HELP!!File Size/Exporting for DVD

[eloquentessence]

Ok - i'm making a movie which is fairly long.
How long a film can i fit onto a blank DVD?
I'm using Adobe Premiere Pro for my editing, should i export through the encoder , and if so whcih settings shoudl i use? I am from australia. Previously i have been exporting to a DV Avi file. which one will create teh smallest file so i can burn to dvd and fit it all on?
One of the sections i have is 28 mins long and when i exported to Dv AVi it = 6GB...so i'm just wondering how will i do this? Will i have to cut down the time for everything so i can only fit so much on? or..?? Because all the footage i have and want to use at the moment will go for between 1 1/2 - 2 hours.
I just really have no idea how to do this since i've only made short films in the past and never had to worry about film length.
any help, asap, that i can get is greatly appreciated!!

[mrlipring]

well, DV avi's only the intermediate stage. You'll do all your editing, in the DV avi format, then you encode to a format DVD players will play, usually mpeg-2. The mpeg-2 will be WAY smaller than the DV avi files.

as for how long you'll fit on a dvd, it depends on a lot of things. Audio bitrate will eat into the remaining space for video. The mpeg encoder you use will make a difference, as some are better than others, quality-wise, so better ones will give the same visual quality in a lower bitrate. You really want to do VBR, not CBR as well. The video content makes a difference. Is it grainy? High-motion?