Hi everyone! Glad I stumbled upon this site, seems very informative. I wanted to post what I am going to do and ask for feedback, tips, etc.
I am putting together a video of my daughets first year for her birthday party. This video is going to consist of pictures and video clips with music in the background. Here is what I am using or can use to do this and have it play in my Pioneer DVD player.
I can either use Windows Movie Maker which creates .wmv files or Adobe Premiere 6 which creates .avi files. Once these movie files are created I would like to convert them VCD so I can view them with my DVD player. I am planning on using Nero 6 to do the conversion and burning. Should I look into using another software? Also, does the quality of CD-R make a difference? I am using TDK. Thanks for any info guys!!!
What is the source of your movie? I'm assuming it's DV camcorder.
You have to transfer it to computer. The best way is Firewire (IEEE 1394). You need a firewire port on your computer. It's either built-in or you'll have to buy one. If you buy one, a lot of them come pre-packaged with beginner-type software.
Once you transfer, it's transferred as DV AVI. Make sure you choose Type II (better compatibility with most proggies out there). The bad thing is the huge amount of HD space it takes. Appx 3.5 GB/15 min.
The pre-packaged proggies can take you through the whole process of capturing, editing, adding FX, and outputting (either as a DV AVI to it'll encode to DVD/SVCD/VCD for you).
If you prefer to get the highest possible output (I do!), then output as DV AVI and follow the guides on this site or dvdrhelp.com to find out how to transfer to DVD/SVCD/VCD format yourself. You'll get a much better product.
I've done quite a few transfers and found that the output is horrible in VCD, bearable in SVCD (2520 kbps), and best in DVD. This is because the source is considered low-quality.
Lastly, Adobe Premiere can do all this for you (even the professional encoding to VCD/SVCD/DVD) but you'll have to get the plug-ins for it (very $$) and there's a steep learning curve. If you already know how to use it, go with it. If not, choose something easier. (Perhaps Ulead VideoStudio, Pinnacle Studio, etc.)
If you use Windows Movie Maker, don't save the file as WMV. Not that good quality and not that supported by authoring programs. Save them as DV AVI (Movie Maker has no support for MPEG-2). Then convert the AVI to MPEG-2 with CCE (CinemaCraft Encoder) or TMPGEnc (about 50/60 $).
If you have Nero 6, you can also use NeroVision Express to convert to MPEG-2 and then burn to CD or DVD. Notice you can also use NeroVision as a video editing tool instead of Movie Maker, but I find Movie Maker easier.
Be aware that Movie Maker does not like large output files. This means you should create a new project as soon as the current project's output size reaches 15 minutes or so :-(
