Generally the DVD authoring part won't effect your video - what will is if the app also encodes or re-encodes the video. Take a look at your source video, and if there's no jerkiness, it's more then likely the encoding settings or perhaps even the flags set in the header for the mpg2?

If your video is jerky before encoding to mpg2, the next question would be is it introduced by your using pan/crop or similar, is it the result of ivt or deinterlace, or is it in the source itself?

If it's the first, Phil's suggestions should help. If it's the 2nd, different methods or settings might work. If it's the source, good luck!

Thanks for your replies guys.
The original, source material is great, the pictures are fine.
If I bring mpeg 2 file into the DVD app, do you think there is a chance it will compress it again to another mpeg 2? I know this sounds silly. I guess the best thing to do is bring it in as an AVI file as oppossed to an Mpeg file. The trouble it is it is much bigger and takes longer to work with.

I really appreciate you taking the time to help.
sparky

Just to clarify, are you encoding to MPEG2 with the MainConcept plugin then importing the MPEG2 files to the DVD program?

If so, have you tried playing the MPEG2 file in Windows Media Player? Is the problem visible there? At least this would narrow the problem down a bit (i.e. Vegas OR the DVD program)

If not, what ARE you doing? (o:

Hi Phil
I render the piece out of Vegas as a AVI file, then import it to Pinnacle Expression as an AVI file. I know it is then converted to MPEG 2 for the DVD.
The mpeg 2 version shouldn't be jerky if it isn't jerky when played out on windows media/ real player?
It this the drawback of using a cheapish DVD authoring package. Would the final picture ne any better say if I used Sonic Foundry's DVD package?
cheers
Mark

Hi mahedy,

Are you using PAL? If so, and if your source footage was DV then you will need to re-render your MPEG2 with the field order set to 'top-field first'

Cheers,

Scott

Hiya Scott.
Thanks for your help
Would this make a difference as I am only using Vegas to render it into an AVI file? My source material is all DV.
I'll try rendering it again using 'top field first' into an mpeg 2 and then importing this nto my dvd program rather than the avi.
Just out of interest, what dufference will the field order set to 'top-field first' make?
thanks again
M

If you're using interlaced footage then field order is important otherwise, if it's wrong, you'll get just the symptoms you describe. DV footage is always bottom-field first regardless of whether it's NTSC or PAL. PAL video on a TV is, however, top-field first so if you are using PAL and you haven't converted your rendered file (AVI or MPEG2) to top-field then you will get jerky motion. The two fields that make up a 'frame' are snapshots in time of 1/50s appart (for PAL, that is). They must be displayed in the right order to display the correct motion.

Scott

I render using Vegas's built in MainConcept plugin set to the "DVD Architect PAL Video Stream" template. This is a video only (no audio) template.

I then render the audio separately as a "48,000 Hz, 16 Bit, Stereo, PCM WAV" file.

As long as the 2 files have the same name (e.g. "video.mpg" and "video.wav") then DVD Architect treats them as a single file - I don't know how your DVD authoring program handles separate files though.

The only reason I separate the files is to prevent DVD Architect from re-compressing the audio (which it insists on doing if you give it an MPEG2 file with audio).

Try rendering a short section in this way and then see if your DVD program will import the files - this way the DVD program doesn't need to do any transcoding.