1. Project Settings

On Vegas, it’s very important to have the right project settings before you start editing. From the main menu select “Project Properties”, and a new dialog will pop up. In there, click the right outmost icon, the one that reads “Match Media Settings” when hovered with the mouse. From there, select one of the files you will be editing with, and click “open”. Vegas will now automatically fill up most of the project settings for you, after analyzing the video file you picked.

After it does that, you need to do a few changes manually to that dialog: For the de-interlacing option select “interpolate”, and for the Quality option select “Best”. You can save a new template with these settings, so each time you start a new project with the same kind of footage, you can just pick it from the list! So, after your project settings are set, click “Ok”, and edit as you would normally do. Save often.

2. Ensuring visual quality
After you have edited, select ALL video clips in the timeline sans the audio clips (e.g. by using the SHIFT key), right click, select ‘Switches’, and then select ‘Disable Resample’. By disabling resample we ensure no ghosted image (especially if you used slow-motion).

3. Exporting

Vegas Pro 7/8/9/10 users: Export in Main Concept (MP4 h.264 VBR), or Sony AVC as fallback.
Vegas Platinum 7/8 & Movie Studio HD users: Export in Windows Media Video (WMV).
Vegas Platinum 9 users: Export in Sony AVC (MP4 h.264), or in WMV as a fallback.
Vegas Platinum 10 users: Export in Main Concept (MP4 h.264 VBR), or Sony AVC as fallback.

- Main Concept export:
  Use visual guide below to export to MainConcept. Make sure you use the right frame rate in the exporting dialog, same as in your project properties, as configured in step #1.

Note:  You can apply same settings taken from the YouTubeHD tutorial.  For example:  under the "Custom Template" screen - enable "Two-pass" and increase "maximum bps" to 135,000,000 like YouTubeHD.  Make sure to select "Best" on the "Project" tab as well.