4x3 SD project from HDV
 

Since getting my FX1 last year my goal has been to be able to create 4x3 SD output from the HDV input. I have Edius PRo3 and Premiere 1.5.1. My attempts at getting this 4x3 output are not what I would like so far. Edius Pro 3 has no keyframess for the layout crop function so only fixed shot clips are possible. Premiere will create a pan or zoom with keyframes but the user interface is very difficult ( can't see the whole picture only the crop, unless I am doing this wrong). Vegas LE which I have seems to have a useable cropping function in that the crop lines are visible over the original and the output is visable in the preview ( that is what I want). I have not moved to Vegas in the past since I have a Canopus DVRaptor RT2 and became addicted to the realtime output. Since rendering is a neccessity with HDV I am looking again at Vegas 6. Has anyone used Vegas 6 to get 4x3 cropped output and what success have you had.
Further my encodes to DV or MPEG2 from either the Canopus HQ or CFHD intermediate files are not as high a quality as from the raw m2t( in Edius ).

Any input would be welcome.

Ron Evans

Have you tried using a 3D picture-in-picture keyer in Edius to control the position of video on the screen? Or better yet, forget about 4:3 output from HDV and start delivering all your videos in widescreen format, which will show as letterboxed on regular TVs and full-screen on expensive HDTVs.

I'm guessing that Ron wants to be able to pan and scan at 4:3 frame around in the HD image....

Yes I have tried the 3D PiP in Edius. Yes I do want to pan around a 4x3 in the 16x9 HDV frame( in fact it doesn't really matter whether its 4x3 or 16x9 the task is still the same). Vegas seems to have the best user interface for doing this I am just trying to get some user input before buying yet another NLE to learn!!! The other issue is the quality of the resulting video. Having now tried 3D PiP and layout in Edius both with HQ and raw m2t--the m2t source gives the best quality output from layout. Also tried Cineform Pan and Crop controls as well as motion control in Premiere 1.5.1 which gives about the same as the Canopus HQ but not as good as the raw m2t as source in Edius. HQ and CFHD were at their largest file sizes too almost 4 times source file. I feel that I must be doing something wrong but don't know what. Tried using source projects as HDV as well as source project being DV. Output test was using both render to DV as well as render to MPEG2 at 6000 CBR for DVD use. The experiment is to see if its possible to use just one HDV camera at an event and then in post create the effect of a multi camera shoot in SD. This would even be useful if there were two HDV cameras used in the normal way but allow more options in editing for an SD output( but only if its easy and effective)

Ron Evans

So is there anything about the 3D PIP keyer which doesn't do what you need to do? I just used it for essentially this result in a video I'm doing, but I don't see that being effective enough to adequately simulate having two cameras. Better to use it for emphasizing particular things in a scene by zooming and cropping, which 3D PIP can do. What else do you need?

There are a few things that I want from a way of simulating multi camera shoot. A view that always retains the wide screen view of the fixed camera video and shows outline of the crop moved and scaled with the mouse, aspect ratio of crop defined to be that of the output format, key frame control, preview screen showing result of crop and then good quality video output of the crop. Having researched a little further I expect that Vegas 6 can do this. IF layout in Edius had keyframes it too would do what I want though it looks like Vegas has a more comprehensive user interface.

Ron Evans

Hey Ron, I am plugging on frequent basis for keyframes in layout and we will get there...I never thought about what you are attempting and if you get something like you are describing done I want to see it. At first I thought no way you can get close to looking two cam but my interest is peaked.

Hi Randy,
Yes I would prefer to stay with Edius having moved from Premiere, I like the speed especially with the Raptor RT2 for DV. I have tried multi cam output from the HDV twice so far. Both were dance demonstations where I also ran a second DV camera and actually left the FX1 running by itself while I moved down close to stage for close-ups with my TRV50. This first time was soon after I got the FX1 and really didn't pay enough attention to how critical the focus is with HDV so the results were not as good as the second time. There should be enough resolution to get a DV quality image of about a quarter of the HDV scene and I have acceptable image from a slight zoom on this too with a little sharpening.
Editing with Layout was Ok but required a two pass approach. Go through and split the clip at the edit points then go back and apply layout to define the crop. IT worked Ok for a 20 min demonstration but would be very tedious for a 2 hour show!!! The Vegas Pan and crop user interface is very nice in this regard as the details of aspect ratio etc are taken care of and one can focus on which part of the scene is to be used for the output, all the while seeing the full view. I think I have talked myself into trying Vegas 6 at least for this activity since I could also use a DV proxy to make editing quicker mixing with a second DV camera. For fast DV output Edius takes the prize easily, it's difficult to beat realtime!!!.

Ron Evans