Photo quality follow-up questions

Hi

Aside from cropping photos to 4:3 format does increasing the dpi of the photos have any effect in improving the quality of the final image in iDVD?

Yes and NO -

• YES a very low dpi - say 24dpi - will result in BAD result

• NO - for standard size e.g. 4Mb or more and 300dpi photos - using 1500dpi will NOT IMPROVE but might result in the opposite as downscaling not always are done so well.

I'm making a dvd of family photos for my wife. Some were taken with a digital camera, some are photos scanned by myself and some are photos given to us by relatives that they scanned. I'm putting them together in iMovie, leaving them static - no pans or zooms, keeping the image size at a value of "1", setting the duration at 5 seconds and grouping them by subject using chapter markers so I can get around the 99 photos limitation. (I have over 1500 photos.)

OK - but there are a 99 Chapter limits too. (just to mention)

I've already burned on dvd and was disappointed by the "jaggies" on most of the photos when viewed on my cinema display. Haven't looked at the dvd on a regular tv (CRT, not flat screen/digital). The images looked great in iMovie. It occurred to me that increasing the dpi - most were at 72 dpi - to 300 might improve this issue all other things remaining the same. I can do that easily in Photoshop, but was wondering if that would be a waster of time - especially if no improvement would be realized.

YES - as this due to two things:

• DVD Standard - Whatever program is used - is ONLY - interlaced SD-Video Quality. iDVD does the job as good as any other DVD authoring program.

• nor iMovie'08 or 09 or 11 - Can not deliver this - they all throw away every second line When dropping material into a Project. There are NO way around this - but to use another Video-editing program

- iMovie up to HD6 - Can deliver 100% of what's needed

- Any version of FinalCut can do this as well

Something to remember is:

• That one can make an as good DVD as the tools availably - BUT in iDVD YOU CAN ALSO add a data-folder containing the full quality photos - so that anyone that need the full 100% quality - can open it on a Computer and use them as You'll suggest them to.

Yours Bengt W

There are many ways to produce slide shows using iPhoto, iMovie or iDVD and some limit the number of photos you can use (iDVD has a 99 chapter (slide) limitation).

If what you want is what I want, namely to be able to use high resolution photos (even 300 dpi tiff files), to pan and zoom individual photos, use a variety of transitions, to add and edit music or commentary, place text exactly where you want it, and to end up with a DVD that looks good on both your Mac and a TV - in other words end up with and end result that does not look like an old fashioned slide show from a projector - you may be interested in how I do it. You don't have to do it my way, but the following may be food for thought!

Firstly you need proper software to assemble the photos, decide on the duration of each, the transitions you want to use, and how to pan and zoom individual photos where required, and add proper titles. For this I use Photo to Movie. You can read about what it can do on their website:

http://www.lqgraphics.com/software/phototomovie.php

(Other users here use the alternative FotoMagico: http://www.boinx.com/fotomagico/homevspro/ which you may prefer - I have no experience with it.)

Neither of these are freeware, but are worth the investment if you are going to do a lot of slide shows. Read about them in detail, then decide which one you feel is best suited to your needs.

Once you have timed and arranged and manipulated the photos to your liking in Photo to Movie, it exports the file to iMovie as a DV stream. You can add music in Photo to Movie, but I prefer doing this in iMovie where it is easier to edit. You can now further edit the slide show in iMovie just as you would a movie, including adding other video clips, then send it to iDVD 7, or Toast, for burning.

You will be pleasantly surprised at how professional the results can be!

To simply create a slide show in iDVD 7 onwards from images in iPhoto or stored in other places on your hard disk or a connected server, look here:

http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1089

YES Klaus1

I forgot it

Got FotoMagico™

Yes it delivers DVDs via Toast™ with great quality.

Even greater if Blu-Ray component is used and

• Standard DVDs - for shows less than 30 minutes

• Blu-Ray burner and disks for longer ones

BUT - they need Blu-Ray player to be played

- Can not be played on any Mac of mine

- Plays well on PlayStation 3

alt.

