How Best to Burn a DVD from Recorded Video

durango · Jun 3, 2009

I just purchased a Canon Vixia HF11 AVCHD Camcorder. After I record a video, I want to burn it on a DVD to send to family members to play on their standard definition DVD players. My question is how best to do this using my new iMac? I am very new to video recording, and all I have done thus far is to read tutorials and help files.

It appears that I can burn a DVD using iMovie '09 and iDVD, i.e., download my video to iMovie, do my editing, and then export the edited video to iDVD. Is this correct? And somewhere in the process will I have the option of burning the DVD as standard definition so that a blueray player will not be required?

Thanks for any help/advice you can give me...........I'm struggling, lol.

xstep · Jun 4, 2009

iDVD only burns standard definition discs, so there isn't anything to worry about for Blu-Ray. The one concern is that your family members have players that can burn home made DVDs. Older ones couldn't but I think most if not all newer ones can.

To burn a Blu-Ray, get Toast 10. It doesn't have fancy menus but can create the disc, if you have an external Blu-Ray writer. Those aren't cheap. There is an ability to create DVDs that contain Hi-Def Blu-Ray material that can be played in Blu-Ray players. I think Toast can do that. This allows for about 20 minutes of material.

Nethfel · Jun 4, 2009

Yes, you can. I think you may have to have imovie output your video in SD rather then HD that the HF records natively. I don't know if iDVD will resize hd video to SD through its own converter for prepping video.

In terms of compatibility GET DVD-R
NOT:
DVD+R
DVD+RW
DVD-RW

GET DVD-R. The reason for this is -R was approved by the DVD Forum - the official body that set forth the technical specifications for the DVD format. +R is a competing format and has much more limited support especially for older DVD players. Although DVD-R may not work in *all* older players, it will work in many more players then DVD+R.

DVD+R hadn't been approved by the DVD Forum until January of 2008; until then only DVD players that specifically state they will play DVD+R media are guaranteed to work with that particular media format.

Other little tidbit of useless knowledge

- DVD-R is not DVD "minus" R, it's DVD "dash" R.

xstep: yes, toast can burn an avchd dvd with an additional module you can purchase for like $20.

durango · Jun 4, 2009

Nethfel said:
xstep: yes, toast can burn an avchd dvd with an additional module you can purchase for like $20.

If I purchase toast and the additional module, then will my iMac burn the avchd dvd or will I still need a blu-ray writer?

In addition to burning an SD dvd for my family members, I also want to burn an HD version of my edited video to play on my HDTV. Woudn't that be the avchd version generated by toast?

Like I said, I'm very new to video recording and I'm not sure I'm even asking the right questions. What I do know is that after I use my camcorder to make an HD video, I then want to edit the video using iMovie. After that, I want to burn both a HD dvd for me an an SD dvd for family. So am I on the right track? Will iMovie/iDVD and toast do all this for me?

Thanks to you and xstep for your help/advice........

macattack101 · Jun 4, 2009

click

durango · Jun 4, 2009

macattack101 said:
click

I don't understand what this "click" means....am I missing something?

Nethfel · Jun 4, 2009

I dunno what that post from macattack was about, not worried about it

If you want to play it as a HD video, you will need a bluray player (or ps3), and you will either need to record a bluray disc or a AVCHD DVD. Toast, when you have the extra module allows AVCHD DVD or bluray (assuming you have a bluray recorder if you want to burn to a bluray disc) so that would fit your needs to burn an avchd dvd. I've played AVCHD discs recorded in other software before on my ps3 and it's worked wonderfully. I don't know why toast seems to only work well up to about 20 minutes as I've used other recordings up to an hour on a single layer dvd.

Of course, that AVCHD DVD won't play in a regular DVD player, but no big deal, you make that format so you can have HD without the cost of a bluray burner

I will say, like iDVD the menu capability of toast to me is kinda lacking, but for a home movie it should be fine.

Here is the product list from roxio:

Roxio - CD Burning & DVD Burning Software - Creator Software

You can also get titanium 10 plus that from what the specs say includes the HD component already it has a few other features that toast 10 titanium doesn't have, but if you don't need it then there's no reason to spend the $30 above what toast10+hd module costs.

durango · Jun 4, 2009

Nethfel said:
If you want to play it as a HD video, you will need a bluray player (or ps3), and you will either need to record a bluray disc or a AVCHD DVD. Toast, when you have the extra module allows AVCHD DVD or bluray (assuming you have a bluray recorder if you want to burn to a bluray disc) so that would fit your needs to burn an avchd dvd.

OK, even though I don't have a blu-ray burner, I think you are saying that I can still use toast+module to burn a ACVHD DVD. Is that correct?

Of course, that AVCHD DVD won't play in a regular DVD player, but no big deal, you make that format so you can have HD without the cost of a bluray burner.

