Quality reduction when sharing with iDVD

Hi Everyone
I'm new to iMovie 11. This week I made my first short movie with a 720HD camera and I'm very pleased with the quality. When I watch it on my iMac it's great and when I share it with iTunes and watch it on my home TV, using AppleTV, the picture is great as well. However, when I share it using iDVD there is a fall off in video quality (with blocky text in title sequences) as I play the disc back through my DVD player and TV. I've tried playing the disc back through a friend's DVD player and TV, but things are no better.
Is this normal when sharing through iDVD or is there a setting I've overlooked?

Hi
As You see there are much to this - at least three levels as I get it
1. DVD-standard 480i
2. How it moves from iMovie to iDVD - Share to Media Browser and as Large
3. Choise of video editor as
iMovie'08 or 09 or 11 - are not tools of choise as they discard every second line resulting in 240i quality
I use
• iMovie up to HD6 or
• FinalCut any version
as they deliver 480i not losing anything.
Use High quality DVD - I use Verbatim DVD-R
Burn at slower speed - I use x4 - to get less burn errors
makes the DVD even better (plays on more Players)
Yours Bengt W

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Bad Quality When Sharing with iWEB

Sorry if this is posted somewhere on here. I could not find it.
I am having a problem with real choppy video when sharing with iWEB. My videos when viewed on my website are very blurry to the point that you can not see faces. Any help would be most welcome.

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IMovie project stuttering when shared to iDVD

I have a 38 minute iMovie 09 video that I exported to iDVD. It stutters about a minute in to the movie. I have done the following:
1. exported a shorter version (1:48) into iDVD. The same thing happened.
2. exported this shorter version into quick time. Worked just fine. Don't know how to make a DVD that I can watch on a player from this though.
3. tried to export this shorter version to youtube. It said that "youtube reported an error"
3. backed up my Macbook and used migration assistant to put all of my data on my husband's iMac. I ended up with clips missing or replaced by others when shared to iDVD.
I tried to get it in a format that I could show all of you but because it was multiple files, I couldn't use dropio or dropbox.
Any suggestions? I know the movie is large, but the shortened movie displayed the same behavior.
Thanks

Bump.

HT201177 I am trying to create home movies and each time there is no sound when I play back the disc. The sound is there when I play back in imovie and also after I've shared with idvd and played back. Not sure what else to do???

I am trying to create home movies, and do not have sound on the final disc. The sound is there in imovie and after sharing to idvd. This has only happened a couple of times before and I have made a lot of movies. I have just gone through about 8 discs, all with no audio when I play them!!!

You need to ask for support in the iMovie forum.

TS2289 Audio in iMovie 11 files but missing in sections when shared to iDVD. The movie and audio plays fine in iMovie but my burned iDVD movie is missing some audio .

I imported a movie into iMovie 11 from a Canon Vixia HFR 300 SD card with no problem. I have a new iMac running OsX 18.8.4 I think. I added chapter markers and shared it with iDVD. And burned it to a DVD. Towards the end of this 30 minute movie the sound just stops. I do remember some screen came up when I wanted to burn DVD that said something was wrong with files but I couldn't figure what do to fix it and allowed me to continue. Any ideas?

