) is:

Frame width: 720
Frame height:402

Data rate: 903kbps
Total bitrate: 1034kbps

Could the source be the problem?

[Pat Adams]

I’ve used a variety of settings, including variable bit rates, based on tutorials. This is the one I used just a few minutes ago. I’m using Vegas Pro 12, if that’s important.

[Pat Adams]

The problem is that my actual rendered video itself was soft/blurry looking – unlike the original imported clips – looking just as it did in Preview (Best), which I had been using. I just did switch to Preview (Auto) on your suggestion and will try it that way by re-importing several clips and seeing if they’re sharper in the final rendered product.

Perhaps my Render Settings are not optimal either, since I’ve seen several different variations on what is considered “Best”.

I may need advice on the definitive best render settings as well.

Thanks for your reply, John!