I encoded a 1080p Apple ProRes HQ file in Toast 11.0.2 (BD plugin). MAde a disk image and watches the resulting MTS file in VLC, which plays it smoothly BUT I see, in some scenes,a pulsing of the pixels, as if the GOPS are trying to do their job but I end up seeing a blur of pixels pulsing rythmically.
So now I am using FCP 7 Compressor's encoder, which has a nifty setup for BD encoding, making the mbps between 15-17. Will this do a better job? I guess I'll soon find out, but if anyone has a good recomendation for non-costly high-quality AVC encoding for BluRay (is this a paradox?) ... many thanks!
I've used the encoding in Compressor with success. Here's a tip - what you're seeing as 15-17 Mbps is the encoding for AVC on DVD-R. Switch your burn drive in the preset to either your Blu-Ray burner or Hard Drive (for a disk image) and the bitrate options expand to ~30Mbps, which is much higher quality. I use mostly automatic encoding settings in Compressor from there, and I get good results.