HD movie archive

[sidd finch]

I have started to do a fair amount of editing in HD (Premiere Pro CS3) which I like a lot. But, I was wondering what format is the best to save my finished opus? In the good-ole-days of editing in SD I would output to MPEG II with a high setting and store the finished movies on my hard drive. What I do is gather the relevant movies and burn to a DVD.

But now I am wondering what is the best file format to save the finished movies to my hard drive in HD? Should I use the MPEG 4 H264 format? Once completed I have no desire to go back and edit the movies. I guess at some point I will get a blue ray burner? But I am not sure what is a good format.

Sidd

[Paul LS]

H.264 or MPEG2 I guess. As I burn AVCHD discs which use H.264 and can be created with smart rendering I tend to archive video in this format.

[sidd finch]

Is there a HD MPEG2 setting? I have archived most of mine with MPEG4 H.264

Sidd

[Steve Grisetti]

Try Share/Personal Computer/MPEG and use the 1440x1080 30 fps preset.

That will output the equivalent of HDV footage.

[Jayell]

Try Share/Personal Computer/MPEG and use the 1440x1080 30 fps preset.
That will output the equivalent of HDV footage.

So I assume if one plans to take the footage into DVD Architect Studio, the same rule would apply?

[Steve Grisetti]

No. There's no point in using a hi-def MPEG in DVD Architect Studio, since it can only output a standard DVD.

For DVD Architect, use Share/Personal Computer/MPEG and use the DVD-MPEG preset.

[Jayell]

Thanks Steve. My head is still spinning in trying to understand what each step of the process adds (or doesn't) when the original project was recorded and captured in HD.