Hi
Either the problem is in iMovie or in iDVD
two notes
No Audio in iMovie
Most common origin is use of audio from iTunes.
Work around -
• Select needed audio to one new playlist
• Copy out this as an Audio-CD .aiff (not .mp3)
• Use this in the movie-project
Other origins are
1. strange / alient file formats as -
• .mp3, .avi, .wmv etc
• Convert them into .aiff 48kHz 16-bit and use this
2. the Mac is set wrongly in regard of midi -
• Close iMovie and other programs
• Start GarageBand
• Make a new GB-project and play some notes
• Close GB and Save
• Now try iMovie again
3. No audio when playback in iMovie 1 to HD 6.
a. in iMovie pref. - deselect ” Playback via Camera”
b. in System preferences - see that Audio out is not set to zero. Mine often does this
without me knowing why.
4. iMovie’08 & 09 & 11
• Toggle audio-scimming by cmd-K
Stuttering audio and video
1. FileVault is ON - Turn it off
2. More than 50 audio files in a movie-project
Mix down to one audio clip
3. Project is stored on one (USB) external hard disk - should be a FireWire one
4. the External hard disk is not Mac OS Extended formatted - but
UNIX/DOS/FAT32/Mac OS Exchange and this will not work for Video.
5. To little free space on internal boot hard disk.
I go for a minimum of 25Gb free space when project is imported and edited and this goes for
4x3 SD Video. For 16x9 HD my guess would be about 5 times more at least.
Neither Mac OS, iMovie or iDVD can address any other hard disk than the boot drive for it’s
scratch files. (Unlike Final Cut Express/Pro where You select scratch disk/s)
6. Network storage - DOESN’T WORK
No audio on DVD disc.
Most common origin.
1. Imported audio from iTunes.
• In iTunes copy out as an Audio-CD .aiff (Same as played on standard Stereo CD - no .mp3)
• Use this in Your movie project
2. Low - Free Space on Start-up/Boot/Internal/Mac OS Hard disk makes it hard for iMovie to work as intended.
Down to 1.3 GB and it doesn’t work - especially audio don’t migrate over to Media Browser
(iM’08 & 09)
3. Material in iMovie’08 & 09 - Shared to Media Browser and here selected as Large
large.m4v. It silenced out this project in iDVD. By making a slight alteration - provoking it to ask for a new Share/Publish to Media Browser and here selecting 640x480 - and audio was back when a new iDVD project was created including this movie.
Minuscular - - 176x144
Mobile - - - - - 480x360
Medium - - - - 640x480
Large - - - - - - 720x540 960x540
HD - - - - - - - - 1280x720
4. Strange audio formats like .mp3, .avi etc.
• Change them to .aiff. Use an audio editor like Audacity (free)
5. Main audio is set to off in System Preferences - Does this by it self - Don’t know why
Cheque Audio-Out resp. Audio-In
6. Ed Hanna
Had the same problem; some Googling around gave me a kludgy, but effective fix
Downgrade Perian from recent versions back to version 1.0.
That worked for me, and so far I haven't encountered any deficiencies — except it takes more advanced versions of Perian to enable QuickTime to handle subtitles in .srt format — that I have noticed.
7. GarageBand fix.
In this set audio to 44.1 kHz (Klaus1 suggestion)
(if this don’t work try 48 kHz - me guessing)
Before burning the DVD.
• Do a DiskImage (File menu and down)
• Double click on the .img file
• Test it with Apple DVD-player
If it’s OK then make Your DVD.
Burn at x1 speed.... (or x4)
• In iDVD 08 - or - 09
• Burn from DiskImage with Apple’s Disk Utilities application
•OR burn with Roxio Toast™ if You got it
Yours Bengt W

[solution inside] Poor quality of DVD created with iDVD '08 (jerky movie)

Hi everyone !
I have a problem with the export of iDVD, the result is jerky.
Here's what I done
- filmed (cam sony 42E, DV)
- imported to iMovie '08, exported to the media navigator
- taken in iDVD and burned on a DVD simple layer in professional quality
And it looks like the movie is 15 images/s (but apparently no problem of sound)
I checked everything's in PAL (I'm in Europe)
I checked with another DVD
I checked the large selection in the navigator (720 * 540, H.264, 25 fps, 4Mbps)
I tried with "best performances"
I tried to cut the movie : 72 min -> 35 minutes
I exported just an image disc
Nothing fixed the problem
Finally, I exported from iMovie in .dv then integrated the file in iDVD and, this time the result was the same as in the preview (thanks to SkyDrinker for the tip)
So this is a solution, but this is strange :
or my iLife is corrupted, or the way Apple say to work (with conversion in h.264) is not good.
Did anyone else had the same problem ?
Thank you for your feedback.
Take care!

I had the same problem with jerky pans and dancing pixels particularly when using Ken Burns on stills.
Here is a solution. Save the 08 movies in Quicktime using AIC encoding then burn using Toast 8 with the quality slider set to best. The improvement in quality is substantial.
There is some improvement(not as much as using Toast) using Quicktime AIC encoding then burning with iDVD with Professional Quality and dual layered DVDs just to make sure the quality indicator is well into the green.
The disadvantage in using Toast as compared to iDVD is that the cool menus are lost.
PS: All my burning is done using NTCS but it should not make a difference.

