Compressing HD for DVD

Hello to all you kind peoplel,
Please help me here.
Having looked hard at the forum topics, I still find the need to ask these questions.
I have edited (FCP X) 7 lectures in 1920 x 1080 format, which makes nearly 4 hours of video, and the client wants it on not more than 2 DVDs. Given the file sizes after compressing to Mpeg 2 in Compressor 4, I can only fit 2 on at a time in DVD Studio Pro.
Is it humanly possible to put them all on 1 or 2 DVDs and still have reasonable image quality as well as the 16:9 aspect ratio? If so how do I go about it?
Thanks for listening,
Pat

When you compress the files to MPEG-2 set an appropriate bit rate.
4 hours split onto 2 DVDs allows about 5 Mb/s average rate for the picture.
A cheaper alternative is 1 dual layer DVD which allows about 4.5 Mb/s average rate for the picture.
Even 4.5 Mb/s allows quite good image quality if you denoise.

Dennis Couzin
Berlin, Germany

Thanks so much. I'm trying this advice and it seems to have sorted out the issue for me.
Much appreciated.

Here's a question linked to the last one.
Is it better to make 7 projects for the lectures or one project with 7 chapters for the dual layer DVD?

Thanks,

Pat

Sorry, I think I should have posted this on the appropriate forum topic...

What are the clients asking for? If they want seven DVDs, then seven projects (but you can design it first, then just duplicate the first DVD project and replace the media on each one). If they want seven tracks on one DVD, then one project.

If it's up to you, then you should do one separate movie file per lecture. Much less chance of failure and technical snafus. You can always arrange the seven movie files in any way you want on the DVD.

You said they wanted "no more than two DVDs". I'd just stick to one. Because if they then ask you to co-ordinate making 500 copies, you're doubling the cost by using two DVDs.


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