People mad over Blu-Ray Discs

[Jordanmphoto]

I guess you don't need both programs. DVD Architect Studio does it all -- and allows you to set burn speed.

I just usually create my DVDs as Prepared Files -- finished DVD files that I store on my hard drive. Then I use ImgBurn to burn off discs as needed. As I've said, I like the added bonus of ImgBurn's verification feature. It hasn't let me down yet.

BTW, I burned a blu-ray in DVD Architect Studio. It has one burn speed for BD, which is 4x.

Doesn't Nero do the same thing? I mean, burn off multiple copies. I have that on my computer, but if ImgBurn is better I will go after that.

I don't miss the PE menus at all. DAS has a lot better looking menus than PE and they seem easier to control. For one thing, when I insert a background of my own it doesn't get lost!

Your tutorials on DAS are good, Steve. I don't want to get into it enough to read the whole book, but I think I've learned enough to burn the discs the way I want them. I'm getting ready to join so that I can learn the part about scene markers . .

I'm excited about PE10 supposedly burning HD to a regular DVD. Does that really work? Is it as good as a Blu-Ray?

[Steve Grisetti]

Premiere Elements 10 will burn AVCHD to a DVD. However this doesn't mean you'll be able to play it on your a DVD player!

Your DVD player is standard definition, 720x480. And it can only play DVD video.

AVCHD, like BluRay, can only be played on high-definition BluRay players (even if it's on a DVD disc) -- and then only on BluRay players that can play AVCHD video.

It's not possible for a DVD player to play hi-def video.

[Jordanmphoto]

I have to admit I was doubtful about the DVD making an HD quality disc. So what you're saying is that we could burn a Blu-Ray disc to a DVD and save some money or would it be lesser quality?

This may be playing devil's advocate, but upstairs I have a DVD player that I had just prior to buying the BD player. It could take normal commercial DVD's and upgrade them to high resolution. This actually worked. It was not quite as good as the Blu-Ray but darned close. (Close enough that I sort of regretted spending the extra dough on a BD player at that time). I wonder if this kind of player would get high res out of the AVCHD video on a DVD?

[Bob]

So what you're saying is that we could burn a Blu-Ray disc to a DVD and save some money or would it be lesser quality?

No, that's not what Steve is saying. We're talking about three different disk formats here. The standard DVD disk format, the Blu-ray disc format, and the AVCHD disk format. All three are different. Steve is talking about burning AVCHD format discs.

Your DVD player and discs support standard definition only. You have a dvd player that resamples the standard definition video to high def frame sizes (that's called uprezzing) for viewing on your HDTV. But, the disk still contains standard def content.

Blu-ray is currently the standard distribution format for high def content. Blu-ray uses a different disc than DVD and requires a Blu-ray burner and/or player. Blu-ray discs will not play on a DVD player.

AVCHD discs are somewhere in between the other two formats. This format was originally created to capture high def AVCHD video in disc based camcorders. It's not used for that any more, but some people use the format as an inexpensive way to create short high def discs. AVCHD disks are similar to Blu-ray discs, but are burned to standard dvd discs using a standard DVD burner. They will not play in a DVD player. AVCHD disks are not Blu-ray on DVD. You need a Blu-ray player capable of playing AVCHD discs -- not all Blu-ray players will do that. The bitrate is only half that of Blu-ray and can only hold about a half hour of content. Because of the potential incompatibilities, this is not a good format for distribution. If you are burning high def discs for others, use Blu-ray.

[Jordanmphoto]

Will do. Thanks for the explanation, Bob. It looks like this new feature Adobe is promoting is a little bit misleading. But I'm still thrilled about the 64 bit Win 7 support.

[Jordanmphoto]

More about burning the Blu-Rays: I saved my two halves of the video to MPEG's and then assembled them in DVD Architect Studio. (I can create a disc menu there and am pleased with the results) When I play the DAS preview they are just right. I burned the project to a Blu-Ray at 4x. If I play the resultant Blu-Ray on my computer it still looks as it should. If I take it and play it on the Samsung Blu-Ray player in my living room (on TV) it suddenly has flaws. The TV does not have full 1080 resolution and therefore I don't expect the picture to be quite as sharp. However, there are several errors which seem related to the player rather than the TV. First, the audio track sort of "burps" at the beginning of the video and at the beginning of the second half. In other words, you miss the first few notes of music. Second, the color balance in the video is very red and not at all what it appears to be when played on the computer. Keep in mind also that commercial blu-rays played on this system run with no problem and look just gorgeous.

If I burn with ImgBurn and verify it, would that assure that the Blu-Ray would play well on all BD players? If I do this, should I just create the movie file with PE9 and go straight to ImgBurn or is there some advantage of assembling with DVD Architect Studio?

[Steve Grisetti]

Well, there are no guarantees with home-burned discs, Jordan. They use a chemical process to add the video data to a disc -- as opposed to commercial DVDs and BluRays, in which the data is pressed into the metal disc inside the plastic.

ImgBurn and verification can ensure you have the best possible disc. But the results are ultimately only as good as the disc player's ability to read them. And, while most players are designed to read home-burned discs, sometimes they just won't go no matter what you do.

So, as we said earlier, there appears to be no indication at all of a problem with the software that's creating your video data or creating your disc files.

[Jordanmphoto]

Yeah, I think that the guy who couldn't play the BD was talking about an early player that is built into his TV. He always has to be the first on his block to have the latest and this was the latest, but many years ago. He said the BD would play the disc menu on his son's player but he couldn't get the "Play Movie" button to work. Well, the problem is apparently that the other son bought the player as a gift and it was a floor model with no remote control. Apparently there is only a "Play" button on the machine itself and it will serve as "Enter" for a commercial disc, but not for my chemical disc. So, it's like you say, sometimes they just won't go no matter what you do. Today I am going to burn them another Blu-ray on DVD Architect Studio using a Verbatim BD-R. If that doesn't work, they're just going to have to settle for the SD version on DVD until they upgrade their stuff.

[Steve Grisetti]

Glad you're on a way to a solution, Jordan!

[George Tyndall]

I'm excited about PE10 supposedly burning HD to a regular DVD. Does that really work? Is it as good as a Blu-Ray?

by Bob » Thu May 05, 2011 11:33 am

RJ posted while I was writing this, but he is correct. DVD Architect burns a valid Blu-Ray disc on Blu-Ray media. The media template is unlocked and you can choose to burn your Blu-Ray on DVD media. Burning Blu-Ray to DVD doesn't produce a true AVCHD disc. It produces Blu-Ray on DVD which is even less compatible than AVCHD discs -- it won't play on all Blu-Ray players including some that support true AVCHD discs. Samsung has also done a similar thing with removing support via firmware changes.

Bottom line, if you are producing this for clients, use Blue-Ray media for best compatibility.

[Steve Grisetti]

Well said, George. And Robert.

[George Tyndall]

Well said, George. And Robert.

That's RJ and Bob, Steve, from a prvevious thread (June 2011),

[Steve Grisetti]

Oops! Sorry. Credit where credit is due.

[Jordanmphoto]

Thanks, you guys. I am pretty clear now that I will use BD's for HD videos and DVD's for everything else.