hi
Although I don't know why you get this error message, maybe we can get some progress by the following:

Your explanation and question raises some questions.

• Moving from VHS to bluray is a huge step in quality, from very very poor, to very good. Even if you take time and effort to improve the VHS quality (e.g. the quality of the digital copy of the VHS) any attempt to step up to bluray quality does not bring you bluray quality. Only Bluray quality of the poor VHS registration if you like.


• Smart fit would mean that the video file parameters (like the bitrate) may get changed, decreased (if the files do not fit the disk) or increased (if there is more room to work larger files). Given the previous point, the increase will NOT give you better quality (even if this error message did not occur) and a the decrease will likely give you even lower and poorer quality.


• Are you targetting to make a bluray disk that can be played by regular bluray players, or did you select bluray because then at least the files would fit on one disk? I am asking because the MP2 setting you mention are typically those of DVD and not of Bluray.


• Obviously a bluray with only video files and no menu structure may cause difficulties when playing the disk in a regular bluray player. Some may be able to recognize the files and formats and play, others don't. If they play and recognize then it is even possible that your DVD format will be recognized and the player may even may try to upscale the DVD quality to bluray quality in case you have a HD-TV connected. (NB. Maybe this is not so bad an option, because the upscaling capabilities of either the bluray player and/or your HD TV tend to be better than software can give you. All you have to do a check whether the 4 hours would fit on a DVD, double layer likely).


• So could it be that you are trying to make a DVD disk (given the 720x576 formats and have a Bluray disk in your recorder, which PD does not expect and gives the errormessage you mention (I am guessing)

depending on what is happening and what you aim for, you may want to try and prepare a (bluray) disk and have it written to hard disk instead of to Bluray disk in one go. You have two options here 1) to make the full and ready Bluray disk with PD; the buring to disk using a separate buring program would be straight forward, or 2) to produce bluray compatible files with PD, and use a disk creation program to create the disk with the PD files as input and burn it.
My two cents.

Thanks for taking the time to reply!

I'll try to clarify a little better..

I bought the 50GB Blu-ray disc mainly becuase I took my Family on vacation to Disney, and wanted to fit the entire trip (shot in 1080p HD on my Sony video camera) onto one disc, plus some family events that followed after the trip.

The home movies I'm working on for In-Laws are "silent movies" form the late 60's, up until 1991. They now longer have a way to watch these old hom moives.

I simply transfered those home movies onto my hard drive, then imported them into my timeline in PD 17. Collectievly, from 1967 - 1991 there is 4 hrs of content, that I wanted all on one disc for them.

I thought (assumed) the Smart Fit would auto choose the best resolution to burn the video to the BD disc. That's when I ran into that error.

I know enough to use PD to make fun edits, add music to jazz up an event, and provide a menu with chapter selection.

You asked me about MPEG2 -- should I be using something else to burn on Blu-ray? I know just enough to make a fun home movie, but also I'm trying to learn and make sure I am truly choosing the best quality options too.

So...at this point, I'm just trying to figure out the best quality setting in PD to burn the disc.

Also, do I need to "Produce" the disc before I go to burn it?

Ok thanks for the explanantion.

It seems to me that your approach, putting the videos on the timeline and producing a Bluray is the right approach if you merily want to get those old movies on Bluray. PD should be able to do that for you and even the smart fit should work.

For Bluray PD gives two options MPEG and H.264. You may want to experiment with that, but both are good options, H.264 may give you slightly smaller files. As far as I know you cannot mix MPEG and H.264 on one disk so be carefull.

No you don't have to produce the disk before you burn it. PD should work fine producing the disk at once. My suggestion to produce files first and then use these files as input for the disk creation, has to do with
a) (your approach) you select the file format you want (either MPEG or H.264. And you select the resolution too (for full blown HD usually 1920x1080... 24 or 50). It may be a good idea to define some chapters in the timeline, or even by producing separate files e.g. one per year or decade depending on yor needs.
b) With the file produced you can see for yourselve how much space is needed on the disk. If it all fits your 50Gb disks (make sure to tell PD that you are using those!) you can then create and burn the disk. Should it not fit, you can change the parameters for (some of the) the files to get them smaller. To my mind you are a bit more in control yourselve.
I usually take the b) approach as it gives me a feeling to be more in control and if something goes wrong with the burning I dont have to go through all the waiting for files to be produced as PD would do from scratch from the timeline.

Did you try the smart fit approach with the creation of an iso file rather than buring the disk at once? I admit 50Gb of bluray takes time, but you can determine whether it was the disk or something else that causes the error?

You have my sympathy as I know what labour it takes. A while ago I have done the same, took the old 8mm movies and got them on Bluray for the family. I took the b) approach, but I also decided to change all into 16:9, which took a bit more time, because you would want the important stuff still in the frame.