How to output HDV without recompressing unaltered frames?

Question

Hello everyone,
I have posted a similar question on the 2.0 forum, but thought I'd give it a go here as well, and try to fine tune it a bit.
My goal is to output a video I have been working on at the highest quality possible, and use it as a 'master' for all further purposes (be it compression for the web, DVD, etc.) In doing so, I'd like to keep the quality as high as possible (so as not to limit future applications), but at the same time, try and not do so at the cost of unnecessarily huge file sizes (that is, I'm not sure there is any need to export a gigantic uncompressed video file where the original footage was shoot in HDV, which is compressed to begin with)
So the solution seems to be trying to maintain as much of the original quality of the HDV footage captured as possible. A discussion with a FCP user led me to the understanding that on final cut you have an option to only render your edits, and save out the file as HDV, thereby leaving the rest just as they were upon import (without further recompression) I cannot see why would there not be a similar option on Premiere...
On the same note, I've done a lot of reading on the subject both on this and outside forums, and noticed that there are quite a few questions that address the subject of export format/setting/quality from various angles, and thought that it might be a good idea to add a thread in the FAQ about the best export settings for... 'X', 'Y', 'Z' -- this way users can share the settings they use for specific purposes or to attain certain results in one place, rather than having them scattered around the forum...
At any rate, all feedback will be much appreciated. Many thank!

Answer 1

Thanks for all the feedback!
Steven:
i "There will be some decrease in the quality over the original because there is no way to just re-encode the changed frames. That is due to the Long GOP nature of the beast."
This made me think... I'm assuming the reason you're saying that it's impossible to just re-encode the changed frame is because with GOP there are very few true whole frames, while the rest are being constructed at real time; now, would that still be the case if I were to first capture the footage using a lossless codec, and then import it into the time line? Because I'm thinking that perhaps, since the latter is actually composed of true frames, there is no reason why premiere could not re-encode only the changed ones... Thoughts?
Also, could you please explain the following (as I'm not sure I understand correctly which format you are referring to, as well as where to/how should I copy the file...)
i However, you will probably be happy with exporting to SD, or to any size other than HD, and the format is already HD, so just copy the file.
Jim,
am I correct to understand you are convinced that working with HDV is a futile effort? If so, could you please elaborate a bit on your conclusion?
Howard,
I actually thought about exporting MPEG 2 out myself the other day--two questions:
1. I read that HDV utilizes a
i form
of MPEG 2 compression; would the MPEG 2 export option offered by adobe premiere be exactly the same, or could it be the same genral method, yet different in some ways?
2. Supposing that it is exactly the same compression method as HDV, would premiere not re-compress again the entire sequance if I were to export the project in MPEG 2, resulting again in lower quality?
Thanks again!