Deliver Show on an USB-Memory

- then Quality can be much higher - as in iMovie

Yours Bengt W

iMovie HD 6.0.3 and iDVD 6.0.4

As far as I know - this will give max quality possibly when making a Video-DVD

resolution: 72dpi or 300dpi

depends on size

A small picture 200 x 300 pixels - will be worse than a 1200 x 1600 picture.

Resolution doesn't matter as I see it.

iMovie and/or iDVD will try to scale it to fit - and up or down-scaling

will not be done kindly.

Still using my 2016 × 1512 - usually give good result in iMovie

but if I Share to iDVD (iMovie HD6 6.0.3 or 4) - BAD RESULT

I just close the iMovie project

Drop the iMovie project icon (With a black star on it) into the iDVD application (menu window).

Result best possibly for a Video-DVD - DVD standard is the limit.

Else that determine the final quality on the DVD

DVD quality

1. 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.

2. Video from

• FCE/P - Export out as full quality QuickTime.mov (not self-containing, no conversion)

• iMovie x-6 - Don't use ”Share/Export to iDVD” = destructive even to movie project and especially so

when the movie includes photos and the Ken Burns effect NOT is used. Instead just drop or import the iMovie movie project icon (with a Star on it) into iDVD theme window.

• iMovie’08 or 09 or 11 are not meant to go to iDVD. Go via Media Browser or rather use iMovie HD 6 from start.

3. I use Roxio Toast™ to make an as slow burn as possibly e.g. x4 or x1 (in iDVD’08 or 09 this can also be set)

This can also be done with Apple’s Disk Utilities application when burning from a DiskImage.

4. There has to be about or more than 25Gb free space on internal (start-up) hard disk. iDVD can't

use an external one as scratch disk (if it is not start-up disc). For SD-Video - if HD-material is used I guess that 4 to 5 times more would do.

5. I use Verbatim ( also recommended by many - Taiyo Yuden DVDs - I can’t get hold of it to test )

6. I use DVD-R (no +R or +/-RW) - DVD-R play’s on more and older DVD-Players

7. Keep NTSC to NTSC - or - PAL to PAL when going from iMovie to iDVD

(I use JES_Deinterlacer to keep frame per sec. same from editing to the Video-DVD result.)

8. Don’t burn more than three DVDs at a time - but let the laser cool off for a while before next batch.

iDVD quality also depends on.

• DVD is a standard in it self. It is Standard Definition Quality = Same as on old CRT-TV sets and can not

deliver anything better that this.

HD-DVD was a short-lived standard and it was only a few Toshiba DVD-players that could playback.

These DVDs could be made in DVD-Studio Pro. But they don’t playback on any other standard DVD-Player.

Blu-Ray / BD can be coded onto DVDs but limited in time to - about 20-30 minutes and then need

_ Roxio Toast™ 10 Pro incl. BD-component

_ BD disks and burner if full length movies are to be stored

_ BD-Player or PlayStation3 - to be able to playback

The BD-encoded DVDs can be play-backed IF Mac also have Roxio DVD-player tool. Not on any standard Mac or DVD-player

Full BD-disks needs a BD-player (in Mac) as they need blue-laser to be read. No red-laser can do this.

• HOW much free space is there on Your internal (start-up) hard disk. Go for approx. 25Gb.

less than 5Gb and Your result will most probably not play.

• How it was recorded - Tripod vs Handheld Camera. A stable picture will give a much higher quality

• Audio is most often more critical than picture. Bad audio and with dropouts usually results in a non-viewed movie.

• Use of Video-editor. iMovie’08 or 09 or 11 are not the tools for DVD-production. They discard every second line resulting in a close to VHS-tape quality.

iMovie 1 to HD6 and FinalCut any version delivers same quality as Camera record in = 100% to iDVD

• What kind of movie project You drop into it. MPEG4 seems to be a bad choice.

other strange formats are .avi, .wmv, .flash etc. Convert to streamingDV first

Also audio formats matters. I use only .aiff or from miniDV tape Camera 16-bit

strange formats often problematic are .avi, .wmv, audio from iTunes, .mp3 etc

Convert to .aiff first and use this in movie project

• What kind of standard - NTSC movie and NTSC DVD or PAL to PAL - no mix.

