laserdoc,
a few things can be the cause of apparent lousy DVD quality.
First thing is the resolution of a DVD is designed as standard quality 720x480 maximum. Even with wonderful HD video, when you burn to a playable DVD (different than a data DVD) your resolution takes a hit.
Another thing it is often better to produce your video project to MPEG2, standard quality, and use that new file in your SD-DVD burn because the Produce/burn all at once can cause issues, too. Some folks produce to HD lite 1280x720 and use that file to burn to SD-DVD because they feel they get a better result from that workflow.
And, of course, some people do not like the Cyberlink DVD encoding at all and use another software to take the video file to SD-DVD.
What steps did you take to create your DVD and what was the source-file?

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when I was done working on it I clicked the produce tab and clicked on create Disc and followed the prompts. It looked like in the drop down that it was MPEG2. Did not have a choice. I guess the source file was the project I just created ??

Right. What Barry was suggesting was to Produce to an MPEG-2 file first, then add that clip to the Content window in Create Disc and burn your DVD:



YouTube/optodata

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ok i will try this when I get a chance. when I go to produce is there a tab to use just for MPEG2

Sure is, and the default options are what you want:



YouTube/optodata

DS365 | Win11 Pro | Ryzen 9 3950X | RTX 4070 Ti | 32GB RAM | 10TB SSDs | 5K+4K HDR monitors

Canon Vixia GX10 (4K 60p) | HF G30 (HD 60p) | Yi Action+ 4K | 360Fly 4K 360°

Ok I burned a couple and I do see some difference. I used the cyber link burn choice and then the windows DVD maker. The windows one I thought was slightly better I think. Is there a DVD maker that is better to burn or are they all about the same.Will a different DVD burning program give better results or is it,,,it is what it is.
Thanks guys!!

Glad to hear that you've seen some improvement.

Reread Barry's post above for some other options to try out.

YouTube/optodata

DS365 | Win11 Pro | Ryzen 9 3950X | RTX 4070 Ti | 32GB RAM | 10TB SSDs | 5K+4K HDR monitors

Canon Vixia GX10 (4K 60p) | HF G30 (HD 60p) | Yi Action+ 4K | 360Fly 4K 360°

As stated earlier, some folks simply do not like the Cyberlink DVD encoder. It's really all I use so I don't know the difference, I suppose.
Many folks use IMGburn, but I do not know the workflow, nor how you put a menu in it. I'm not sure if CL falls down in the DVD creation, or the actual DVD burn. Others may chime in. HP Envy Phoenix/4thGen i7-4770(4@3.4GHz~turbo>3.9)
Nvidia GTX 960(4GB)/16GB DDR3/
Canon Vixia HV30/HF-M40/HF-M41/HF-G20/Olympus E-PL5.
Tape capture using 6 VCR, TBC-1000, Elite BVP4+, Sony D8 camcorder with TBC.
https://www.facebook.com/BarryAFTT

Still looking for the best DVD burner quality. Sure would be nice to have the same quality as a regular DVD so I could share a disc instead of a link

I'm not sure what's holding you back from burning a disc. Another option is to produce directly to a higher quality format than MPEG-2 then import that into PD and burn it to DVD. Maybe try producing to these settings and see what the DVD looks like:



YouTube/optodata

DS365 | Win11 Pro | Ryzen 9 3950X | RTX 4070 Ti | 32GB RAM | 10TB SSDs | 5K+4K HDR monitors

Canon Vixia GX10 (4K 60p) | HF G30 (HD 60p) | Yi Action+ 4K | 360Fly 4K 360°

Quote: Still looking for the best DVD burner quality. Sure would be nice to have the same quality as a regular DVD so I could share a disc instead of a link

By regular DVD, if you mean a store bought movie on DVD, no, a consumer editor like PD or the like will never achieve that type of quality. If your potential viewers have a Blu-ray player you’d be much better with that option for picture quality vs standard DVD.

Jeff

Thanks Jeff

Had the same issue. I just burnt the MP4 to a disc as they didn't need the DVD file menu system. I've heard that some Blu Ray players will play the MP4.

