Use Photo Story 3 for the easiest way to put your videos on DVDs for TV viewing with these custom profiles!
For the novice video person, using PS3 is the easiest way to create stunning and professional looking DVDs. After much experimentation, I actually was able to create a 17 minute DVD with music and then add it to the Windows Movie Maker. To begin, I downloaded the PS3 version for free from the Windows Web site: http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?Fami lyID=92755126-a008-49b3-b3f4-6f33852af9c1&DisplayLang=en
Next, I installed it and followed the simple wizard steps to include my pics. But the best part is using a web site I found by Papa John - he is a pro at using PS3 and WMM - see this site: http://www.papajohn.org/.
This web site has lots of info but the best section for me was learning how to improve the quality of the blurred DVD results I was getting. See the section under Photo Story 3 that is titled Saving - it will say Saving and Distributing on the page. By downloading the custom profiles he created for DVDs, you can get the best results when you create the DVD for TV viewing. This page explains all of the details of how to produce the final results. The specific profiles are found at the bottom of the page - DVD Profile (NTSC and PAL) 1280 x 960. Once installed, you will get the perfect TV viewing DVD that you need to share with your friends for their viewing pleasure.
After I created my picture story in PS3, I opened Movie Maker and imported the WMV file that I produced. I then imported a WMV file I created that was actual video content from my camera. I was able to join the two together in MM - so I had a set of pictures for the first part of my video and then it switched to a live video - making the result very impressive - I shared this with my friends and family.
Next, by using a new program from Nero, called NeroVision, you can burn the DVD in a matter of minutes. The older version of Nero 6 Demo may be free to download and it will install quickly. It will provide you all of the coolest video recording features and is simple to use.
NeroVision can be found here:http://www.nero.com/enu/downloads-nero6-update.php
Nero demo version can be downloaded here (CNET site) or other download sites: http://www.download.com/Nero-6-Ultra-Edition/3000-26 46_4-10424809.html
Be sure to use DVD RWs when you are recording your results - that way you don't waste DVDs when you are playing round with the settings and learning how to do this video recording stuff right - I burned up 4 or 5 DVDs just playing around and then decided to invest in some RWs so I could keep trying.
Best of luck - it takes some learing but these resources will help you get up to speed much faster than I did!