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Chris, nothing about Blu-ray is simple. It is all complicated so best just keep this in mind.
Video formats first.
You are starting with a lossy H264 file in an MP4 wrapper, and then editing this and re encoding to another H264 variant as an M4V - this seems counter productive to me and is guaranteed to reduce the quality of the footage.
You also have 3 different codecs and each codec has either 15 or 18 variant resolutions allowed, making for a large number of video forms and resolutions. Here's the list.
i/. 1920x1080 (aka"Full HD") allowing frame rates of 29.97i, 25i, 24p and 23.976p
ii/. 1440x1080 allowing frame rates of 29.97i, 25i, 24p and 23.96p
iii/. 1280x720 allowing frame rates of 59.94p, 50p, 24p and 23.976p
iv/. 720x576 allowing a frame rate of 25i
v/. 720x480 allowing a frame rate of 29.97i
However, this list is not as straightforward as it might seem at first because although many people will try to tell you the whole PAL/NTSC thing is a dead duck this is not the whole story, as 25i is simply not going to work well - if at all - on a large number of displays that run on 60Hz mains (IE, USA and NTSC regions) and the same thing happens with 29.97i in PAL regions - although that said you have far more chance of a 29.97 frame rate running on a 50Hz system than the other way around. This is purely the way these things work.
Best advice I can offer is to always shoot at 24 or 23.976fps (they are pretty much the same thing anyway, although you would do well to remember that all 24 and 23.976 timecode in Premiere Pro is output at 24p values) as this can be progressive scan and will work universally on all Blu--ray players as the support for this frame rate is mandatory at 1920x1080, unlike 29.97i and 25i which are both optionally supported (read "probably not supported" on cheaper players) and I can vouch for this from personal experience - been there, done that, cocked it up.
All that now said (and I have not even started with the audio oddities) if all you want to do is a single playlist item, this should not be too difficult as long as you adhere to some basic rules, and the main one is to prepare all assets outside of Encore, and feed Encore just the final elementary streams using it solely as an authoring tool and not an editor of any sort at all. This will seem complex, but please believe me it is the easiest way to proceed.
Let's begin with planning.
Before you start with anything - including the shoot - make certain you know what you are trying to do, so the first thing is to work out exactly where you want this disc to be playable. This can be broken down broadly into 2 options - PAL regions or NTSC regions. Some will tell you this does not matter but from my experience it absolutely does matter because each of those 2 regions is different not out of bloody mindedness but because of the frequency of the mains supply. PAL regions tend to operate on 50Hz and NTSC on 60Hz. Have you ever seen a film where there is an old CRT TV in the background, where the film is being shown in a region different to the one it was shot in? The display on the film will appear to roll, or have a pronounced banding effect and we need to avoid any display problems. You also need to consider what resolution you will be shooting in, as some regions allow frame rates others do not have to support & if you use 25fps in an NTSC region, even if the player can read the disc the odds are high that all you will see on the display is a black screen, or a message that the resolution you are using is not supported.
If shooting at 1920x1080 your only progressive scan option is 24 or 23.976 (23.98) - both 25 and 29.97 are interlaced display only. See image below for a comparison of the 2 where the top image is PS and the lower is interlaced:
As you can see, interlacing can leave nasty artefacts which should be avoided.
The way to get around this is to use progressive scan at 24fps (or 23.976 of course) because although 1920x1080@25p and also 1920x1080@29.97p are both in the SMPTE HD specification, neither are in the Blu-ray specification - those resolutions are interlaced only and optionally supported. I know I keep repeating myself but this is important to understand if you do not want to get returns and/or complaints about discs not playing or image quality.
Another option is to use a lower resolution that will allow 25p or 29.97p, but you will still have issues with the frame rate not working in other regions so it is really for the best to avoid those frame rates if at all possible.
The Shoot.
Do not shoot to a lossy form if you need to edit the results. Whilst setting a camera to AVI or MOV (QuickTime) may appear to be all you need to do you should check the camera manual to be sure just what codec they are putting out, as both those stream extensions are what we call "wrappers" - it is very likely that even though you choose AVI or MOV you are still shooting to a lossy file type. Check the camera manual & use the highest quality it is capable of in lossless for preference.