This is not a new issue as many users have complained about the disappointing quality of DVDs from PDR13. Can we please get to the bottom of this problem. We are talking about "perceived" quality - or a visual loss in quality which is subjective.

According to Wiki
"The following formats are allowed for H.262/MPEG-2 Part 2 video.
At a display rate of 25 frames per second, interlaced - 720×576 pixels
At a display rate of 29.97 frames per second, interlaced - 720×480 pixels"

So there should be a visual quality difference between PAL and NTSC.

The DVD MPEG-2 format is limited to a bit-rate off 9.80 Mbit/s used for video alone.

Jeff may be right but I have seen many DVDs produced by other NLEs like Edius with really good quality when played on an HD TV.
A pal of mine had a 50 min 720p MP4 wildlife docu video and ask me if I could put it on DVD for him. I used a free program called Freemake Video Converter and with a single click it converted the file to MPEG2 and wrote a DVD-R. I was amazed by the quality as I viewed both the MP4 file and the DVD on my TV. I cannot get anything close to that quality from PDR13.

It may have something to do with PDR13 and the way it converts/resizes.

My PDR13 projects consist of 10Mp photos, 1080 50p MP4, 720 50p Mp4 and 1080 50p MTS (from my Sony).
Quality is good on DVD-AVCHD and BluRay DVD, but as soon as I create a normal MPEG2 DVD the quality is unacceptable.
I found my photos (slides) needed to be re-sized from 10Mp to 1920X1080 (2Mp) using PhotoDirector before importing into PowerDirector13. HD output quality improved a lot. PDR13 likes input quality as close as possible to planned output.

Most users now shoot HD vs SD, but DVDs are still the cheapest and easiest way to distribute edited video projects and if you want Titles and Chapters PDR13 DVD writer should be able to produce decent quality MPEG2 DVD.

The most confusing thing in PDR13 is the myriad of output options you are faced with in Produce regardless of your project content with no explanation or guidelines of how to use them. Within each option you can change output quality and fps and the consequences are not always good and you can create your own custom settings to further confuse things.

For example I complained about the poor color saturation in an HD project made from GoPro HD clips and I blamed PDR13. Ron (optidata) suggested I create a custom template and increase the H.264 MP4 bitrate from the default setting. It made a huge difference and I never would have figured that out on my own. I just assumed that PDR13 default setting would be best.

Once again, my observations are subjective but there have been so many complaints about DVD quality on this forum, I think it warrants a proper objective investigation because it is just plain unacceptable - or to me un-useable.

Al Power Director 13&14 Ultimate, Photo Director 6, Audio Dir, Pwr2Go 10
Win 10 64, Intel MB DH87MC, Intel i5-4670 CPU @ 3.40GHz, 16Gb DDR3 1600, 128Gb SSD, 2x1Tb WDBlue 7200rpmSATA6, Intel 4600 GPU, Gigabyte G1 GTX960 4GB, LG BluRay Writer

I just finished working a 2 hour HD video from my camcorder. (Canon)
I first copied all the show files from the cam via USB to a folder, then started my new PD13 project.

I put all the files into the timeline and edited out the junk. I then produced a .m2ts file at default settings.
Now I have a 13 gb file to work with.

I started a new project in PD13, added that file, and SPLIT scenes to make my chapters. Saved the project, and then worked on the MENU. I used the TOP menu choice. Now I have a video project with menu that I can BURN a DVD, or BlueRay with. Everything I did was with PD13. No other programs needed.

DVD was burned at default settings, (MPEG2) and the BD disc as H.264. VERY pleased with the results of both formats. .
.
Never, under any circumstances, combine a laxative and sleeping pill on the same night.

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As long as it works for you and you are happy with the quality then all is good. Quality is very much in the eye of the observer and the type of footage one is working with.

Quote: I put all the files into the timeline and edited out the junk. I then produced a .m2ts file at default settings.
Now I have a 13 gb file to work with.

Typical approach here would be to create a "Produce" profile that matches your source footage. "Intelligent SVRT" often good for identifying a profile but maybe not ideal to encode the footage with SVRT. Your produced .m2ts at "default", whatever setting that is, may or may not be the best. Again, if you are happy with the results, that's what counts.

