I personally would use MPEG 2 throughout the whole process, especially if SVRT is available. If you use AVI for the initial capture you will have less compression and should get better results, but remember that the file will be absolutely huge. __________________________________
CORNBLOSSOM

Jaime, I dont' mind if the files are huge, I have plenty of space, but it's more about the quality for me. Quality of the stored file for future use or saving, and quality of the resulting dvd.

Are you saying capture in avi, and produce to mpeg2? (that was one of my 'results' that looked good compared to others) The capture to mpeg2 and produce to mpeg2 was obviously fast, but didn't look much, was a bit fuzzy.
Jenny

Yes, you can capture to AVI and produce to MPEG 2 if that gives best results. In PD, DV-AVI has little, if any, compression, so you are really not encoding twice. That may be why you got better results. __________________________________
CORNBLOSSOM

This is a good thread. Thanks for your input, Jaime. As a newbie myself I find all these formats confusing.

How noticeable is the difference between MPEG-2 and MPEG-4? I realize that each conversion does degrade the quality and that all this is inevitably a compromise, but will I see the difference upon replay through a DVD player into my telly?

I am converting VCR cassettes to digital using an EasyCap cable. It was cheap but seems to work. Is there any point in using a higher quality format? Custom computer: 8 processors, 16G Ram, ,C: drive 250G solid state. F: (Scratch drive) 2x 500Gb raid (0). G: (Data drive) 2Tb raid (1)
Power director Ultimate 12.0.2230.0

Most DVD players will not play MP4, so I would avoid even using it for that purpose. As for the difference, I get much better results from MP4, but that is almost certainly because my MP4 equipment is newer and better quality. If you have a high end MPEG 2 camera and convert to MP4 using a high bitrate format you will notice very little difference. The problem comes when people try to squeeze the video to smaller and smaller sizes. That said, with VCR as the original format, you will probably not gain much from a high bitrate format anyways. I hope that didn't just confuse matters more. __________________________________
CORNBLOSSOM

I just tried a very time consuming experiment. I wanted to see what I could SEE on the large TV, how the quality would differ from one to another, so I could choose the best that looked to MY eye. I don't understand files, size, compression, etc, but I cand see a pin in a haystack, so that's my best way of choosing. So...

I captured 3 clips off my old hi 8 camcorder into PD11

the first 3 I captured in Mpeg2 Fine
the second time the same three but in AVI
the third time, same three, in Mpeg2 Fast. (something to do with the speed, not sure what.)

Then Produced all 9 clips (above) into MPeg2 files
Then Produced the smae 9 clips again, but into AVI files,
And again, into AVC files. Now I have 27 clips produced 9 different ways.

I then wrote those to an MPeg2 dvd disc.
Then I wrote the same files, but this time to an avchd dvd.
Of course then I had to watch them all. Lucky I love my kids, and I didn't capture any 'whining' noises!! lol.
Here's the results:

Looked Good: I feel MPeg2 , producing to mpeg2 and writing to mpeg2 disc was a 4/5.
Avi Capture, avi produce to mpeg2 disc looked good 4/5
Mpeg 2 capture to AVc to and avchd disc looked maybe the best.
and mpeg2 capture to mpeg2 produce to avchd looked good too.

It's hard to watch all the clips and still be able to judge, but some were extremely jittery, and some artefact-y. The Captured Avi, produced to Mpeg2 was awful and pixelated. the other way around it was artifacty.

there's probably obvious reasons why these looked good to me, (on a fairly large dig hd tv screen) while others didn't. I'm looking at them on a disc through a blu ray player.

Is there any reason why writing them to a blu ray disc instead of dvd ultimately will change the quality? I haven't tested the whole lot on a blu ray disc yet (waste of a good disc). But can you put mpeg2 on a blu ray?

My result was that I liked the look of the capture of Mpeg2 produced to AVC and put on an avchd dvd best. I'm wondering if that's going to be the same putting in on blu ray (purpose only to put a lot on one disc).
I'm still confused about which I should ultimately choose, as there may be a reason why Jenny

I am not sure why it would look worse on a Blu-Ray disc unless it was the AVCHD compression. You can use MPEG 2 on Blu-Ray disc, even for SD video. Thanks for sharing your results. __________________________________
CORNBLOSSOM