Interlace Problem in FCP?

Vishad Dewan · September 13th, 2007, 04:04 PM

Hi Aric,

Yeah I tried that. As far as I know there was something really funky going on with the footage. It might have been the DV tapes themselves (even though I purchased brand new tapes for this particular shoot). In any case, copying and pasting the video in the video2 timeline in FCP, and adjusting the deinterlace filters took care of most of the issue. There's a little bit of interlace artifacts left, but I'm watching the footage on my LCD TV, so it might just be the TV itself.

John C. Plunkett · September 14th, 2007, 09:01 AM

I don't want to hijack this thread, but this seemed like the best place to post this.

I originally created a project in FCP 4.5 with both captured DV footage and moving picture files. I captured the video in FCP 4.5 and created the pictures in Photoshop 7 (RGB Mode). I then converted it to MPEG-2 format with Discreet Cleaner 6. Everything processed perfectly. I've since gone to FCS2 and converted the project file over to FCP6. Everything plays fine on the time line. I've exported the clip as an uncompressed mov file and brought it back into FCP to test on an NTSC monitor, everything still plays fine. Here is where the problem begins.

I am encoding this material to a program stream .mpg file. It's a 30 second spot, NTSC formated SD content, interlaced for output through our ad insertion equipment. After encoding one of two things happen depending on which field dominance I select:

- Bottom Field: my video plays fine, but the moving pictures stutter.
- Top Field: my video is horribly interlaced and jerky, moving pictures appear fine.

I'm no longer using Cleaner 6 and have been using Compressor 3 since the switch to FCS2. I have to believe Compressor is the culprit here, but I don't have the hard facts to support it. I can't go back to using Cleaner because I need an encoder that can do both program and transport stream encoding.

Here are the settings for Compressor

Name: ADTEC MPEG
Description: MPEG-2 Program Stream with MPEG audio at 48kHz. Settings based off the source resolution and frame-rate.
File Extension: mpg
Estimated file size: 2.58 GB/hour of source
Segmentation on cluster disabled
Type: MPEG-2 program stream
Video Encoder
Format: M2V
Width: 720
Height: 480
Pixel aspect ratio: NTSC CCIR 601/DV
Crop: None
Padding: None
Frame rate: 29.97
Frame Controls: Automatically selected: Off
Start timecode from source
Aspect ratio: 4:3
Field dominance: Lower
Average data rate: 5.5 (Mbps)
Best motion estimation
Closed GOP Size: 15, Structure: IBP
Audio Encoder
Format: MPEG
Sample Rate: 48.000kHz
Channels: 2
Bits Per Sample: 16

Is there something not set correctly that would be causing this interlacing problem after encoding? Any help would be appreciated and again, sorry for hijacking the thread, but I thought maybe Vishad's problem and mine were somehow connected.

Vishad Dewan · September 14th, 2007, 07:48 PM

Yeah, that's something like the problem I'm having.

Vishad Dewan · September 14th, 2007, 07:52 PM

Hi Aric,

Yeah, I tried that twice. The first time it really didn't seem to make any improvements. Then the second time the option just wasn't there. I couldn't even get interpolation to work. It worked on another, smaller clip, but it just didn't work for this one.

Any suggestions? I'm really at wits end now with this footage.

Vishad Dewan · September 14th, 2007, 07:54 PM

Hi Aric,

Yeah, I tried that twice. The first time it really didn't seem to make any improvements. Then the second time the option just wasn't there. I couldn't even get interpolation to work. It worked on another, smaller clip, but it just didn't work for this one.

Any suggestions?

R. Phil Johnston · September 16th, 2007, 07:18 PM

Hi,

Im having a similar problem to john in that I'm mixing screen grab footage i recorded through ishowu with DV footage. when i have field dominance set to one the screen grabs look great but the Dv footage looks bad and when i set it to lower I get the opposite - DV footage looks great screen grabs look bad.

I've tried FCPs de-interlace on the DV footage but it makes it look very soft.

Is there another plugin or some other software I can use to either fix the DV footage or the screen grabs?

Thanks

Phil.

Aric Mannion · September 17th, 2007, 09:00 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Vishad Dewan

Hi Aric,

Yeah, I tried that twice. The first time it really didn't seem to make any improvements. Then the second time the option just wasn't there. I couldn't even get interpolation to work. It worked on another, smaller clip, but it just didn't work for this one.

Any suggestions? I'm really at wits end now with this footage.

I don't know what after effects you have, and you may know how to do all this stuff but: Bring your original captured footage into AE. Control click your footage in your project window and select interpolation. Choose upper or lower from the drop down menu, and at the bottom choose what type of footage it is. Just make a movie of a very short clip from the footage, as animation, with all the best settings ofcourse. Only then can you really judge the picture.
I forgot to ask this before, but how does your footage look in your capture scratch, and does it look good on the tape?

John C. Plunkett · September 17th, 2007, 09:21 AM

I was able to work around the problem by exporting an uncompressed Quicktime movie, then bring that clip back into FCP and deinterlace the entire clip, then re-export with compressor with my aforementioned settings (bottom field dominance). I've also noticed that of all the clips I'm encoding with Compressor, the only clips that experience this interlacing problem are ones with still images or PSD files included in them.

I hope this isn't a bug in Compressor and is just something I'm doing (or failing to do). I can't use this work-around very much as I have a lot of material I have to encode weekly and it would take far too long to go that route.

