Odd Effects After Burning Hd Movie

[cgulls]

Background:

 

using an old-ish iMac, I created a movie in iMovie 11 using HD footage from my HD camcorder.

 

I discovered that when using iDVD to burn a disc, HD is lost. So, after researching some forums, etc., I bought Roxio Toast 11.

 

I bought the HD/bluray plug-in, created the movie in Toast, selected the HD format option, then burned the movie onto an SD disc.

 

The good news is that when I play it in my bluray player on my LCD TV, the HD is back! Most of it looks terrific.

 

But it created two new problems:

 

1) I'm a novice and don't know the term for this effect, but there is a massive amount of the edges of objects looking very ragged. It doesn't happen on all the video. Just some. Possibly when there is a certain movement? It's not subtle. It makes certain portions of the movie unwatchable. It may be an unfair question if I'm not describing it clearly, but can anybody possibly help me identify what this is and how I might get rid of it?

 

2) I'm using some blank screen (black) during some transitions between movie segments. On my Mac and when I burned using iDVD, those appeared as they were supposed to. Using Roxio Toast, though, those black screens aren't properly black. It looks like a video effect of flying a spaceship through a star field.

 

Can anybody help me?

 

Thank you!

[tsantee]

Since you are burning to BD media choose the Blu-ray setting in the Toast Video window (if that isn't what you already did).

 

There are two encoder options available. In the custom encoder settings window you can choose either MPEG-2 or MPEG-4. I'm not certain which is the default. But it may help to choose whichever is the other one. You also can increase the bit rates when you know that disc space isn't an issue. Increase the bit rate for the Dolby audio as well. There is a Half-pel box that can improve video where there is a lot of motion. That may apply only to MPEG-2 encoding but check it anyway.

 

Probably the best approach is to select a short segment of the video that you know includes those problem scenes and choose Save as Disc Image. That way it won't take forever to check out different settings. When the disc image is done you can mount it and then play back the video using Roxio Video Player that's accessed using the Extras menu in Toast.

[cgulls]

tsantee, thank you for your help! I should clarify two other points:

 

1) though I'm using a blu-ray player for playback, the media is a Standard Def DVD. I used a DVD+R. I read somewhere else I should try DVD-R so I bought some of those today and will try tonight.

 

2) I created the Movie in iMovie 11. When I was in Toast, I selected that movie project. Toast seemed to recognize it was a 1080p project.

 

Do these facts change your suggestions in any way?

 

And where do I Save as Disc Image? Is that in iMovie, Toast or somewhere else? Again, thank you!

[tsantee]

tsantee, thank you for your help! I should clarify two other points:

 

1) though I'm using a blu-ray player for playback, the media is a Standard Def DVD. I used a DVD+R. I read somewhere else I should try DVD-R so I bought some of those today and will try tonight.

 

2) I created the Movie in iMovie 11. When I was in Toast, I selected that movie project. Toast seemed to recognize it was a 1080p project.

 

Do these facts change your suggestions in any way?

 

And where do I Save as Disc Image? Is that in iMovie, Toast or somewhere else? Again, thank you!

Since you are burning to regular DVD discs then you used the correct setting in the Toast Video window. My other suggestions still apply. However, if you move the bit rate up too much it is possible the outcome won't fit the disc. My preference is the MPEG-4 setting because it takes less space without any loss of quality.

 

You choose Save as Disc Image from the File menu instead of clicking the burn button. You can also choose disc image as the destination where Toast shows your disc-burning drive. When you do that the burn button changes to "Save." There are multiple ways to mount a .toast image file. One is to control-click on it in the Finder and choose Mount It from the contextual menu that appears. Another is to select it using the Image File setting in the Toast Copy window. Yet another is to choose Mount Disc Image from the Toast Utilities menu.