Just thought I would mention a quick tip for all of you doing encoding and authoring:
When encoding video for DVD or Blu-ray, it’s important to use the highest bitrate that space and specs allow for maximum quality. Regardless of how high quality you would like your DVD content to be, the maximum a burned disc can safely playback is around 8 mbps. For Blu-ray, the maximum for a burned disc is around 30 mbps. With this in mind, you can calculate out the highest bitrate you can use to fit all the content on your disc using a Bitrate Calculator.
For Blu-ray & Standard DVD encoding, I highly recommend this Bitrate Calculator :
http://dvd-hq.info/bitrate_calculator.php
Make sure to set the bitrate limit for DVD to a custom 8000 kbps instead of the default 9800 kbps. And for Blu-ray, a custom bitrate limit of 30,000 kb/s. Audio is typically encoded at 192 kb/s for dolby digital ac3.
Bitrate calculators are especially useful when using 3rd party mpeg encoders or when you want to prioritize bitrate quality for particular videos on the disc (such as giving the main video a higher bitrate than the bonus features/additional content)
If you have any questions regarding this topic, feel free to post a comment.