Low quality importing DV to iMovie 'o8

I'm a Mac and iMovie '08 newbie, so apologies if this has been covered, but I haven't found answer to this problem.
When I download DV video (via FireWire) into iMovie'08, the quality of the video is much worse than when I view my video on a TV directly from camcorder. The poor video quality exists whether I view Project or Entry clips within iMovie, or watch exported projects (large format) in QuickTime or iDVD.
I have a fairly old, standard mini DV camcorder (Panasonic GS9 - 680,000 pixels; 680x480 stills) and a new iMac with Intel Core 2 Duo 2.4GHz running Leopard.
Despite the deficiencies of iMovie '08 relative to '06, my understanding from the other threads is that both versions of iMovie should import DV video at full resolution - is that right?
Have I got an incorrect setting or am I doing something else wrong? Help very much appreciated. Thanks.

Is this quality loss pre or post processing. To examine files pre-processing open the imported files (home/movies/imovie events, by default) in QT. (ensure high quality playback is selected in the QT prefs)

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Hello Rob,
if you check through discussions, you'll find a number of posts adressing this subject.
check if you can find some hints in this one:
http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=194962&start=0&tstart=0
Pictures are different from video. In addition to that the quality of your movie/slideshow should be judged on a TV screen. iMovie provides you with a preview (even if it's a good one)
also have a look at this one:
http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?messageID=2419872&#2419872
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I've a iMovie HD project that I want to burn via iDVD (7.0.4).
If I click "Share with iDVD" the quality of the resultung video (which is burned to DVD) is rather poor. As I've read within this discussions, the preferred way is to close iMovie and "drag and drop" the iMovie project into iDVD.
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Hi,
the iMovie project was created as "DV" project and I imported DV PAL clips. The iDVD preferences are also PAL (25fps) and the quality setting is "professional quality".
I've also tried the setting "best performance" within iDVD (as suggested within this forum), but with the same poor result.
I can see within the iDVD "project info" that iDVD will use "mymovie.mov" within the "Shared Movies->iDVD" of the iMovie project (Show package contents).
As this converted movie is of low quality, I think this is the root of evil.
If I export the movie from iMovie with "Export as DV stream" and import this converted movie into iDVD the quality is ok - but I lose the chapter markers ..
Is there any way to keep the chapter markers?
Kind regards.

I'm thinking of using Final Cut Pro to straighten slightly crooked footage and then re-import back to iMovie to complete the video. Does this have any impact on image quality?

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As your rotate the image, you will begin to see black edges. So, as Tom implies, the image must be scaled up to hide those voids. If you shot 4k ad are editing in a HD timeline, no problem, lots of room to spare. If you shot 1080 and are editing in a 1080 timeline, you will run into issues at a certain point. However, if your 1080 project is going to be transcoded to 720 or ye olde DVD you won't notice any deterioration at all.

After import from Iphoto some pictures are of very low quality. The original file in Iphoto is very good.

Final cut Express
I imported several pictures by using Iphoto. Some of them, not all, are of very low quality even if the original file is of a very good quality.

It sounds as though you may have imported the thumbnails but I can't imagine how.
It all depends on what you mean by very low quality.
Your iPhoto pictures will be around 4,000x3,000 pixels but when they are imported into a standard def timeline they will be around 720x540 which is a tremendous reduction.
They should still look OK but not as good as the brilliant hi-res originals.
Message was edited by: Ian R. Brown

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Hi
In the media bin window drag a clip onto the new icon or select a clip right click and select new sequence from clip.
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• Your original iMovie movie is harmed and You need to re-import Your photos and re-do the edit.
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Low quality importing DV to iMovie 'o8

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