AVCHD/MPEG2 files too big to burn onto DVD

Red Hare

My sister has a Panasonic Camcorder that only records in a file called AVCHD.
She has recorded a lot of Camogie matches which are just over one hour in length. These files are too large to burn onto DVD.

The software that comes with Camcorder allows her to convert AVCHD to Mpeg2 but these files are still to large.

I was wondering if there was a good free software to convert to another smaller file type and if so what file type? - she want to be able to play the DVD on a television.

She went into a computer shop about this problem and was told that as she is recording a lot of matches and want to play them back - to buy a "screenplay - director".

Is the screenplay director the way to go or is she better off sticking to DVD's?

Any help would be appreciated

thanks

Bellu

To convert the AVCHD to other video format, could turn to Handbrake, or get ffmpeg to have a try.
If you want to burn the AVCHD videos into DVD directly, then could get voilabit DVDCreator or something like that to burn dvd in mins.

Fionn

I suspect your sis is recording the games onto a prosumer camcorder and most of these record to AVCHD format, (much of the same way a camera might save images in .jpg format)
This is a storage issue and files from digital camcorders can be very big, the screenplay - director is really only an external hard drive with a few added features, if she's filming a lot, she'll fill up the screenplay - director eventually.

A better solution would be to process the files in a video editing program that will also allow authoring them to DVD, that way you can edit the games, add title, background narration/music, intros and closing credits etc. It will also be much easier to distribute the finalised film to DVD.