Lousy DVD video quality on high res photos!

Question

I need some help. I am new to using iMovie and iDVD.
I just created a 15 minute video with a lot of high resolution photos (anywhere from 1920x1200 to 4256x2828). These photos are sharp and look superb on a computer monitor. Once processed through iMovie and iDVD the photos look terrible - low res noise all over the place - pixels are swimming - when played back on an HDTV with a nice upscaling DVD player. (I've tested on three DVD players - one on my MacBook Pro - all DVD output looks terrible.)
The process I used from iMovie was Share Export to iDVD. While the Share Export to Quicktime output looks great in the native 960x540 playback in QuickTime - even full screen on an HDTV. But quality of what is on the DVD is terrible - particularly at showing the still pictures!
Question: If I want to optimize the image for highest quality DVD playback is there a resolution I should process the photos to with Photoshop prior to importing to iMovie (640x480 for example?) Is this just one factor? What about the method of getting the iMovie product to iDVD - does THAT matter?
How do I get to a quality, hi res. image during DVD playback if I'm using iMovie and iDVD for a slide show?
Note that most DVD players are upscaling to an HD monitor with resolution of 1080i or 1080p.
What is the secret?
Thanks!!
Terry Tigner

Answer 1

Hi
Still just thinking.
What file format was Your photos ? .jpg, .tiff, .psd, .bmp else
Free space on internal boot hard disk way over 25Gb free - I hope.
4x3 SD video standard or 16x9 HD - iMovie project ?
Make a small 4x3 SD DV iMovie project with a few pictires - no Ken Burns
Close iMovie
Open iDVD - import (This should work - if not the problem is more severe)
Here make a DiskImage
Close iDVD
Open the image
Play with Apple DVD-player
How does this play.
as Standar DVD ? If so we have a start to work from.
Else on DVD Quality - Unsorted list of thoughts.
*DVD quality*
1. iDVD 8 has three levels of qualities.
iDVD 6 has the two last ones
• Professional Quality (movies up to 120 min.) - BEST
• Best Performances (movies less than 60 min.) - High quality on final DVD
• High Quality (in iDVD08) / Best Quality (in iDVD6) (movies up to 120 min.) - slightly lower quality than above
2. From
• FCE/P - Export out as full quality QuickTime.mov (not selfcontaining, no conversion)
• iMovie x-6 - Don't use ”Share/Export to iDVD” = destructive even to movie project and especially so
when the movie includes photos. Instead just drop or import the iMovie movie project icon (with a Star on it) into iDVD theme window.
• iMovie’08 not meant to go to iDVD. Go via Media Browser or rather use iMovie HD 6 from start.
3. I use Roxio Toast™ to make an as slow burn as possibly eg x1 (in iDVD’08 this can also be set)
This can also be done with (Apple) Disk Util tool.
4. There has to be about or more than 25Gb free space on internal (start-up) hard disk. iDVD can't
use an external one as scratch disk (if it is not start-up disc).
5. Verbatim ( also recommended by many - Taiyo Yuden DVDs - I can’t get hold of it to test )
6. DVD-R (no +R or +/-RW)
7. Keep NTSC to NTSC - or - PAL to PAL when going from iMovie to iDVD
8. Don’t burn more than three DVD at a time - but let the laser cool off for a while befor next batch.
iDVD quality also depends on:
• HOW much free space is there on Your internal (start-up) hard disk. Go for approx 25Gb.
less than 5Gb and Your result will most probably not play.
• What kind of movie project You drop into it. MPEG4 seems to be a bad choice.
other strange formats are .avi, .wmv, .flash etc. Convert to streamingDV first
Also audio formats matters. I use only .aiff or from miniDV tape Camera 16-bit
strange formats often problematic are .avi, .wmv, audio from iTunes, .mp3 etc
Convert to .aiff first and use this in movie project
• What kind of standard - NTSC movie and NTSC DVD or PAL to PAL - no mix.
(If You need to change to do a NTSC DVD from PAL material let JESDeinterlacer3.2.2 do the conversion)
(Dropping a PAL movie into a NTSC iDVD project
(US) NTSC DVDs most often are playable in EU
(EU) PAL DVDs most often needs to be converted to play in US
UNLESS: They are plabacked by a Mac - then You need not to care
• What kind of DVDs You are using. I use Verbatim DVD-R (this brand AND no +R or +/-RW)
• How You encode and burn it. Two settings prior iDVD08
Pro Quality (only in iDVD08)
Best / High Quality (not always - most often not)
Best / High Performances (most often my choise)
1. go to iDVD pref. menu and select tab far right and set burn speed to x1 (less errors = plays better) - only in iDVD08
2. Project info: Select Professional Encoding - only in iDVD08.
Region codes:
iDVD - only burn Region = 0 - meaning - DVDs are playable everywhere
DVD Studio pro can set Region codes:
1 = US
2 = EU
Yours Bengt W