Resolution question

[hoops10]

I'm making an svcd from captured DV video. Im using Avisynth to frameserve into CCE. My question is this: My Apex will play both 720x480 resolution and 480x480 resolution. What is the difference between the two? Bigger filesize? Better quality? Thanks.

[adam]

Well first off you do realize that 720x480 is not supported in the svcd specs correct? I'm sure your Apex will play it fine though.

Resolution has no effect on filesize.

The higher the resolution the sharper the picture. But as you increase resolution you increase the total number of pixels you have and that takes more bitrate to achieve the same level of quality that you would get at a lower resolution.

Its really a subjective choice, do you prefer a sharper picture or a picture with less artifacts.

Actually dv doesnt transfer so well to svcd. It really needs higher bitrate to perform well, so 720x480 is not a very good resolution to use. I really don't think its possible to get an acceptable amount of bits per pixel at this resolution using svcd bitrates, regardless of your source. I would actually consider lowering the resolution even more to 352x480, I think this will yield much higher quality than 480x480 or 720x480.

35x480 complies with the CVD standard which is backward compatible with SVCD so you definitely won't have any compatibility problems.

The difference in quality you will get with different resolutions is highly subjective, however, so the best advice I can tell you is to encode some test clips in each resolution and see for yourself which one you prefer.