Deteriorate image quality using iDVD?

Hi all

I transferred some good image quality photos from the DSLR to iPhoto for it to generate some slideshows. The final product from iPhoto were exported to iDVD for a DvD disk to be used on DvD players.

I noticed following:

a) the theme settings (slide transition and music) and text inserts under iPhoto were not transferred. In fact, some pictures after text insert in a case were ignored. Have to re-insert music on the iDVD platform and limited theme settings (slide transition) were done by iDVD on its own.
b) the final image quality from the DvD deteriorated significantly. This is the worst that one can get which render the final product unusable.

Is there some settings that I missed or my approach (transferring images from iPhoto to iDVD) was incorrect?

Any insight or guidance from Gurus here will be deeply appreciated.

A DVD only has a certain resolution and really high resolution pics on a DVD slideshow like that will cause the pics to loose a lot of detail. If it were just a data DVD and played on your Mac plugged into the TV, they would look great. I ran into this helping a friend with the same issue and researched it.

Maybe someone else will give you more info as I am still half asleep!

Thank you, dtravis7 for the insights. So to keep the original resolution, it will be best to store images as data files and run them through a PC/Mac for presentation on a TV screen.

Just wondering why a movie recorded in DvD is absolutely clear (compared to the outdated Vcd) when played on TV? Is it different format or what?

I am sort of shocked more have not replied to your message. This is most of the issue.


A DVD is standard definition video. That means 640×480 That is all a DVD player is capable of showing. It is standard definition TV. Even if you have a HD television, the DVD player can only show you 640×480, because that’s all DVDs are. But when you look on your Mac, you are seeing it in a much higher resolution. Perhaps your monitor is 1280×1024, for instance. That’s much greater than 640×480.

So it's mostly the DVD format itself and the players that play DVD's are limiting the resolution. With todays cameras, the resolution is way more than 640x480, so the slideshow will look just as good as it can with the lower Resolution.

Some on some forums are blaming iDVD, but I have seen the exact same issue in Windows.

In other words the pics have more resolution than a DVD player can show. I tried to help someone with Windows and this issue and ran into this. Plugged in their laptop to the TV and the slideshow was sharp.