Slippery slope.

Good quality and compression are opposites. Best quality is acheived at non compressed.

The short answer is there is no ONE magic setting. You should have your master video at highest quality and if you want to put a copy on the web you compress a copy for web, you want to dump to an iPod or similar, compress a version for that etc...

Look for Sorenson Cleaner, media compression app with lots of pre-built settings to cover most needs.

Scott

Ok, that makes sense. So I'll leave the video as is and I'll look into that software to compress files for the web and emailing etc...

I guess that brings me to another question. Is it the MiniDV tape causing the lower quality? It's not bad, maybe I'm being too critical. Maybe I'll post one on youtube or something like that and you guys can tell me what you think.

Mini DV as a format is high quality. It's digital, not analog so the only way the source would be bad is if the camera itself does not have the best lens or CCD. If the camera has trouble dealing with low light situations you will get a lot of "noise" and "grain".

I used to use a Sony TRV series camera, awesome quality but not a very durable camera. Cost $1,200 six years ago and spent a lot of time in the shop for various repairs.

Dumped it and got a Panasonic for $300 for the family stuff. Color saturation, white balance and metering not as good as the Sony but it's small, works and is cheap enough that if it goes belly after warranty there is no guilt in ditching it. Plus I deal with the drawbacks in post.

Couple of things can be happening.

1) When you capture use uncompressed setting and save as your master source. Your software could be doing something funky on import/saving.

2) A lot of video editing software does not really preview in hi res mode. Or put another way what you see while working with the clip is not always a true representation of the quality. Working with a lo res preview is easier for the SW and CPU to deal with.

You see the full quality after you build and publish your project (depending on your output settings of course)

A quick read, http://www.wave-report.com/tutorials/VC.htm

Scott

I think that's it. My previous videos were nice and clear. The test videos that I've been doing have been after work in the house. Artifical light, cause it's dark outside. I'll try again this weekend outsided and see what happens.

Thanks for that link.....

You can also test indoors by pointing the camera close to a light source. I get noise in my house, as I do not have the brightest lights at night. Pointing any of my cameras towards one of the lights works well for me late at night.

Dave

Now I have a movie imported on my computer now. So now my question is what format does it need to be in to play on a DVD player? Right now it's in .wmv format. Will that work?

You need a piece of software that will encode it for DVD.

DVD players will look for an Audio_TS and Video_TS folder. Audio_TS will be empty and the Video_TS folder will contain .vob files.

Some disc burning software (Roxio Toast) will let you burn rudimentary DVD's, you drop the video in and it does the coversion. You won't get fancy chapters and transition but you'll get the basics.

If your computer came with a DVD burner it may have come with a free piece of software.

The simpler the software the better. Too many options are not a good thing in the beginning.

When you get to Single Pass and VBR options let me know. You can make a lot of coasters real easy.

Scott