(If You need to change to do a NTSC DVD from PAL material let JES_Deinterlacer_3.2.2 do the conversion)

(Dropping a PAL movie into a NTSC iDVD project

(US) NTSC DVDs most often are playable in EU

(EU) PAL DVDs most often needs to be converted to play in US

UNLESS. They are play-backed by a Mac - then You need not to care

• What kind of DVDs You are using. I use Verbatim DVD-R (this brand AND no +R or +/-RW)

• How You encode and burn it. Two settings prior iDVD’08 or 09

Pro Quality (only in iDVD 08 & 09)

Best / High Quality (not always - most often not)

Best / High Performances (most often my choice before Pro Quality)

1. go to iDVD pref. menu and select tab far right and set burn speed to x1 (less errors = plays better) - only in iDVD 08 & 09

(x4 by some and may be even better)

2. Project info. Select Professional Encoding - only in iDVD 08 & 09.

Region codes.

iDVD - only burn Region = 0 - meaning - DVDs are playable everywhere

DVD Studio pro can set Region codes.

1 = US

2 = EU

unclemano wrote

What it turned out to be was the "quality" settings in iDVD. The total clip time was NOT over 2 hours or 4.7GB, yet iDVD created massive visual artifacts on the "professional quality" setting.

I switched the settings to "high quality" which solved the problem. According iDVD help, "high quality" determines the best bit rate for the clips you have.

I have NEVER seen iDVD do this before, especially when I was under the 2 hour and 4.7GB limits.

For anyone else, there seem to be 2 places in iDVD to set quality settings, the first is under "preferences" and the second under "project info." They do NOT seem to be linked (i.e. if you change one, the other is NOT changed). take care, Mario

to get this to work I

• Secure a minimum of 25Gb free space on Start-Up (Mac OS) hard disk

• Use Verbatim DVD-R (absolutely no +/-RW)

• Set down burn speed to x4 - less burn errors = plays on more devices

• No other process running in background as - ScreenSaver, EnergySaver OR TIMEMACHINE etc

• and I'm very careful on what kind of video-codecs, audio file format and photo file formats I use

• and I consider the iDVD Bug - never go back to video-editor to change/up-date - if so Start a brand new iDVD project

• Chapters set as they should - NO one at very beginning and no one in any transition or within 2 sec from it

• Lay-out - Turn on TV-Safe area and keep everything buttons, titles etc WELL INSIDE not even touching it !

Try to break the process up into two stages

• Save as a DiskImage (calculating part)

• Burn from this .img file (burning stage)

To isolate where the problem starts.

Another thing is - Playing it onto a Blu-Ray Player. My PlayStation3 can play BD-disks but not all of my home made DVDs so to get this to work I

• Secure a minimum of 25Gb free space on Start-Up (Mac OS) hard disk

• Use Verbatim DVD-R (absolutely no +/-RW)

• Set down burn speed to x4 - less burn errors = plays on more devices

• No other process running in background as - ScreenSaver, EnergySaver OR TIMEMACHINE etc

• and I'm very careful on what kind of video-codecs, audio file format and photo file formats I use

• and I consider the iDVD Bug - never go back to video-editor to change/up-date - if so Start a brand new iDVD project

• Chapters set as they should - NO one at very beginning and no one in any transition or within 2 sec from it

• Lay-out - Turn on TV-Safe area and keep everything buttons, titles etc WELL INSIDE not even touching it !

TO GET IT TO WORK SLIGHTLY FASTER

• Minimum of 25Gb free space on Start-Up hard disk

• No other programs running in BackGround e.g. Energy-Saver

• Don’t let HD spin down or be turned off (in Energy-Save)

• Move hard disks that are not to be used to Trash - To be disconnected/turned off

• Goto Spotlight and set the rest of them under Integrity (not to be scanned)

• Set screen-saver to a folder without any photo - then make an active corner (up right for me) and set

pointer to this - turns on screen saver - to show that it has nothing to show

• No File Vault on - Important

• NO - TimeMachine - during iMovie/iDVD work either ! IMPORTANT

• Lot's of icons on DeskTop/Finder also slows down the Mac noticeably

• Start a new User-Account and log into this and iMovie get's faster too - if a project is in a hurry

• And let Mac run on Mains - not just on battery

Yours Bengt W