IPhoto 06 slideshow shared with iDVD 06

I have created a slideshow in iPhoto 06 and shared it with iDVD 06. I have shared the slideshow from iPhoto in 4:3 DVD TV and Widescreen to iDVD and saved as standard and widescreen. When I play the DVD in my DVD player it crops the pictures and titles (I have played on two different TV's and DVD players with the same result). What am I doing wrong?

I have created a slideshow in iPhoto 06 and shared it with iDVD 06. I have shared the slideshow from iPhoto in 4:3 DVD TV and Widescreen to iDVD and saved as standard and widescreen. When I play the DVD in my DVD player it crops the pictures and titles (I have played on two different TV's and DVD players with the same result). What am I doing wrong?

Why does my photo slideshow quality deteriorate when exported to iDVD?

I have a client whose photos look great in iPhoto & iMovie, but look all pixelated when exported to iDVD. I've tried making a slideshow directly with iDVD, but the photos still look worse than they did in the iPhoto slideshow.
The size of the photos is pretty large (as big as 5233 x 3546), which I'm guessing might be part of the problem, so I tried exporting them from iPhoto with a limitation of 720 x 540, but they still look bad. I expect a decrease in quality once I burn the DVD, but these look bad even in the DVD preview.
Any ideas?

All DVD slideshows are defaulted to 640 x 480 pixels. That's the standard. As long as the photos are in the 4:3 dimension ratio you can leave them at their fullest size. You can try using the Pro Quailty encoding to get better quality images. IMO the best image quality is obtained by creating the slideshow in iDVD from still photos. You don't get the Ken Burns effect, but in my opinion it's a bit over used too many time.
If you are creating your slideshow in iMovie then try the following.
1 - when your slideshow is how you want it quit iMovie.
2 - open iDVD, create a slideshow and open the slideshow edit mode.
3 - drag the iMovie project file into the slideshow pane on the left. (NOTE: this lets iDVD scale the movie file to the TV safe area when played on CRT TV sets.)
This also lets iDVD do the encoding for the iMovie assets and avoids two compressions, one by iMovie when you export to iDVD and the iDVD encoding.
TIP: For insurance against the iPhoto database corruption that many users have experienced I recommend making a backup copy of the Library6.iPhoto (iPhoto.Library for iPhoto 5 and earlier) database file and keep it current. If problems crop up where iPhoto suddenly can't see any photos or thinks there are no photos in the library, replacing the working Library6.iPhoto file with the backup will often get the library back. By keeping it current I mean backup after each import and/or any serious editing or work on books, slideshows, calendars, cards, etc. That insures that if a problem pops up and you do need to replace the database file, you'll retain all those efforts. It doesn't take long to make the backup and it's good insurance.
I've created an Automator workflow application (requires Tiger or later), iPhoto dB File Backup, that will copy the selected Library6.iPhoto file from your iPhoto Library folder to the Pictures folder, replacing any previous version of it. It's compatible with iPhoto 6 and 7 libraries and Tiger and Leopard. iPhoto does not have to be closed to run the application, just idle. You can download it at Toad's Cellar. Be sure to read the Read Me pdf file.≤br>
Note: There now an Automator backup application for iPhoto 5 that will work with Tiger or Leopard.

Why does a .mov slideshow look much darker when played with idvd

I have created a .mov slideshow from iphoto. I now want to write it to a dvd using iDVD. When setting up the various dropzones the images look great. When I play the .mov in Quicktime, the images look great. When I preview the proposed DVD, all of the images look to contrasty / dark. Why is this and how can I fix it?

