I am aware that the field order I should use with TMPGEnc is Bottom first. The problem is that TMPGEnc examines my DV file and incorrectly determines that it is in Top first by mistake.

SonicEPM: It actually does look through the file for a while while trying to determine the field order.

As a side question, what is the point of progressive outputs on a DVD player if the MPEG stream has to be interlaced?

The point of progressive outputs on a DVD player, despite the fact that the contents are inherently interlaced, is that it allows you to take advantage of displays that can do progressive. For example, a CRT monitor or TV or projector that can double its scan rate can display progressive, and every single LCD, DMD, and LCOS display or projector out there is inherently progressive (because the pixel elements are always there, they are not scanned by a beam like a CRT).

The best DVD players, and the best hi-def sets or projectors, also detect film-oriented contents and do the interlaced to progressive conversion differently, with better results. This is known as inverse telecine; some devices refer to it as "film mode" deinterlacing.

///d@

SonicDennis :
I have a question related to progressive viewing on a normal TV.
I shot some film using the Film mode of my GL1 camera, so the data is encoded as progressive. How come I can view it normally on my TV ? Does the camera convert the signal on it's output to lower field ?
Does this mean that the video will play progressive if I hook up my camera to a projector ?
Thanks

Some additional information about the progressive/interlace question:

NTSC is assumed to be a 30 frame/sec system, but that's not so--it is really defined to be a 60 field/sec system, where two fields (one made of odd lines, the other even lines) combine to form a full 525 scan. It was done this way for practical reasons dating back to the late 1930's. Each field represents a snapshot of a different point in time.

When movies are shown over NTSC each film frame is converted into an NTSC field via a method called "3-2", so defined because one film frame becomes 3 NTSC fields, and the next film frame becomes 2 NTSC fields. This effectively converts the 24 frame/sec film to 30 frame/sec NTSC. It also introduces a nasty effect called "judder."

DVD is defined to be NTSC compatible, so that means it has to produce 60 fields/second, so a conventional TV understands the signal. But since many big screen monitors today can deliver a "progressive" scan, it seems a shame to go through the whole 3/2 conversion. Thus, the progressive DVD player was born. It still outputs fields every 60th of a second, but it creates those fields from an initial progressive scan of the movie frames. In other words, it delivers two fields from the same film frame, and a progressive TV monitor can take those two fields, recombine them into the original progressive frame, and display that progressive frame. Result: a much cleaner image, with no judder.

Sorry for the long post.

Video shot in "progressive" or "frame" mode is still 60 fields per second, but the second field was captured at the same time as the first, instead of half a frame-time later.

When you play this video on a normal TV, the TV is still painting two fields (242 lines each), temporally offset.

A true progressive display would paint all 525 lines, 60 times per second. This is what the "progressive" output on some DVD players outputs, at twice the bandwidth of an interlaced output. It is also what TV's with internal line-doublers paint.

///d@

But how come my video files are progressive when I import them in vegas ?

Cool explanation. Thanks for taking the time to write that and feel free to be long winded any time you want.

:)

Tom