CineForm and Premiere Pro CS3 / After Effects

[Rick Thornquist]

David -

It's not the quality I'm worried about. :) The main reason I'd like to use DirectShow over Video for Windows is the file size. As you noted for me in a previous thread, the DirectShow interface encodes a bit differently and that makes for smaller file sizes. With so many hours of video, I'd like to save gigabytes whereever I can!

Glad to hear you are taking care of this Ultra stuff. You guys are great!

- Rick

[Herminio Cordido]

Hi guys,

I got a sony EX1 and i am stoked with it...
I got also Cineform's Prospect and when i try to edit (even basic) Premiere Pro closes with the message, premiere pro encouter a problem...will try to save your project bla bla blah.

i am running it on a Intel (R) Core (TM) 2 CPU 6400 @ 2.13 Ghz procesor with 2 gb of RAM, XP service pack 2.

I use an external (usb 2.0) for the project file and an Esata HD for the Cineforms avi files.

Is this set up supposed to work or i need another upgrade?

Thanks in advance...


Herminio

[David Newman]

Yes Prospect HD works. Please contact support and file a trouble ticket www.cineform.com/support

[David Wislon]

David,

I am interested in exporting CineForm HD AVI files from Premiere CS3 but would like to do so with 6 uncompressed wav audio tracks for an Ambisonic theater environment.

When in Export Movie Settings I choose file type: CineForm HD Export my audio options are limited to Sample Type: 16-bit and Channels: Stereo (not 5.1 which I had hoped).

Now that I am running Prospect 2K... If in Export Movie Settings I choose file type: Microsoft AVI and in Video: CineForm HD Codec V3.6.0, I then have the audio options of Sample Type: 32-bit Float and Channels: 5.1 which I need to create an uncompressed 6 audio channel movie.

I don't know what CineForm HD Codec V3.6.0 is. I normally export through CineForm HD Export.

Hope this makes sense. My goal is to produce the highest possible video for 1080p projection with 6 tracks of uncompressed audio for Ambisonic surround.

Many thanks,

David

[David Newman]

Why not export you channel audio tracks separately? We don't support 5.1 yet with the CineForm exporter. If you are seeing V3.6.x encoder, that is via Video for Windows, which is 8-bit RGB only through Premiere. 8-bit is fine if you have completed your color correction.

[David Wislon]

I can and have exported audio tracks separately but I am not clear how I would then re sync the audio tracks with my separately exported CineForm AVI.

On the other hand, this would be a final output for projection (no further color correction). Do I understand correctly that I would not experience quality loss if I were to export with V3.6.x encoder as opposed to the CineForm exporter if my project is complete?

Many thanks again for your help.

[David Newman]

Re-interleaving audio tracks should be straight forward if you put the 5.1 audio is a single WAV, then you should be able to use VirtaulDub or similar to add the audio. I've done it with stereo. While this is the best quality, you will not see any difference, so the VFW export many be the simplist option.

[David Wislon]

Good, it feels I have a solution. Thanks again for your generous help and great work. I, like many, am anxiously awaiting your further contributions to these remarkable times after NAB this year.

[Alex Wren]

This may be a daft question but...

I am using Premiere CS3 on a Dell Precision (M2300) laptop. I have managed to capture footage from my JVC GYHD111 and editing and playback seems to be totally smooth and with issue (so far).

I hear many people using Cineform Aspect to enable them to edit without speed issues. Do I need this or is my PC fast enough not to bother?

Sorry once again if I have got the wrong end of the stick.

[David Taylor]

Alex, first off not everybody requires CineForm. Second, people choose CineForm not just for performance, but for enhanced workflow. Third,, for a description containing a fair amount of detail about what CineForm offers, please see this post: http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/showpost....82&postcount=5.

With that said, I'll cover a few additionaly things here.

1. M2T was not intended for a multi-generation post workflow, and begins to degrade from its first render. One of the key reasons to use CineForm is that CineForm files hold up beautifully through a multi-gen workflow. See various quality analyses: http://www.cineform.com/technology/quality.htm.

2. If you shoot 24p with most HDV cameras, it is embedded in a 60i signal on tape. To obtain the best 24p workflow you need to extract 24p from 60i which means unwrapping it from M2T. CineForm offers the tools to do this. Similar to this, CineForm products offer a myriad of other image processing utilities including spatial resampling, deinterlacing, image flip, etc.

3. CineForm's AVI and MOV files are cross-platform compatible between Windows and Mac. For those who need a shared workflow this is helpful.

4. If you have a multi-source workflow CineForm converts all files into a common CineForm file format, whether your camera is HDV, AVCHD, P2, HD-SDI, etc.

5. You have the opportunity to capture directly from your HDMI connector (newer HDV camera) thus bypassing the highly-compressed HDV format, and boosting visual fidelity from the beginning.

6. The extra "headroom" of CineForm files allows you to "push" your images in post much further than you can with HDV, especially if you upgrade to the 10-bit processing of Prospect HD.

Anyway, these are a few things. They may or may not be applicable to your needs.

[Alex Wren]

Thanks David,

That is really helpful. I had never really thought about these things.

I have looked at the CineForm web site although to tell you the truth it has lots of information for several different products so it rather busy and difficult to read.

Does 10 Bit real make a good difference?

I shall investigate further...

Alex

[David Taylor]

Alex, regarding 10 bits versus 8 bits, take a look here for a visual example of the difference: http://www.cineform.com/products/Asp...pect.htm#10bit

[Henry Clayton]

After installing Prospect 2k, whenever I start After Effects I receive a message warning me that I have multiple copies of a plug-in called 'EMP' installed. I have located a file called CineFormEMP.aex in my After Effects plug-ins folder, but I don't know what or where the other plug-in that it's conflicting with could be.

As a subsidiary question, what does CineFormEMP.aex do?

Any help will be appreciated.

H.

[David Newman]

AJA output for AE. If you don't have an AJA card, you don't need it. If you do, please contact support.

[Henry Clayton]

Originally Posted by David Newman

AJA output for AE. If you don't have an AJA card, you don't need it. If you do, please contact support.

David,

That solves the problem for me. I don't have an AJA & will remove the aex file.