Blurry photos - Premiere Elements 11

Question

(System) Windows 8 64 bit, Core i5 4670 CPU @ 3.40GHz, 8 GB DDR ram, GeForce GTX 650 - Nvidia/MSI - GeForce 320.49 Driver.
Hello I recently purchased Premiere Elements 11 and Photoshop Elements 11.  My first project was a success which included video and photos of my camping trip.  I burned that project to DVD.  My second project was created through PSE which was a slideshow from photos downloaded from Facebook (small images).  I burned that project to DVD.  My thrid project was another slideshow using photos from my camera.  I burned this project to DVD.  Unfortunately the pictures came out really blurry.
After reading the forums here I resized my photos to 1000x750 pixels however, my photos still came out blurry. 
After hours of troubleshooting, I decided to try to re-create my first successful movie which had still photos that were not blurry.  I used the same pictures and this time my pictures came out blurry.  Is there a setting I changed for this to happen?  The photo size from my 1st project is 4608x3456 pixels 7.73 MB.
I'm new to editing therefore I apologize in advance if I left out some critical information.
Thanks,

Answer 1

Moonpie,
Glad that you are enjoying the journey. For me too, that is part of the whole process. Yes, handing off a successful DVD, or BD, to a client, who loves the work, is rewarding, but continuing to learn, in the process is a big payoff too - at least for some of us.
I started way back when video was relegated to the studio only, with either a direct feed to the studio's switcher, or to a 2" tape deck. Back then, the video could only be edited by making a 45 degree diagonal cut with a razor blade, and then applying tape to splice that back together. I was working in film, as the quality and the look were so much better, and my cameras could easily leave the studio. Still, I was limited to one Audio track, to a Butt-Cut, a Fade to Black (that name changed to Dip-to-Black for digital Video), or a Cross-Dissolve (we called that a "Lap-Dissolve"). To see any of those, one had to have the two reels of film "printed" in the lab, and took at least a day - a day, before we could see if we had done well. Our editing rooms were filled with "laundry carts," or "bins," with 100's of yards of little film clips actually clipped to a rack over the bins.
I did not get back to video, until it had gone digital. Oh my, how things had changed! Even with the rudimentary software of the day, it was easy to see the technical and creative power, and that power was intoxicating.
As I had a cine background, plus many years as an advertising photographer, the last decade spent with Photoshop, it was easy for me to define a workflow for my video editing.
I was shooting only SD (Standard Definition) miniDV tape-based material, so it was easy to learn what Project Preset I should be using - NTSC DV, in either Standard 4:3, or Widescreen 16:9, at 29.97 FPS w/ 48KHz 16-bit Audio. That was it, and was so simple. The NLE (Non Linear Editor) programs of the day were powerful, BUT were still quite simple, compared to what we have today.
As I explored more, I realized that I could bring my creativity from my film days, to video, and the program would empower me for so much more. I got better, and better, learning something with each Project, and soon opened my doors to do commercial editing. Almost immediately, I began being handed all sorts of footage by clients, and some of it not meant to be edited - but I still had to edit it. That is where I learned about various file formats, and CODEC's, and also conversion programs. Though I had faced myriad formats with Photoshop, I found that was nothing, compared to the formats, and CODEC's of video. Lot of learning, but that was fun too.
As I had spent so many years doing commercial still photography, it was natural that I also began producing SlideShows, where I got to experiment with Image Sizes and also formats. More learning, through my experiments.
DVD-Video we my most common final output, and that brought a strict set of specifications, that had to be adhered to, for the DVD-Video to work properly.
In my experiments, my eyes told me that I was best off, if I did the Scaling of my camera images in Photoshop, with either Bicubic Smoother, or Bicubic Sharper (depended on the original Image), and then Saved_As PSD's, for Import into Premiere (by then, I had used several other NLE's, but ended up focusing on Premiere, as it worked best for me). I eschewed JPEG (never really liked that format with its compression), and also took 90% of the Scaling load off of Premiere. To my eyes, the quality was better, and worth the effort.
Having worked in photography, doing analog compositing, before there was digital editing, I was aware of resolution, and Scaling, and most of the pitfalls. However, as DVD-Video was still the main output, I understood its limits of 720 x 480 pixels. When I started HD TV's, and as my computer monitors increased in their resolution, I realized that DVD-Video was limited, but there was a war going on between BD and HDDVD, so there was not anything better. Rather than complain that DVD-Video was so limiting, I embraced it, as it was so, so very much better, than what had gone before, regarding video.
When BD was finally decided upon, I was happy, but many clients still needed DVD-Video (and still do), so I had to continue with it, though "something better" was out there. Then, mfgrs. began adding up-rezzing chips to their high-end DVD players, and to most of their BD players, and DVD-Video display got even better, when paired with a calibrated HD TV.
For me, it was easy to understand that a 720 x 480 video image would NOT look THAT good, when displayed on an HD TV, or high-rez computer monitor. It was like shooting 35mm film, and having to blow that up for a double-truck (11 x 17 inch) magazine spread! I knew to not expect too much, in such a case, and also normally shot 8 x 10 (4 x 5 minimum), when I was going to a two-page spread. DVD-Video is akin to shooting maybe 6 x 6 CM film, and going to that double-truck, when displayed on a high-rez computer monitor, or HD TV - never as good, as one would want. That is the nature of the beast.
Soon, we will have 4K, and when it becomes common, those old DVD-Videos will look even worse. I do not think that up-rezzing chips will be improving all that much, especially when displayed on 4K. I also do not think that we will see any disc-based delivery above BD, as everything will go to streaming delivery for the new format. Still, like some people still have VHS tapes, and players, people will still have DVD-Video and BD (which never really did take off, like DVD-Video did). All of those will look pretty bad, compared to 4K material, shot, edited and delivered in that format. Still, those old formats will be around for a bit, and other than those up-rezzing chips, there is nothing that we can do about it - except to produce the best product in those formats, that is possible, and live with the results.
Many have tried to explain the differences between, say DVD-Video and HD TV, but some folk just do not understand it. Having worked in all sorts of formats, with different resoulutions, it was easy for me. The best example that I have seen, to compare the formats is this little image:
That should be clear to anyone.
Hunt