DVD movie disc pictures are very grainy

[Steve P]

I have the Pro version 7.23 of Photostage, and the slideshows created in a  DVD movie disc format are very poor in quality.  The pictures are very grainy and the slideshow is not presentable.  I have created an MP4 file that has much better quality, but I need to be able to create a DVD movie disc that could be played in a DVD player.  Some older DVD players cannot play an MP4 file.  I have tried using support to find out why this is, but they haven't really been able to give me any answers as to how to resolve this.  I am just curious if others have experienced the same issue. 

I will say that I have used version 5.10 of Photostage to produce high quality DVD slideshows in the past, but that was when I was using Windows 7 as my operating system.  I am now using Windows 10 with the latest version of Photostage and now have this issue of poor quality DVDs.  Seems to me like there is a technical issue with the software, but I don't seem to be able to get any answers.

[elk]

Do you get the problem with all the discs you burn? If you play the burnt DVD on your computer, do you still get the problem? What is the resolution of the screen you are using to watch the DVD? Remember that DVD's have an intrinsic resolution of 720×480 pixels (NTSC) and 720×540 pixels (PAL). Those pixels are either displayed in a 4:3 (standard) aspect ratio or a 16:9 (widescreen) aspect ratio. This is typically called 480p video. As you can see, 480p is a whole lot less than 1080p, so if you are using a high resolution screen, it may not look as good as you want. You may test your old version (5.10) and confirm if the issue persists: http://www.oldversiondownload.com/oldversions/photostage-5-10-2018-06-26.exe

[Madalyn Fliesler]

So are you saying you can only watch the slide show on a computer?  I purchased a new DVD player because I thought the old one was out dated (slide shows are grainy).  I have tried saving PhotoStage slide shows in every format, on both DVD and flash drive.  No luck.  The results are very poor quality.

[elk]

I'm not saying that. I was just asking if the problem persists when you play it back on the computer. Also, I asked for your screen resolution. As I explain before, DVDs may not look very good in high resolution screens. Instead, (if you have the right equipment) I would recommend you to burn it as Blu-ray which allows higher resolution.

[Madalyn Fliesler]

Express Burn will not let me burn a regular DVD as a Blu-ray.  

 

[Manny Rodriguez]

I am having the same issues when it comes to viewing dvd burn output on my smart tv screen.. Most of my photos on the slide show are grainy and NOT detailed. This is very annoying and not what I expected after just having used the software for the very first time. What are your suggestions?

[Madalyn Fliesler]

I made a few slide shows with Power Point, put them on a DVD and they visual quality is excellent.  NCH needs to fix this problem.  I paid way too much to have a program that I can't use.

 

 

[Jrs]

I am also very disappointed in the results of my dvd. I spent hours putting together a slide show and the burn results were terrible. Never had this problem with other slideshow programs. Any way to fix this? Program is a rip off. I found a slideshow that will burn dvd with no problem.

Edited December 26, 2020 by Jrs
Addition

[Paul N.]

I got concerned because I was planning to burn some DVD's for family members. I reached out to members of my photography club and they provided the  same information that 'elk' replied with.

What I don't still understand is why the quality of the DVD's from PhotoStage seem so much different than DVD movies I own. I'd need to burn them to 4:3 instead of 16:9 to see if that makes a difference. I found that the Zoom automation on a photo on DVD was very grainy.

I also found that I could not burn directly to my DVD from Export in PS. The resulting files could not be found when I went to play them. I have to save the DVD files then use a utlity to burn the ISO file to the DVD.

So 'Steve P', we are experiencing the result of the DVD standard. More details can be found on the web at places like this.

I know have to figure out how to create portable media to share with my family. I may have to break down and but a blue-ray burner and player 🙂

Some points I was forwarded:

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When you create a DVD file, you have to down-res from your native size to 420p; and then when that gets played back on a modern TV - whether it be 1080p or a 4K - it is up-res’d (scaled up) ... and that makes those visual flaws even more visible.  I don’t think there’s a win here at all.

Your real solution is to make Hi Res MP4’s and distribute them via sharing, YouTube or Vimeo or transferred one-to-one using a service like WeTransfer.  Or perhaps you could make one and copy it to a DVD file (data not a DVD runnable disk) only for distribution, where it would be copied back to the computer to be played.  But any digital distribution system would be better than that, easier and faster.

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When it comes to videos, the terminology can get a bit confusing. MP4 is actually a "container" that generally includes a video track and an audio track (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_video_container_formats). The way the video and audio is encoded is determined by the "codec." MP4 files can include video and audio tracks encoded by a variety of codecs. The most common video codec used in the MP4 "container" is "H.264" and a common audio codec is "AAC." Many slide show programs will generate MP4 files using these codecs. The resolution of MP4 videos can vary considerably. For the club photoessays, I recommend you encode at 1920x1080 resolution.

 

[Paul N.]

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Never had this problem with other slideshow programs

Jrs, which other programs burn acceptable DVD's?