Differences between iDVD encoder settings

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Level 2

171 points

Differences between iDVD encoder settings

Greetings,

OK, I looked in the forums, Pogue and Miller's iMovie'09 and iDVD book, and on the Web, and haven't found a satisfactory answer.

There are three options: Best Perf., Hi Quality, and Professional Quality.

On the iDVD help page (the same can be found at http://support.apple.com/kb/PH5417) it says, and I am paraphrasing and summarizing:

BP: Background processing available. Good for up to 1-hr videos, and quality will be excellent. preset bit rate. Use HQ or PQ for longer video.

HQ: This is the _best encoding option_ [my emphasis] for videos between 1 and 2 hours long. [OK so far.] (iDVD book and Apple disagree on bit rate; the former says VBR, while Apple seems to imply CBR.)

PQ: uses advanced technology, resulting in the _best quality of video possible_ [again, my emphasis]. Select for projects of up 2 hours duration. Time-consuming.

OK. so what's the deal here?

1) HQ and PQ can't both be best. Or is HQ best as a compromise of some sort, in which case it should specify it?

2) What are the differences for videos of less than 1 hour? Seems to me that you can't improve on the BP setting in this case. IOW, is there any point using HQ or PQ for videos of less than 1 hour?

3) For videos of 1 to 2 hours, does PQ always give better results than HQ?

So, is the following right:

A) For videos of less than 1 hour: use BP, as the others won't improve anything.

B) For videos between 1 and 2 hours: PQ will give better quality than HQ, but it will take a lot longer to burn the DVD, and BP won't fit.

Thanks!

AEF

Posted on Mar 9, 2013 11:16 AM

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Answer 1

Mar 9, 2013 11:42 AM in response to betaneptune

Hi

So, is the following right:

A) For videos of less than 1 hour: use BP, as the others won't improve anything.

B) For videos between 1 and 2 hours: PQ will give better quality than HQ, but it will take a lot longer to burn the DVD, and BP won't fit.

About so.

iDVD 08, 09 & 11 has three levels of qualities. (version 7.0.1, 7,0.4 & 7.1.1) and iDVD 6 has the two last ones

• Professional Quality

(movies + menus up to 120 min.) - BEST (but not always for short movies e.g. up to 45 minutes in total)

• Best Performances

(movies + menus less than 60 min.) - High quality on final DVD (Can be best for short movies)

• High Quality (in iDVD08 or 09) / Best Quality (in iDVD6)

(movies + menus up to 120 min.) - slightly lower quality than above

Menu can take 15 minutes or even more - I use a very simple one with no audio or animation like ”Brushed Metal” in old Themes.

About double on DL DVDs.

BUT -

THE TIME is not just the Movie Duration ! ! !

IT IS - Movie time PLUS Menu time !

And Menu can take 15 minutes (or even more from Movie time)

• Using an elaborated Menu with Sub-menus and Animation (playing buttons) and Audio - Can take a lot of TIME

I use an as simple one possibly - most often "Brushed Metal" from Old Themes - NO animation - NO Audio and this takes less than 1 minute. Resulting in about 59 minutes to my movie.

THEN

I think that I get best possibly result with Best Performances if movie is less than 45 minutes and for all that's more I use the Professional Qualit.

Yours Bengt W

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Answer 2

Klaus1

Level 9

52,749 points

Mar 9, 2013 3:03 PM in response to betaneptune

iDVD encoding settings:

http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1502?viewlocale=en_US

Short version:

Best Performance is for videos of up to 60 minutes

Best Quality is for videos of up to 120 minutes

Professional Quality is also for up to 120 minutes but even higher quality (and takes much longer)

That was for single-layer DVDs. Double these numbers for dual-layer DVDs.

Professional Quality: The Professional Quality option uses advanced two-pass technology to encode your video (The first pass determines which parts of the movie can be given greater compresson without quality loss and which parts can’t. The second pass then encodes those different parts accordingly) , resulting in the best quality of video possible on your burned DVD. You can select this option regardless of your project’s duration (up to 2 hours of video for a single-layer disc and 4 hours for a double-layer disc). Because Professional Quality encoding is time-consuming (requiring about twice as much time to encode a project as the High Quality option, for example) choose it only if you are not concerned about the time taken.

In both cases the maximum length includes titles, transitions and effects etc. Allow about 15 minutes for these.

You can use the amount of video in your project as a rough determination of which method to choose. If your project has an hour or less of video (for a single-layer disc), choose Best Performance. If it has between 1 and 2 hours of video (for a single-layer disc), choose High Quality. If you want the best possible encoding quality for projects that are up to 2 hours (for a single-layer disc), choose Professional Quality. This option takes about twice as long as the High Quality option, so select it only if time is not an issue for you.

Use the Capacity meter in the Project Info window (choose Project > Project Info) to determine how many minutes of video your project contains.

NOTE: With the Best Performance setting, you can turn background encoding off by choosing Advanced > “Encode in Background.” The checkmark is removed to show it’s no longer selected. Turning off background encoding can help performance if your system seems sluggish.

And whilst checking these settings in iDVD Preferences, make sure that the settings for NTSC/PAL and DV/DV Widescreen are also what you want.

http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1502?viewlocale=en_US

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Answer 3

betaneptune Author

Level 2

171 points

Mar 9, 2013 3:14 PM in response to Bengt Wärleby

15 minutes of "disc space" just for an animated menu? Wow! Good to know. I was wondering why my short videos take up so much space on a disc. I thought it was some strange overhead of some sort. I'll have to check out that "Brushed Metal" menu.

OK, so it looks like you're saying for 1 hour or less, use BP. And for 1 to 2 hours, use PQ, unless you're in a hurry, in which case use HQ.

Thanks!

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Answer 4

betaneptune Author

Level 2

171 points

Mar 9, 2013 9:45 PM in response to Klaus1

Klaus1,

You say to use Best Performance for videos of up to 1 hour. OK.

Then you say to use High Quality for videos between 1 and 2 hours long. OK

BUT: Then you say to choose Professional Quality "for the best possible encoding quality for projects that are up to 2 hours (for a single-layer disc). This option takes about twice as long as the High Quality option, so select it only if time is not an issue for you."

But the phrase "up to 2 hours" includes lengths of less than 1 hour. IOW, "up to 2 hours" means anywhere between zero and 2 hours, or between 0 and 120 minutes.

So for videos under 1 hour long, which should I use? Best Performance or Performance Quality? Seems to me the former would be best, as there is no compression with it. Or maybe the PQ options would realize that no compression is needed and just burn it "straight".

AEF

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Answer 5

Klaus1

Level 9

52,749 points

Mar 10, 2013 4:11 AM in response to betaneptune

I only use Professional Quality for videos of any length, before burning using Toast - but I am retired and have time to wait! 😀

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Answer 6

Old Toad

Level 10

207,367 points

Mar 10, 2013 9:46 AM in response to betaneptune

One thing to remember is that when beginning the encoding process disable Energy Saving on your Mac. Having energy saving cut in during the encoding process has been proven to be detrimental and can result in an aborted or bad encoding.

Also follow this workflow to help ensure the best quality video DVDd:

Once you have the project as you want it save it as a disk image via the File ➙ Save as Disk Image menu option. This will separate the encoding process from the burn process.

To check the encoding mount the disk image and launch DVD Player and play it. If it plays OK with DVD Player the encoding was good.

Then burn to disk with Disk Utility or Toast at the slowest speed available (2x-4x) to assure the best burn quality. Always use top quality media: Verbatim, Maxell or Taiyo Yuden DVD-R are the most recommended in these forums.

OT

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