AVCHD Encoding

[fblaha1]

I apologize for being a complete neophyte as regards video editing. I found Avidemux because it was advertised as "easy to use."
I took a trip to Cuba recently, which resulted in 250 separate video files, produced with my Sony Camcorder. They are identified as AVCHD files on the SD card on which they were produced.
I am now trying to produce a "presentable product", burned to DVD or copied to a thumbdrive, to give to the people who went with me on the trip. I have spent a lot of  time reading Avidemux help files/tutorials, but my efforts so far have produced less than satisfactory results: the main flaw being encoded files that are breaking up in the middle of the frame and shaking violently, only in the lower half. My trimming efforts have been acceptable(to me )  I suppose that I must not have chosen the right combination of encoding parameters.
I am using a fairly powerful Toshiba Satellite laptop ( Windows 10,  1 TB HD, 16GB of memory, i-7 processor ).
Is there anyone who can give me advice on how to encode these files? I have been led to believe that mpeg 4 files would be best as a final product.
If this is not the place for this post, please relocate it accordingly.

[AQUAR]

Download a program called mediainfo (https://sourceforge.net/projects/mediainfo/).
This program provides details about your video files that are useful for people to help solve such issues.

Off the cuff - suggest you transfer the files from your SD card onto the HDD of your laptop and re-encode/edit with these files.
Thought here is: the read speed of the SD card itself should be fast enough but it may be bottlenecked by your hardware.

[Jan Gruuthuse]

as AQUAR wrote: always transfer video to harddisc for editing, avoiding working on slow storage media
Can you describe your work flow?

If you want only edited HD video: not converting to DVD format: resizing to 720*576 with video stream: Mpeg Video/Audio. Keep the AVC codec
When processing your video files (cutting/saving), make sure these start and end with keyframe. (only selectable with up/down keyboard arrow, not left/right keyboard arrow key.)
see this small video Fast Edit with Copy Mode on our youtube channel Avidemux Demo

If you want dvd-playable (real dvd) in dvd-player: With the current avidemux 2.6.18 (yymmdd_bbf152ebb1b-fflibs 3.0.6)
- In avidemux menu select Auto: dvd
- If the source video = 16:9 format select in the pop-up window "auto dvd"
-- Source Aspect Ratio [1:1] -> [16:9]
--Destination Aspect Ratio [1:1] ->  [16:9]
This will create Mpeg-PS muxed video in .mpg format suitable for dvd production.

PS: You are aware that your powerful laptop i-7 processor processor is a dual core and not 4 core as a desktop cpu?
Intel Core i7-6500U 6th Gen ââ,¬ËœSkylakeââ,¬â,,¢ Higher-End Laptop CPU

[eumagga0x2a]

Providing a short sample would be even better than a MediaInfo report (I guess the camcorder might generate interlaced h264 videos).

As Jan wrote, making DVD videos out of HD content is a terrible loss of quality. Avoid it whenever possible.

[fblaha1]

Thanks for the responses; that will keep me busy for a while.
I did transfer the AVCHD files to my laptop, where they changed to a .MTS suffix. After experimenting for a while, I set the Avidemux 2.16.18 version to Mpeg4 AVC(x264), AAC(lav), and MPv2 Muxer. This produces good quality, stable files that play welll on Windows Media Player, and the Toshiba Media player. The encoding, when I save after cutting, takes up to 3 minutes, depending on the size of the file, which does not bother me too much, as I have plenty of leisure.
With these settings, the fluttering and splitting of the files has stopped. Should I continue in this vein (since it appears to work), and will the results allow me to burn a DVD? My efforts are to produce a purely amateurish travelogue for private consumption. Not that I would mind making it look as good as possible without turning into a video editing pro

[Jan Gruuthuse]

Main question transfer to DVD:
- used as transport media (data-dvd) and to play on other computer (not dvd-video): no problem
- used as dvd-video on standalone dvd player: this will not work. dvd-video is a very strict format. see previous reply: dvd-playable
always keep original video safe! just in case something goes wrong.

[fblaha1]

Thank you! I suspect that all the prospective recipients will be happy to use a thumb drive or a DVD with their computers. I do want to do further work on making the transitions from file to file a little smoother, if possible.
I first acquired a program called Power Director, based on a recommendation from an "expert," but that proved way above my level. I am beginning to be fascinated by the editing process in Avidemux and will probably spend some of my leisure trying to get better at it.