When to convert interlaced to progressive
 

Hi folks

I am putting together a short for youtube, so I will want to output as 1920x1080p25. The video has been shot for DVD so is 1920x1080i50 - normally I would edit it interlaced and convert to progressive in Compressor at the end. However, I am also using some graphics I am creating in Motion. Any thoughts about which workflow is best:

a) Work entirely in interlaced, including in Motion, then convert to progressive at the end

b) Set the FCP sequence to progressive and let it de-interlace the video as I add it

c) convert all the video I am going to use to progressive in Compressor, then work in progressive

The hassle increases from a to c - I guess it is at which point the quality/hassle goes favourable.

Cheers,

Nick

My advice if it's for youtube, and you are not worried about having absolutely pixel perfect graphics as the most important visual element, is to work in interlaced all the way through and de interlace at the end.

It's the simplest workflow and the only place where you will experience any difference in degradation is in the graphics - as those are going to get pretty heavily compressed for web deployment anyway the relative quality drop is negligible.

I use your option B above (with NTSC numbers of course...)

Try a short test of each and see what works best for YOUR content.

The proviso with my recommendation for option A) is that you have tested your deinterlace methodology for the final output - because you are not seeing the results as you are working (like option B) you might do a lengthy render at the end and be displeased at the results - but if you have a tested workflow then you will get better results in terms of deinterlacing the footage by doing the deinterlacing at the end.

I would stay interlaced all the way until the conversion for YouTube etc......
Make a interlaced quicktime master and then let compressor render out the version for YouTube.

Cheers

Thanks for your explanation Craig. I go progressive right away to protect graphics. Up to YOU to decide what's most important.

Absolutely Shaun - individual workflows for individual cases.

According to Jan Ozer at Streaming Learning Center (web video guru), NLE deinterlacing tools (including FCP) are superior to those of encoding tools like Compressor. He also gives Compressor/QT low marks for h264 compression compared to Main Concept or x264 (as do many other reviewers). That's been my experience as well: deinterlace in FCP, export to mov, then use a Main Concept tool like Squeeze or the free x264 QT plugin to compress in h264.