Hi Klaus,
Me thinks you jest my good man.....
Again I repeat, in every other application, the images look the way they are meant to be.
Only in iDVD do they become "corrupted".
Anyone who has anything to do with digital imaging knows you should calibrate your monitors.
An industry standard calibrated environment is a must when dealing with a digital imaging environment.
iDVD is screwing up the images ad making them darker.
Quicktime isn't.
iPhoto isn't.
Photoshop isn't.
Capture One Pro isn't.
Adobe Bridge isn't.
Camera Raw isn't.
InDesign isn't.
Acrobat isn't.
I can list many more applications on both PCs and Macs that correctly display the images.
iDVD is the only one that screws them up!!!!!
Are you seriously suggesting that calibrating our monitors is the cause of iDVD displaying images incorrectly and different to all of the above mentioned software?
Me thinks you jest my good man.....
Kind regards,
Mike

Best Quality import when editing with a DVD master?

I have been on a project, that is nearing online, that has a large amount of footage that I have had to import off of DVD. I have been using Streamclip's "Apple Motion Jpeg A" setting at 100% when I have converted files to QT. Anybody know the best way to get this material off DVD and into QT at the best quality? The footage is so bad, that it may not make a difference, but I thought I would try. Anybody use any treatment tricks when working with old, home movie type footage, to "spruce it up" and help it not stand out so much?
Thanks for your input.

The question would be; is the footage bad only because it is from heavily compressed DVD-Video? Or is it bad because it's old home movie footage? Or a combination of the two.
Since it is old home video footage, I'd suspect a fairly low quality camcorder was used. If that's the case, I'd convert the footage to the Apple DV/DVCPro codec using MPEG Streamclip. Or simply capture the footage through a DV device while playing the disc in a DVD player.
Once it's on your system, try using the 3-Way Color Corrector filter to enhance the contrast and control the chroma levels.
-DH

Quality Loss when sharing

I have recently upgraded from Windows Movie Maker to Premiere Elements 8 and I have noticed a considerable loss in quality when I have burned my project. The source media is pretty poor, I use a Panasonic VDR-D160 mini DVD camcorder (yes it is a total nightmare getting importing the footage), and when I import the footage it is a .VOB file. The stats for the .VOB files I am working with are 704 x 576 picture that goes at 25 frames per second. The data rate is 9558kbps and the total bitrate is 9814kbps.
The first project I have done is very straight forward, with minimal editing and no effects. However, when I burn it to a DVD or a DVD folder it changes the frame to 720 x 576 and reduces both the data rate and bit rate to 7464kbps and 7656kbps respectively. This creates an obvious pixilation of the image - especially for parts of the video that are moving and it can be seen on lower resolution televisions. In sharing/publishing the video, how do I retain the same quality as the original? I have been through the help, and due to my lack of understanding of premiere elements I have not been able to figure out whether it is just a matter of changing one of the settings.
Thanks!

Unfortunately, you are starting with material that has already been compressed heavily to the MPEG-2 format/CODEC. Then you are editing and outputting to a Scaled up (the DVD-spec for PAL) and then re-compressed to MPEG-2. This is a triple whammie. Because PrE does not do "smart Rendering," what you see is what you will get.
A better choice for limited editing, basically just Trimming the material, would be a program that does "smart Rendering," where all material, that was not altered, except to remove portions of it, would NOT be Transcoded a second time to MPEG-2. I believe that some of the Sony Vegas products do this, but there are others. If you Google "smart rendering," you will see several programs, that feature this. I would choose from those.
You will still have the Scaling issue, unless you completely allow your smaller than spec. material to be surrounded by black. If you Scale in an editing program, even with smart Rendering, it will then need to be Transcoded to MPEG-2 all over again.
With that footage, the choices are very limited.
Good luck, and sorry for the bad news.
Hunt

How to get lower-quality previews when working with Full-HD?

I'm working with Full-HD video, but I don't need preview (rendered) files to be 1920x1080 too. It takes a lot of disk space and a lot of time to render preview files.
Is there a way to have them some lower quality? For example 720x405 resolution would be enough.
But when I want to make a final export, I need to get Full-HD video.
Thanks!

Use a Custom sequence and change the previews as desired.