Quote: DVD was burned at default settings, (MPEG2) and the BD disc as H.264. VERY pleased with the results of both formats.

Similar thoughts here, one has 3 very common different H.264 settings for putting basic HD 1920x1080 content timeline unto a BD. The quality can be vastly different, 16Mbps bitrate vs 28Mbps interlaced or progressive can be very significant quality difference for some footage. Again, if you are happy with your BD, that's what counts.

Jeff

Yeah, well, Produce offers a default setting. I use AVC 1920x1080/60i.
The only choice for DVD is Mpeg2, so that's the default.
BD is H.264 at HD 1920x1080/60i

I've had many problems with other authoring programs. PD13 is the only one I have been able to produce a playable DVD with, without spending a ton of money only to use something a few times a year. .
.
Never, under any circumstances, combine a laxative and sleeping pill on the same night.

PowerSpec G310
ASRock Extreme 6 A85X
AMD A10 6800K Quad Core Processor 4.1GHz
16GB DDR3-1600 RAM
EVGA GTX960 Super OC GPU
Windows 7 Pro

Quote: Yeah, well, Produce offers a default setting. I use AVC 1920x1080/60i.
The only choice for DVD is Mpeg2, so that's the default.
BD is H.264 at HD 1920x1080/60i

I've had many problems with other authoring programs. PD13 is the only one I have been able to produce a playable DVD with, without spending a ton of money only to use something a few times a year.

On the Produce side there are no defaults, there are several presets for you to pick from. The option you picked is simply a preset, amongst other common presets of 24Mbps, 28Mbps 1920x1080 settings. Most Canons are capable of 24Mbps, it makes little quality sense overall to down convert your source to H.264, 1920x1080/60i (16Mbps) during your produce operation. Unless of course you have your camera set to record 16Mbps, if so, I'd probably consider changing the record quality to the max supported by the camera for most videoing. The difference between 24Mbps and 16Mbps can be significant for many common video scenes.

For quality it's often best to stick with what you record at, 1920x1080/60i(24Mbps) Canon camera > Produce to the same > create BD to the same.

Jeff

Quote: As long as it works for you and you are happy with the quality then all is good. Quality is very much in the eye of the observer and the type of footage one is working with.

Quote: I put all the files into the timeline and edited out the junk. I then produced a .m2ts file at default settings.
Now I have a 13 gb file to work with.

Typical approach here would be to create a "Produce" profile that matches your source footage. "Intelligent SVRT" often good for identifying a profile but maybe not ideal to encode the footage with SVRT. Your produced .m2ts at "default", whatever setting that is, may or may not be the best. Again, if you are happy with the results, that's what counts.

Quote: DVD was burned at default settings, (MPEG2) and the BD disc as H.264. VERY pleased with the results of both formats.

Similar thoughts here, one has 3 very common different H.264 settings for putting basic HD 1920x1080 content timeline unto a BD. The quality can be vastly different, 16Mbps bitrate vs 28Mbps interlaced or progressive can be very significant quality difference for some footage. Again, if you are happy with your BD, that's what counts.

Jeff

Hi Jeff,

I'm also confused. I have a 30 min HD project with 1920x1080 slides and 1080 50p MP4 clips. When I Create Disk the quality looks good for AVCHD DVD (needs a BluRay player) and BluRayDVD but if I Create a normal DVD from the project quality is terrible with noise and flicker. If I Produce the project to a file and then re-import into PDR13 and Create Disc using DVD what is the best format to use? I can't see where M2TS would help as PDR would still re-convert to MPEG2. Could you recommend a "standard" approach to get best quality 9.8 Mbit/sec MPEG2 quality DVD-R from a 1920x1080 50p HD project?

Thanks,

Al Power Director 13&14 Ultimate, Photo Director 6, Audio Dir, Pwr2Go 10
Win 10 64, Intel MB DH87MC, Intel i5-4670 CPU @ 3.40GHz, 16Gb DDR3 1600, 128Gb SSD, 2x1Tb WDBlue 7200rpmSATA6, Intel 4600 GPU, Gigabyte G1 GTX960 4GB, LG BluRay Writer