Expert: Andre Hickman - 5/23/2008

Question
QUESTION: Mr. Hickman - I am a beginner at producing videos and recently filmed an event that I transferred from my panasonic dvx100b to dvd and processed it in adobe premiere elements. The problem is that when viewing on dvd on a normal tv I can see "flashing" or almost individual frames. Especially when there is movement of a subject or around the edges of the video. It is a little difficult to describe, but the images are not smooth, except when the subjects are standing still or not moving horzontally across the screen. It is subdued and mild. Not blatant. If it would help I could make a clip and send it. It is also worth noting that I can't see this until I get it to DVD on a normal TV. At least I dont think I can. Premiere Elements indicates that I filmed this at 30fps. Thanks for any help you might be able to provide - bill lane

ANSWER: Hey Bill,

Hmmmmm, that is puzzling.  And even harder without seeing what you see.  Let me get some things straight first, and then try to go from there:

1) you are importing DV footage to your computer, using a firewire (IEEE) connection from your camera directly to the computer using the capture video function in Premiere Elements.
Note: this should save in the form of .avi files with DV quality (29.97 fps, which is the same as 30 fps drop frame, and the resolution should be 720x480)

2) From there, after editing video, etc. you are authoring a DVD with menus, etc.  When you play the DVD you can then see glitches in the footage that weren't there in the imported .avi files.

If these are correct, let me ask this, when editing the files, do you then export the edits to a new .avi file before creating the DVD, or do you "Export to DVD"? I do not have Adobe premiere elements, so I am not certain of all of it's import and export features.  Also is the DVD authoring functionality inside of Premiere Elements, or do you author the DVDs (i.e. create a working dvd with play menu, etc) in a separate program?

Try to answer these questions the best you can, and We'll go from there.

Cheers,
Andre'

Hey Bill, I did some more research, and found that other people are having the same problem.  Looks like it might just be Adobe Premiere Elements has a crappy DVD authoring compnent.  Everything else probably works fine, but when it comes to authoring the DVD, the quality goes to crap. If there is a place to "switch fields" on the video interlacing, then you may try that, but I really am starting to believe that it's not something that you are doing wrong.

I use all adobe professional version products, but when it comes to authoring a dvd, I have never used the internal function. I import using Premiere Pro, edit, and then render to a file (.avi or .mpeg movie). Then I actually use Sonic MyDVD (Which is now called Roxio MyDVD Studio)to author the DVD, and you can find it for less than $50 online.  Adobe editing and production functions are great, but I'm not sure that they ever got their authoring portion right.  In which case, I suggest you go find something off the shelf at a store like Best Buy, or Circuit City.

I hope this helps.

Cheers,
Andre

---------- FOLLOW-UP ----------

QUESTION: Andre -

1. I am transferring the data from my camera to physical DVDs through my DVD player. Directly to DVD. My PC does not have a DV connection. When I get them to DVD they are .VOB files. When I go to properties within Elements, it shows as a MPEG movie, despite the .VOB extension, and 29.97fps, 780x480 image size.
2. I am a little confused on "authoring". I am 'burning' the  DVD to a folder then using Sonic to copy the files within the VIDEO_TS folder to a DVD. FYI - No menus within the final production.

Um, on your last question: I am creating clips from the original files. It appears that PE is then creating new .VOB files corresponding to the new clips. Then I put those clips in the order within the sceneline for my production. I'm not doing any "exporting".

I'll try the 'switch fields' idea - even though I have no idea what this means. If you have any other suggestions, please let me know. Thanks for your help.

Bill


Answer
Ahhhh!...Ok...now that you have explained what you are doing, I see exactly why the footage is not good...

When you convert to DVD format files (those .vob's that play on an actual DVD player), the footage gets major compression, that is made to view on TV, but not really suitable for editing.  Then you are trying to bring DVD compressed footage into your computer, and edit it, which results in the compression really showing up.  By the time you edit, then put it back on DVD, you have actually gone through the DVD compression twice, and the result is a bunch of flickering, and probably pixilated areas, like squares in the video, which is especially apparent around edges of people and sharp angled lines in the footage background.

What you need is a Firewire (IEEE) card installed in your computer.  It is a piece of hardware, similar to a USB port card, with ports made for Firewire.  usually the port on the card is a 6-pin port, which looks like a rectangle with both corners on the right cut of at a 45-degree angle.  On your camera, the DV port is usually a very small port that looks like a short and fat "U".

Here (the links below) is what the card looks like that needs to be added to your computer (unless you look and see these ports already on the back):

http://www.bestbuy.com/site/olspage.jsp?skuId=6307392&st=ieee+card&lp=1&type=pro

or just go to bestbuy.com and search "ieee cards"

The cable that you will need to connect from the camera to the computer is this:

http://www.bestbuy.com/site/olspage.jsp?skuId=8478792&st=ieee+cable&lp=2&type=pr

(or search "ieee 4-pin to 6-pin cables")

which is a 4-pin to 6-pin cable. You can find these things cheaper elsewhere, but I just wanted to direct you somewhere that I thought you would be familiar with.  Once installed, when you have Premiere running, and connect and turn on your camera, you can do a video capture, and record the footage without compression directly to your computer's harddrive.  From within premiere you will actually be able to control your camera's play/rewind/forward functions, and do a "dub" record directly to your computer.

This is the way DV was intended to be captured to the computer and edited.  I hope this helps.  Trying it that other way is always going to make your footage look sub-par.

If you need any further clarification, just let me know.  If you've never opened up your computer to install something like a sound card and are afraid to, I think some stores like best buy and microcenter will do it for you, but they will definitely charge a bundle for installing something that takes about 2 minutes to do, and is as easy as sticking two LEGOS together...

Cheers,
Andre'