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Who burns their home movies to DVD? (1 Viewer)

Travis Hedger

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Joined
Mar 24, 1998
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I am in the market for a DVD Burner and will likely get a Pioneer A07 8x DVD+-R Burner.

I have a Sony D8 Cam with Firewire so I can easily import video and then do a direct dump of the data into DVD Video Format.

My question is, what software do those of you here that do this use? Is there one winner out there that does everything the best or are there any niche favorites?
 

John_Berger

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Nov 1, 2001
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Your DVD writer will come with the software necessary to do this as long as you buy a retail (not OEM) package. Pinnacle Studio 8 is very good for what you want to do. Ulead and Sonic have some good products out there to do it as well.
 

Jeff Jacobson

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Dec 24, 2001
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I was reading recently on doom9.net about a few DVD-RW or DVD+RW burners that can be converted to DVD±RW burners with a firmware upgrade. (The specific models are listed in the news items on doom9's main page.) Perhaps you could get a cheaper +RW or -RW and upgrade it to a ±RW burner.

Also some (or maybe all) of the Lite-on brand DVD burners can be made region-free. I'm not sure what kind of software they come with though.

EDITED: Removed an extra "of".
 

Aaron_*P

Stunt Coordinator
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Nov 22, 2003
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I'd definatly go with Adobe Encore DVD. Great software, although a bit pricy. I also personally really like the lite-on dvd/cd drives, but to each his own.
 

Travis Hedger

Supporting Actor
Joined
Mar 24, 1998
Messages
695
Ack, $699 for Adobe Premiere? Man why so expensive? Im gonna be screwed if I wanna do anything more than basic capture video then straight burn to DVD then. Heh, at least Winodws Movie Maker is free. :p
 

Rob Gillespie

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Aug 17, 1998
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Have a look at Vegas Video. Probably not as comprehensive a package as Premiere but without the bloated price either (think Paint Shop Pro vs. Photoshop).
 

Rob Gillespie

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Aug 17, 1998
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I was offered an OEM copy of Premiere for and additional £120 when I bought my Canopus capture card. Since the card already came with Vegas Video 3.0 LE I didn't take them up on it. Vegas does what I need it to do and probably a lot more. Premiere is a grand product, no doubt, but like Photoshop, it's probably quite daunting for someone new to the hobby.
 

John_Berger

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Nov 1, 2001
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Okay, what am I missing here? Guys, please, lay off the expensive stuff, all right? Just because you use it and know HOW to use it doesn't mean that it's automatically perfect for Travis. I think that many of us lose sight of the fact that expensive does NOT always equal "more suitable to the situation". I'm reminded of the time when Sonic Scenarist was suggeted because the one guy uses it at work - forgetting that it's a multi-thousand-dollar package.

I use Media Studio Pro and DVD Workshop, both of which would total over $400 just to upgrade, but I'm not about to suggest them to a newbie - not by a long shot. It's too much power for a newbie at too high a price. Reality check, folks. You know, small steps? Put one foot in front of the other? Start out slowly? You have to walk before you can run? All of those tired clichés?

Travis, check around to see what kind of software somes with the writer that you want. Then do some investigation on that software or come back and ask. There are many sub-$100 packages that are MORE THAN ADEQUATE for what you want if you decide that the bundled software is not appropriate. Save your money until you become more adept at DVD authoring and THEN go for some of the more expensive products if you so desire. It's ridiculous to suggest that you buy a Lamborghini just to drive to the corner store.
 

Joe Ku

Stunt Coordinator
Joined
Apr 1, 2003
Messages
69
To convert to Mpeg2 I use TMPGenc, it is cheap ($50) and one of the best encoders out there. They also have an authoring program now, they want $100 for the authoring/encoder combo. I don't know how good the authoring program is but I think they have a free trial version if you want to try it out.

I forget what program I use to actually author my DVDs, It is some cheesy program that came with the drive, It isnt very powerful but works (its encoder sucks though), I know there are free programs out there you can use to author the DVDs too. To get some great info go to

www.vcdhelp.com

or

www.doom9.org
 

Travis Hedger

Supporting Actor
Joined
Mar 24, 1998
Messages
695
Thanks a lot everyone for the suggestions.

Last night I nearly had a heart attack, as I was doing a capture of video (20 minutes worth) in preperation for a DVD burn when I finally get a unit. Basically I was capturing at the highest quality in order to make the best DVD quality. 1 minute was about 200MB of space, I whipped out the calculator and nearly died. I must have hit the wrong button because the output was 40GB of space, I was like holy crap this isn't high definition video!!!! After recalculating I settled down as that same amount of video would roughly take up about 4GB at highest quality. Needless to say, I was much relieved.
 

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