[MacDV] Re: Formats...

[Mark M. Florida]

> This is an AfterEffect project. No DV footage used. The "none" or
> uncompressed version looks great, the "DV codec" compressed version
> looked soft.

The DV version will look "soft" on your computer, but will look excellent
when output to video -- that's what it's designed for -- full-motion
playback on your computer screen (though not full-res), and
full-motion/full-res output to video.  Using the "None" codec or any other
QuickTime codec should yield appropriate results on your computer screen,
but will still need to be converted to whatever codec your final output
device supports (again, DV for FCP or iMovie through FireWire).

> The none version stuttered on my machine and I was wondering if that
> was a function of the computer and whether that limitation would be
> overcome by the compression applied when making a DVD.

I think everyone's kind of confused by this...  When you make a DVD, it
makes essentially no difference what format the source video is in (other
than quality difference) -- the video is COMPLETELY DIFFERENT when it comes
out -- a metamorphosis of sorts.  The main factor of DVD quality is going to
be what level of compression you use to compress the DVD video.  iDVD uses a
fairly high bit-rate MPEG-2 compression to yield the best results on the
final output.  However, when using another DVD compression tool like DVD
Studio pro (the MPEG-2 export QuickTime component) or Cleaner, you can
manually set the bit rate higher to achieve a much better looking DVD (less
MPEG-2 motion artifacts), or a lower bit rate to fit more on a DVD-R, but at
a lower quality as well.

The end-product quality difference of creating a DVD with iDVD from a DV vs.
"None" codec source will be extremely small -- almost non-existent -- they
will look the same when viewed on a TV -- don't worry about it...

Matthew, going back to your old issue of playback performance on your
computer, if you just want to get a motion preview of your AE project, then
you should probably use a computer playback-friendly codec like MJPEG-A or
Photo-JPEG at 1/4 screen size (320x240), then when you're sure it's good,
make a DV version at 720x480 for output to video (via DVD or otherwise).
Yes, it will look "soft" on your computer screen, but will play back fine.
I have yet to use a computer that can playback uncompressed video (that's
what the "None" codec is) without the assistance of an uncompressed video
editing card...

> 
>> I not sure I understand the "run not as good", though. Are you saying
>> that
>> if the original DV-compressed shoot is rendered without a codec and
>> then
>> burned to a DVD, it will have problems running on a standalone player?
>> jb

To clarify -- a DVD video player will only play a properly formatted DVD
*video* disc created with iDVD or DVD Studio Pro using MPEG-2 video.  It is
possible to back up the video *DATA* to a DVD-R disc, but think of it as
creating a 4.7 GB data CD-R (absolutely no DVD video player playback
capability -- for data storage only)...

Hope all that helps some...

- Mark