Abstract: The present invention relates to the deposition in a magnetron reactor (1) equipped with a magnetron cathode (MC) of at least one material on a substrate (11a), according to which process said material is vaporized by magnetron sputtering, using a gas that is ionized in pulsed mode. To this effect and in order to favour the formation of high current pulses of short duration while avoiding the formation of electric arcs and while enabling an effective ionisation of the sputtered vapour, a preionization of the said gas prior to the application of the main voltage pulse on the magnetron cathode (MC) is carried out in order to generate current pulses (CP) whose decay time (Td), after cut-off of the main voltage pulse (VP) is shorter than 5 ?s.