Next, it is a good idea to avoid using different brands - even models - of camera if the results are to be mixed, as you may well run into serious colour space & Gamma problems. If a multi-camera shoot, try to use the same camera types across the board all set to the same settings, and make sure your black levels & white balances are matched to avoid issues later. I have taken footage at face value before from a client that was not properly graded, and the whites turned Blue after being encoded. Seriously.
The Edit.
This is where things can go horribly wrong on a display, but if using a computer monitor you may not even notice the problem - especially if using interlaced footage, as most mainstream computer monitors will automatically remove interlacing unless you have set them up properly & told them not to. The end result can be a clip that if someone waves an arm you will get a trail of ghost arms following. At the worst case this will be totally unwatchable and in the best case it will be extremely irritating.
See also this excellent Cow Forums thread on the subject - it is specific to FCP and Quicktime but applies equally to PPro - Filed/interlace issue with Quicktime export : Apple Final Cut Pro Legacy
Specifically pay attention to post 6 - most people think this is a problem, but the poster there is correct when he says it is not a problem, it is how it is supposed to be - the only error is in mixing field orders at the edit, or a failure to properly prepare your assets in the first place. Just remember computer monitors will automatically deinterlace when this should be done by the editor as job #1 after ingest (assuming any interlaced footage is present of course) - read post 6 and learn this - it is really important if you carry on shooting at 25fps. Also, bear in mind this will happen to you one day sure as the sun will rise in the morning, so it is good to know how to deal with it and ideally prevent it happening in the first place as correcting this after the event is close to impossible and with lossy output it will be exacerbated.
Quicktime is not your friend. This has been deprecated by Apple now (and you were never allowed to create ProRes on a PC anyway as Apple refused to allow this) so if on a PC use either a lossless AVI such as Lagarith, or better still DnxHD (which will have an .mxf extension) as this is truly cross-platform (and is also the form used for DCP exports (Digital Cinema Package) using JPEG2000 codec).
Never scale and transcode to lossy at the same time. Always scale first and import this back - check carefully (preferably on Glass or else on a proper TV display, not a computer monitor (unless you have a certified and correctly set up display) and only then output your final form for disc.
Oh - I almost forgot. Premiere Pro has a "Smart Rendering" codec option. Be very careful here, and before you make a setting please read the following page very carefully:
Smart rendering in Premiere Pro
Export for Blu-ray or DVD
This should be the final operation, and for DVD you should use MPEG-2 DVD codec in AME (unless you have a better 3rd party plugin or standalone encoder) and for Blu-ray I would always use H264 rather than MPEG-2 or VC-1 as it is a much more efficient compression algorithm and will output the same quality as MPEG-2 at half the file size.
H264 for Blu-ray will default to a multiplexed stream (m2ts or m2t) and this is not what you need - Encore prefers elementary streams, so under the "multiplex" tab in the export dialogue (and this applies mainly to 3rd party plugins such as the very good TMPGEnc 264 Premiere Pro plugin) make certain you are set to NONE as it will try to default to an m2t stream multiplex including the audio inside the wrapper. See example below for this plugin
I repeat this will not happen if you use the right source material type and the AME H264 Blu-Ray option will always output m4v and pcm audio if you are using the correct source footage
Have you spotted the deliberately left default settings error? This is a nasty "gotcha" waiting to trap the unwary, as if in the UK the AME always seems to default to 25fps when I think it should always default to "Match Source".
Additionally, there is a second error here that is another common thing. I shall not tell you what the 2 mistakes here are, but if using a setting for Blu-ray you need to be aware of the assumptions the AME will make & be ready for them. Below is what it should look like:
Can you see the changes?
One more thing to watch out for in Premiere when scaling and exporting - when you start out with a stereo interleaved audio file it often outputs to dual stereo, with L and R on separate tracks - despite this option not being selected. This is a bug pure and simple so please be careful and check carefully.
Encore.
If Encore is used as an assembly tool, you will have no real problems. It is just fine at doing this and the troubles always start when editing source material through Encore. Just don't do it.
I hope this helps in a small way and please post back with any questions
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