Burning DVD in PAL

Question

Level 1

2 points

Burning DVD in PAL

I have the following problem:

I would like to burn my DVDs in PAL format but whenever I try to burn I receive the following message 'Trying to burn a NTSC movie on a PAL disk'. If I continue then a low quality NTSC DVD is created. I have tried deleting all media and re-creating the project from scratch. I have deleted and re-installed iDVD6. All to no avail.

I have previously burned DVDs in PAL and I do not think I have changed any settings.

What do I need to do to convince iDVD to burn a PAL DVD?

System set-up:

MacBook
OS 10.4.11
iMovie 6
iDVD6

Project is using a iDVD 5 theme

Settings:

In iDVD6 there seems to be two menus where the media format can be set:
1. Project info -> Video mode
2. iDVD preferences -> Projects -> Video mode

Both are set to PAL

iMovie 6 was used to create the content and there does not seem to be an option to set the video mode

iMac G4 & white MacBook, Mac OS X (10.4.11), iDVD 6 & iMovie 6

Posted on Oct 12, 2008 1:56 AM

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Answer 1

Rich839

Level 8

48,156 points

Oct 12, 2008 8:01 AM in response to Andrewpratt2

In iMovie's General Preferences, you will see drop down menu that says New Project Frame Rate. 29.97 is NTSC and 25 is PAL. Try setting it to 25 and see if that helps.

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Answer 2

Andrewpratt2 Author

Level 1

2 points

Oct 17, 2008 7:43 AM in response to Rich839

Dear Rich839,

Ah, that would seem to be the problem. As you suggested the frame rate was set at 29 fms. However, in the general preferences it says the option is for 'new projects'. Does this mean I can not change the frame rate of the existing project and will have to reload all the clips again?

Regards,

Andrew

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Answer 3

Klaus1

Level 9

52,879 points

Oct 17, 2008 11:33 AM in response to Andrewpratt2

Yes it does.

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Answer 4

Rich839

Level 8

48,156 points

Oct 17, 2008 11:48 AM in response to Andrewpratt2

I've never had to change formats in a project before, so I'm not sure. I didn't see this issue discussed in the help menu, but I suspect that you can't change horses in mid stream. You could try it on a back up copy of your project to see if it works, though.

Possibley you could copy-paste or drag your clips from the old project into a newly created project set at the new frame rate, but that might not work either if the clips have been rendered at a different frame rate in the old project.

You might experiment and see what happens.

Or, make a new post to this forum ("changing frame rate") and then asking the specific question of whether you need to reload all clips into a new project if you want to change the frame rate (from NTSC to PAL) of an already existing project. Someone who has done this procedure I am sure will know the answer and will respond.

Wish I could be of more help. Good luck with this.

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Answer 5

Klaus1

Level 9

52,879 points

Oct 17, 2008 12:08 PM in response to Andrewpratt2

If your original source video from the camera was in NTSC you need to convert that first, as NTSC is interlaced. Merely importing into a PAL iMovie project will give you a jerky video with no audio.

To do this you need JES Deinterlacer, which is freeware available from:

http://www.apple.com/downloads/macosx/video/jesdeinterlacer.html

and this can convert the project from NTSC to PAL, which can then be imported into a new iMovie project, which of course must be set to 25 fps.

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Answer 6

Rich839

Level 8

48,156 points

Oct 17, 2008 8:06 PM in response to Klaus1

Klaus 1,

Glad you weighed in.

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Answer 7

Klaus1

Level 9

52,879 points

Oct 18, 2008 1:53 AM in response to Rich839

No problem Rich!

It was a case of 'been there, done that' with my brothers old home movies! 🙂

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Answer 8

Andrewpratt2 Author

Level 1

2 points

Oct 18, 2008 4:24 AM in response to Klaus1

Dear Klaus,

Thank you for the advice.

For some reason the Apple link is broken so I went back to the source:

http://www.xs4all.nl/~jeschot/home.html#DEI

Does Quicktime keep the interlacing? Could I export the clips to Quicktime (at the highest resolution) and then import them into a new imovie project set to the correct frame rate? Or is exporting to Quicktime and then run Deinterlace and then import into a new iMovie project the only option?

Regards,

Andrew

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Answer 9

Klaus1

Level 9

52,879 points

Oct 18, 2008 4:40 AM in response to Andrewpratt2

There is no reason to export to Quicktime.

Drag the iMovie project to Deinterlacer, convert, import into a new iMovie project, then to iDVD for rendering and burning.

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Answer 10

Andrewpratt2 Author

Level 1

2 points

Oct 25, 2008 11:49 PM in response to Klaus1

Dear Klaus,

I have downloaded Deinterlacer and tried it out this weekend but I seem to be do something wrong. The version of Deinterlacer I have does not seem to be 'drag-and-drop' - at least not for imovie projects.

I found that I had to open the project from within Deinterlacer. The Deinterlacer settings I chose were 'Project': Standards conversions - 'convert to PAL'. I left the colours at default and for 'output' I selected 'Compressor direct DV-Pal'. For input I ticked 'remove jaggies' and 'reduce noise'.