IMovie crashes when sharing with Quicktime

I think I posted this in the wrong forum earlier. I am a novice, please forgive me.
I updated my iMovie program and now everytime I use it and try to share movies with Quicktime it closes unexpectedly. I can export the movie as a m4v file using "export movie", but I need for it to be a .mov file and I typically use "export using Quicktime". It worked flawlessly until I updated. Has anyone else had a problem with iMovie after updating it? Is there a way to revert back to the previous version? I have called Apple Support and the gentleman that helped me got it to do what I could get it to do, but could not get the movie to share using Quicktime. He said that all of the files are the same (?) and that I could just use the m4v. I am doing work at home for someone else and they need the .mov file. Any help or thoughts would be greatly appreciated.

I believe I did see multi-pass checked when I was looking at the Compressor Quality. I thought about changing it also because I get about a quarter of the way through the process and then it closes on me.
My sound settings are:
Format: Linear PCM
Channels: Stereo L R
Rate: 44.100kHz
Render Settings:
Quality: Normal
Linear PCM settings:
Sample size 16
Little Endian is checked

Terrible quality slideshows when exporting to iDVD

Hi,
I created a FCE file of photos and audio that I applied motion, zooming, and other various effects to. The imported photos are PSD files. Some have a pixel dimension of 972 x 648 (1.5" x 1" and 648dpi) and other are 3888 x 2592 (4" x 6" and 648dpi). I know that the pixel dimensions are the one that video uses, not dpi, so I had converted some to the lower size. I don't see a difference between the higher and lower sized files though. I changed the pixel aspect ratio to D1/DV NTSC (0.9) as well.
When I set the keyframes for movement, I made sure I used even numbers for the vertical setting. None of the photos are scaled over 100%. They range from 50 - 90%.
When I export the file from FCE to bring into iDVD, I have exported it as a QuickTime movie (with and without the self-contained movie option).
The problem I am having is that the slideshow in iDVD looks AWFUL. The images are blurry & pixely, text from LiveType is pixely, it's shaky, and there are moire patterns. It looks like I took pictures with my cell phone and used them. I am viewing it at actual size, but it is still terrible.
I'm wondering if the extra information in the files are causing the problem. (I come from a print background, so deleting the dpi goes against my nature - LOL!). Should I go back and convert all of these photos to a smaller sized file? If I change the resolution to 72dpi, the pixel dimensions change and I will have to rescale/reposition ALL of my photos (over 360 of them) - right? Is the fact that the computer screen is showing the interlacing adding to the problem and it won't be as bad when it is on the tv? Is there a different way to export these to fix the slideshows?
I haven't burned them to a disk yet, this is just from the preview in iDVD. I have imported a video sequence from FCE, that looks fine.
Thanks in advance for any help.
Kristin

Me again,
I'm still having a hard time fixing this. I've put so much time and effort into these "slideshows" and I am still having problems with interlacing on the photos I could cry. I hooked up a tv to the computer today to see what the video "really" looks like and I was able to fix the video problems with the de-interlacing filter. The photos are nice and crisp. However, since I've applied movement to them (ex: cropped photos move across the page vertically or horizontally) and they are filed with the horizontal lines. Moire patterns, too. The de-interlace filter and flicker filters don't seem to fix them.
I found one of your posts before about how to remove moire & flicker by adding a blur filter:
For interlace, you'll need to blur vertically to reduce adjacent scanlines flicker. The standard technique for this is to apply:
Video Filters > Blur > General Convolution:
Cell 2 = 0.25
Cell 5 = 0.5
Cell 8 = 0.25
all other cells = 0
Apply as the last filter in the chain. However, if you see moire due to the Wave or some other distortion filter, you might try adding another one at the beginning of the filter chain.
Where is the Blur > General Convolution? Was it removed from FCE 4.0.1? I've got another one-to-one session scheduled, but it's not for another week and I need to get this video done by thurs eve.
Thanks for any input.
Kristin

A portion of audio that is synced in iMovie, is out of sync when burned with iDVD. How can I avoid this?

I'm trying to burn a simple movie, using iMovie and finishing in iDVD. A portion of the audio is out of sync when burned, despite it being in sync in iMovie. Any suggestions?
Thanks.

Hi
Try to - Save as a DiskImage - then test this with Apple DVD-tool.
Does this play OK - burn this DiskImage by using Disk Util tool.
Set down burn speed to x2 or 4
Yours Bengt W

Quality reduction when sharing with iDVD

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