September 13th, 2007, 04:04 PM	#16
Vishad Dewan Regular Crew Join Date: Feb 2006 Location: Yuba City, Ca Posts: 126	Hi Aric, Yeah I tried that. As far as I know there was something really funky going on with the footage. It might have been the DV tapes themselves (even though I purchased brand new tapes for this particular shoot). In any case, copying and pasting the video in the video2 timeline in FCP, and adjusting the deinterlace filters took care of most of the issue. There's a little bit of interlace artifacts left, but I'm watching the footage on my LCD TV, so it might just be the TV itself. __________________ Vishad Novus Productions - www.novusproductions.com -

September 14th, 2007, 07:48 PM	#18
Vishad Dewan Regular Crew Join Date: Feb 2006 Location: Yuba City, Ca Posts: 126	Yeah, that's something like the problem I'm having. __________________ Vishad Novus Productions - www.novusproductions.com -

September 14th, 2007, 07:52 PM	#19
Vishad Dewan Regular Crew Join Date: Feb 2006 Location: Yuba City, Ca Posts: 126	Hi Aric, Yeah, I tried that twice. The first time it really didn't seem to make any improvements. Then the second time the option just wasn't there. I couldn't even get interpolation to work. It worked on another, smaller clip, but it just didn't work for this one. Any suggestions? I'm really at wits end now with this footage. __________________ Vishad Novus Productions - www.novusproductions.com -

September 14th, 2007, 07:54 PM	#20
Vishad Dewan Regular Crew Join Date: Feb 2006 Location: Yuba City, Ca Posts: 126	Hi Aric, Yeah, I tried that twice. The first time it really didn't seem to make any improvements. Then the second time the option just wasn't there. I couldn't even get interpolation to work. It worked on another, smaller clip, but it just didn't work for this one. Any suggestions? __________________ Vishad Novus Productions - www.novusproductions.com -

September 16th, 2007, 07:18 PM	#21
R. Phil Johnston New Boot Join Date: Jan 2007 Location: IRELAND Posts: 22	re: John Hi, Im having a similar problem to john in that I'm mixing screen grab footage i recorded through ishowu with DV footage. when i have field dominance set to one the screen grabs look great but the Dv footage looks bad and when i set it to lower I get the opposite - DV footage looks great screen grabs look bad. I've tried FCPs de-interlace on the DV footage but it makes it look very soft. Is there another plugin or some other software I can use to either fix the DV footage or the screen grabs? Thanks Phil.

September 14th, 2007, 09:01 AM	#17
John C. Plunkett Regular Crew Join Date: Aug 2007 Location: Jacksonville, Illinois Posts: 130	I don't want to hijack this thread, but this seemed like the best place to post this. I originally created a project in FCP 4.5 with both captured DV footage and moving picture files. I captured the video in FCP 4.5 and created the pictures in Photoshop 7 (RGB Mode). I then converted it to MPEG-2 format with Discreet Cleaner 6. Everything processed perfectly. I've since gone to FCS2 and converted the project file over to FCP6. Everything plays fine on the time line. I've exported the clip as an uncompressed mov file and brought it back into FCP to test on an NTSC monitor, everything still plays fine. Here is where the problem begins. I am encoding this material to a program stream .mpg file. It's a 30 second spot, NTSC formated SD content, interlaced for output through our ad insertion equipment. After encoding one of two things happen depending on which field dominance I select: - Bottom Field: my video plays fine, but the moving pictures stutter. - Top Field: my video is horribly interlaced and jerky, moving pictures appear fine. I'm no longer using Cleaner 6 and have been using Compressor 3 since the switch to FCS2. I have to believe Compressor is the culprit here, but I don't have the hard facts to support it. I can't go back to using Cleaner because I need an encoder that can do both program and transport stream encoding. Here are the settings for Compressor Name: ADTEC MPEG Description: MPEG-2 Program Stream with MPEG audio at 48kHz. Settings based off the source resolution and frame-rate. File Extension: mpg Estimated file size: 2.58 GB/hour of source Segmentation on cluster disabled Type: MPEG-2 program stream Video Encoder Format: M2V Width: 720 Height: 480 Pixel aspect ratio: NTSC CCIR 601/DV Crop: None Padding: None Frame rate: 29.97 Frame Controls: Automatically selected: Off Start timecode from source Aspect ratio: 4:3 Field dominance: Lower Average data rate: 5.5 (Mbps) Best motion estimation Closed GOP Size: 15, Structure: IBP Audio Encoder Format: MPEG Sample Rate: 48.000kHz Channels: 2 Bits Per Sample: 16 Is there something not set correctly that would be causing this interlacing problem after encoding? Any help would be appreciated and again, sorry for hijacking the thread, but I thought maybe Vishad's problem and mine were somehow connected.

September 17th, 2007, 09:21 AM	#23
John C. Plunkett Regular Crew Join Date: Aug 2007 Location: Jacksonville, Illinois Posts: 130	Update: I was able to work around the problem by exporting an uncompressed Quicktime movie, then bring that clip back into FCP and deinterlace the entire clip, then re-export with compressor with my aforementioned settings (bottom field dominance). I've also noticed that of all the clips I'm encoding with Compressor, the only clips that experience this interlacing problem are ones with still images or PSD files included in them. I hope this isn't a bug in Compressor and is just something I'm doing (or failing to do). I can't use this work-around very much as I have a lot of material I have to encode weekly and it would take far too long to go that route.