Creating DVDs with JVC Everio source questions

1. torumsie
   Member

   

   I have some questions about source editing for DVD creation using Everio .mod files as the source.  I currently film for a halau in my area using a JVC GZ-MG330 camcorder.  Now, I realize that the source I'm pulling from the Everio, even on highest settings, are not going to be of the best quality but as of this time it's all I've got to work with.

   Onto my questions ->  I've tried various different programs and techniques for editing my videos and authoring them to DVD and I keep coming back to the TMPGEnc suite of programs as coming out with the best quality, for me at least.  I've worked with the videos using PowerDirector and PowerCinema which come with it, and I've also tried Sony Vegas and Adobe Premier.  Believe it or not, the Cyberlink solutions came out with some decent looking video output to the DVDs.  At this time what I'm doing is using MPEG Streamclip to convert the video to a compliant MPEG format and make my cuts then using the TMPGEnc tools to tweak and then finally author the DVD.

   Is there any way I can make my edits any easier, without having to re-encode and lose quality from an already finicky source?  I'm mainly either cutting a full performance video into individual songs, taking out camera shifts and such between songs during the cutting process, or combining multiple song footage into 1 file so that I then can create the chapter breaks in the authoring software.

   TMPGEnc has so far given me the best results, and it's somewhat frustrating because I will spend an unbelievably long time working with a new piece of software, because I'm stubborn and just 'KNOW' there has to be an easier/faster way, and then the result comes out of such low quality that I am unwilling to let it out of my hands so I go back with TMPGEnc and make short work of it to finish it out for production.

   Now, I do this work for the halau for free, my wife dances and teaches hula for them and I video performances for their teaching purposes and for the families of some of the dancers.  But even though I perform this service gratis, I still have some pride.  I am going to be upgrading to a better camera, but for now this is the only one I have.

   Thanks for any assistance that you can provide.

   Posted 5 months ago # Login to Send PM

2. XTR-91
   Member

   

   So what exactly is your question? Looks like you are only telling a story of your experience.

   Posted 5 months ago # Login to Send PM

3. torumsie
   Member

   

   Is there any way I can make my edits any easier, without having to
   re-encode and lose quality from an already finicky source?  I'm mainly
   either cutting a full performance video into individual songs, taking
   out camera shifts and such between songs during the cutting process, or
   combining multiple song footage into 1 file so that I then can create
   the chapter breaks in the authoring software.

   Hmm... looks like the above would be my question, quoted from the original post for clarity...

   Posted 5 months ago # Login to Send PM

4. cfulton
   Key Master

   

   I'm a little surprised that you're having to preprocess the video with MPEG Streamclip before you put it through TMPGEnc. I've had very good luck with TMPGEnc, though I have to find a little quality time to spend with the new CyberLink tools before I can comment further on them. But yeah, from my experience, TMPGEnc's tools are very solid.

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5. XTR-91
   Member

   

   It looks like you are importing MPEG-2 video and exporting it in MPEG which is a lossier format. To preserve quality, you are better off exporting in MPEG-2. If your editor can't produce MPEG-2, I would use the virtually lossless DV-AVI format.

   Posted 5 months ago # Login to Send PM

6. torumsie
   Member

   

   Thanks for the replies, guys.

   cfulton:  Well, to tell the truth I don't think it's fully preprocessing it in Streamclip.  One huge problem I'm having right now is that I record in 16:9, but the bit isn't present in the video file so any player I use thinks it's a 4:3 source unless I tell it different... and I've not had the best of luck so far, probably because I'm a neophyte at video editing so am not as familiar with terminology and such as I should probably be.  When I process the video in Streamclip I make cuts and set the 16:9 flag, it only takes a few minutes to process when I do that after I save it to an *(edit).mpg file.  At that point I take into TMPGEnc and work with it there.

   XTR-91:  Thanks for the advice, and that information is something I needed.  I do dislike having to do re-encodes for no reason into MPEG-2 format, because of the level of encoding that is already in the format.  That's one reason I was so disappointed in Premier when I used it.  I've got the MPEG-2 plugin for it, but even when I just made cuts it would want to re-encode the ful thing instead of just assemble the cuts.  I always make sure to cut on a keyframe too, and I have a couple of tools which can retime the clip if needed but I normally don't need that.  So with Premier I was getting successively lower quality clips unless I did all my work without saving, which ate alot of memory and would eventually crash the program.  :-(

   Thanks for both, and I hope I'm not being too confusing.  I'm truly not trying to be obtuse, just getting a grip on things.  I'll probably see about transcoding it to DV-AVI and work with that file for edits, then finalize the work into MPEG-2 and author from there, I just have to get a handle on how large the files are going to be when doing that.  :-)

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