Since I have not used this programme and did not want to potentially ruin the existing project in DV-NTSC format I copied the file into a temporary file. I found that Deinterlacer did not recognise the project but I was able to look through the associated source files and select the media in the project.

When I start the deinterlace I received the message 'Adaptive deinterlace with blockmatchThreshold = 0 is no better than simple deinterlace. Rest to 400 (clean video) or 600'. The programme seems to ignore this warning and continue conversion after a short pause. I can not see a menu option change this value anyway. Is this warning important?

Since I am changing the media in a project I did not set an output media. Is this correct?

I then started deinterlacer. It powered on for a long time. Once It had finished the next problem seemed to be to get the converted clips into a new project. The only way I could find to do this was to open the existing project and then create a new project and then drag and drop the clips in the timeline (the ones I had just deinterlaced) into the new project. However, when I tried this imovie said the clips were still in NTSC format.

Therefore, I think I have done all the steps correctly but the media do not seem to have been converted as expected.

BTW, reading the programme manual it does suggest that there can be some issues with deinterlaced video. Have you noticed any of the quality issues in the clips that you have converted?

Any advice you can give will be greatly appreciated

Andrew

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Answer 11

Klaus1

Level 9

52,879 points

Oct 26, 2008 5:36 AM in response to Andrewpratt2

Sorry Andrew, senior moment - I gave instructions (about drag and drop) for a completely different application!

In the JES DeInterlacer folder there is a manual which is reasonably helpful.

Try working with that and post back.

There is also useful advice here:

http://www.danslagle.com/mac/iMovie/tips_tricks/6017.shtml

Let me know how you get on! 🙂

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Answer 12

Nov 8, 2008 9:48 AM in response to Klaus1

Hi Klaus:

I am reading some of the posts in an attempt to discover if ANYONE has found a way to get better than "lousy" image quality out of iMovie 6 and DVDHD 6. On a plasma screen played through a good DVD player, the image quality is very poor.

Any thoughts on how to improve it? I am running some tests today - comparing iDVD burns to those from Toast.

Thanks.

Bob Johnson

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Answer 13

Nov 8, 2008 3:35 PM in response to Klaus1

Klaus:

I am at "robertpj at frontiernet dot net" if you care to communicate directly.

Bob Johnson

Edited by: Moderator - edited email address

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Answer 14

Klaus1

Level 9

52,879 points

Nov 8, 2008 2:35 PM in response to Robert P. Johnson

Hi Robert!

Firstly, please note that it highly inadvisable to publish your email address in an open forum, as this represents a serious security risk to you from automatic scanners seeking info for phishing purposes. For that reason it is actually against the terms of use of these forums, but I emphasise that it is for your own protection. 🙂

I have therefore asked the hosts to either edit out the @ in the address, replacing it with 'at' or even to delete it altogether.

Now, about your question!

Feeding iMovie with a digital DV stream, then transferring to iDVD (or Toast) for final burning usually gives results on a conventional TV more or less as good as a commercial DVD. I actually use an analogue video camera and therefore have to convert the stream to digital first, but even my results look pretty good even on a Sony Bravia 32" screen!

I have no idea of this would be different on a plasma screen, nor do you say how big that screen is.

If your results really are 'lousy' then we need to investigate the source, but in order to do that PLEASE start your own thread, as 'threadjacking' somebody else's thread with a different problem IS against the terms of use! 🙂

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Answer 15

Andrewpratt2 Author

Level 1

2 points

Nov 15, 2008 11:43 PM in response to Klaus1

Dear Klaus and anyone else reading this thread,

How did I get on with Deinterlacer?

The link to a hints page was very useful. Although the hints were actually for the opposite direction (PAL to NTSC) they were quite clear.

The key was that the notes advised that Deinterlacer should be pointed towards the '.mov' file rather than the individual Quicktime clips I had been pointing the programme at.

Also, in previous attempts I had copied the project to a separate directory (leaving the Mac short of disk space). Instead, I started Deinterlacer by pointing it at the original project and specifying a separate directory for the output file.

These changes in my procedure created a Quicktime file that played in Quicktime. The next task was to import this 13MB file (yep, Deinterlacer mergered all the separate Quicktime files and transitions into a single large file. The programme notes say that Deinterlacer keeps any chapter markers but at the time of writing I have not confirmed this). The first time I tried to drag and drop the Quicktime movie, I dropped it directly into iMovie's timeline. iMovie does not seem to like this (or at least, I wasn't willing to wait more than the 2-3 hours it seemed to be taking to finish processing the file). The good news is that dropping the Quicktime file into the clips area worked. From the clips area, the Quicktime clip can be dragged into the timeline as normal.

Finally, some comments on the quality of the output. When a person or object moves quickly then some blurring is noticeable. Also, some of the clips I took were in low light situations and the picture graininess has become slightly more noticeable. I need to decide whether this degradation is acceptable or not.

Next step is to send the clip to iDVD

Regards,

Andrew

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