Are most of the modern DVD players today capable of playing AVCHD DVD's, or will I still need a blu-ray player? I guess I need to go read the specs on my two DVD players, both of which are about two years old.

I want to add that I'm most appreciative of your help. My camcorder won't arrive until next week, so I'm trying to learn as much as I can before it arrives. Then I can begin to experiment and will probably have another set of questions, lol.

Again, thanks much......... :Cool:

Nethfel · Jun 4, 2009

No problem, there are a lot of VERY knowledgeable people on the forums here, many much more knowledgeable then I

OK, even though I don't have a blu-ray burner, I think you are saying that I can still use toast+module to burn a ACVHD DVD. Is that correct?

Yes, that is correct.

Are most of the modern DVD players today capable of playing AVCHD DVD's, or will I still need a blu-ray player?

But, yes, if you want to play an AVCHD DVD, you REQUIRE a bluray player. Standard DVD players CAN NOT play HD video - they're not designed to. DVD players are designed to play SD based material.

If you don't want to buy a bluray player, but want to play the native hd video on your tv, you can always hook your mac to your HD tv and play your video from a file on your Mac.

xstep · Jun 4, 2009

Nethfel said:
I don't know why toast seems to only work well up to about 20 minutes as I've used other recordings up to an hour on a single layer dvd.

If you mean two similar HD videos, I'd guess it has to do with the compression used. With higher compression you can increase your playback time, but you decrease the image quality.

If you are comparing HD to SD then consider this; A 1080i image is about 6.5 times bigger than a 480i image. If you have a finite space of 4.7GB to fit the video on and the 480i video just fits, consider how much more compression will have to be applied to the HD version of the same video to fit onto the DVD. To avoid the huge quality loss that would occur, Toast uses better compression but at a loss of time.

It is big balancing act of compression and acceptable quality for the end viewer.

Nethfel · Jun 4, 2009

no no, trust me, I'm comparing HD to HD.

I know of the balancing act of compression, I've used other software that has increased compression a bit and still yielded an excellent image - we're also talking home use and not for professional distribution.

I've watched up to an hour AVCHD DVD, that, aside from some of the extremely fast motion (and some shadow areas), looked quite good on my 67" screen - for home use, there should be no reason a person couldn't get between 30 and 40 minutes with good results as long as the footage doesn't have overly fast movement. Some software also handles this better then others; not all encoders/transcoders are created equal, and yes, toast does use less compression at the sacrifice of time

.

durango · Jun 4, 2009

Nethfel said:
If you don't want to buy a bluray player, but want to play the native hd video on your tv, you can always hook your mac to your HD tv and play your video from a file on your Mac.

Can't I also hook my camcorder up to my HDTV via HDMI and watch my recorded HD video (both have HDMI ports)?

I guess the problem starts when I import my HD video into iMovie and then do some editing. This may be a stupid question, but is there anyway to then upload my edited video back to my camcorder (e.g., to it's SDHD card) so that I can once again connect it to my HDTV to watch the edited version?

And what about watching the edited video on my iMac. Isn't that what I will be seeing if I play the edited files on the Mac?

One more question. If I get the urge to purchase a Blu-ray player, will they all play AVCHD video, or is that something I need to carefully look for? Thanks....... :Cool:

Nethfel · Jun 4, 2009

Outputting back to the SDHC card may present its own challenges. For example, I use an HF100 camcorder (I'd love a prosumer camera, but just can't afford it) - it uses a fairly deep folder structure standard for AVCHD camcorders. I'd literally have to take my video and recreate that structure so the camcorder would recognize it.

If you can find a way to output back to a hierarchy the camcorder would recognize, it's possible. I don't know if it's doable, I'm just saying it's theoretically possible

If you use a camcorder that records straight to .mov or .mp4 or some other format without having the avchd folder hierarchy then it's much easier as long as the video is encoded with the right settings so the camcorder can play it.

And what about watching the edited video on my iMac. Isn't that what I will be seeing if I play the edited files on the Mac?

not sure what your asking here exactly. My comment had been in regard to hooking your mac to your HDTV so that the TV literally becomes an extended monitor and you play the video using the mac hooked up to the tv for viewing (like if you wanted to hook your iMac with a 20" screen up to your 50" HDTV for example).

In terms of will they all play AVCHD - honestly, I don't know for sure. I've only tried two different players - my ps3, and a friend who has a samsung Bluray that I gave a AVCHD DVD to and they say it played perfectly. From what I understand not all do, but I can't give an answer of which will or won't.

This is a bit of an older thread here:

Blu-Ray players that play AVC-HD movies. - Club CDFreaks - Knowledge is Power

but it does talk about the issue of AVCHD DVD's played back on bluray players.