Novice problem capturing HDV footage from HD100

[Jack Walker]

Originally Posted by Bart Walczak

Ouch... HD100 = 720p and Z1U = 1080i, and it will be pain to do without loosing quality. Certainly you cannot fit both in the timeline without rendering when editing in native HDV mode in Premiere Pro 2.

I would recommend getting Aspect HD from Cineform, which will allow you to resize your Z1U or HD100 footage during capture/convert plus it will speed up your editing in Premiere. Aspect HD is an intermediary codec which is less computing power consuming and allows for faster/better editing in PPro 2. Connect HD is the same but for Sony Vegas, you won't be needing that. Main Concept plug-in is for encoding for DVD/Blue Ray and its SD version is already included in PPro.

So you would only need Aspect HD for editing.

BTW, your machine would be an overkill for HDV editing unless you would do some serious AE work.

Sorry, I didn't make it clear that HD100 video and Z1U video will not be put in the same project. One or the other would be used for the project.

The Main Concept plugin I mean is the one just above in this thread that limits rendering of the video only to frames that have changed -- as opposed to requiring re-encoding of all video put on the timeline, even if it has not been touched (which I believe is what Premiere does on its own?)

(Note: yes, the computer ended up with its specs for reasons other than editing requirements)

[Dave Wallin]

Just a few comments -

Originally Posted by Bart Walczak

Main Concept plug-in is for encoding for DVD/Blue Ray and its SD version is already included in PPro

Actually that is not 100% true. The MainConcept Mpeg Pro plug-in allowed Premiere Pro to nativly edit Mpeg on the timeline. it also added capture to Mpeg in PPro. PPro 1.5.1 added the Cineform codec so you could edit HDV nativly, but the MainConcept add on allowed for more options - such as native 24p that you would get from the HD100. Now enter PPro 2 - they dumped the Cineform codec and added "native Mpeg" editing. The MainConcept codec did not work in PPro 2. MainConcept, ,more or less, started over from scratch and rewrote the plug-in and added a lot of things to it. (Read the full info by going to the MainConcept site) It is backwards compatable with PPro 1.5 as well. It is not simply a plug-in that allows for Blue Ray authoring.

Originally Posted by Jack Walker

The Main Concept plugin I mean is the one just above in this thread that limits rendering of the video only to frames that have changed -- as opposed to requiring re-encoding of all video put on the timeline, even if it has not been touched (which I believe is what Premiere does on its own?)

PPro 2 *does* re-render untouched HDV footage even if you have done nothing to it. Now with this new MpegPro plug-in PPro 2 allows for the same output as the project (say 24p) and not reconforming for no reason.

[Jack Walker]

Originally Posted by Dave Wallin

Just a few comments -
Now enter PPro 2 - they dumped the Cineform codec and added "native Mpeg" editing. The MainConcept codec did not work in PPro 2. MainConcept, ,more or less, started over from scratch and rewrote the plug-in and added a lot of things to it.

PPro 2 *does* re-render untouched HDV footage even if you have done nothing to it. Now with this new MpegPro plug-in PPro 2 allows for the same output as the project (say 24p) and not reconforming for no reason.

So I guess my question is, which is better, or are both needed?

--AspectHD (which uses the Cineform codec)
--MainConcept _new_ plugin (that doesn't require re-rendering of the timeline in PPro)

[Bart Walczak]

Right. I was wrong about MainConcept Mpeg Pro.

To Jack:

The question is, what you prefer - native editing with Mpeg Pro for $400 or intermediary Aspect HD for $500. If you are planning to do everything in Premiere, then maybe it is enough for you to stick with what PPro2 itself has to offer, there is no necessity to buy either. Your machine can certainly handle it. If you are downconverting to SD from Premiere timeline via Adobe Media Encoder which uses MainConcept codec, then everything will be re-encoded anyway, so the mpeg pro lack of re-rendering is of no concern.

I myself am very happy with AspectHD, because it allows me to use modes in HD101, which are not available from PPro (like HD-SD, 576p50).

[Dave Wallin]

If you are not shooting native 24p than PPro might be all right for your needs if you are going to output/down-rez.

Here are some things to consider. if you are going to be doing a lot of comp work than Cineform might be better for you as their intermediate will hold up over several renders. Mind you I have not actually rendered out via the cinefrom intermediate 9 times and than back to HDV and compared to original to the final render but many people have had a work flow that tested it and reported it works. Also the Cineform codec will be in the 4:2:2 color space where as native HDV is in 4:2:0. As the MpegPro plug-in stays Mpeg native it may not hold up with multiple renders - but again, this is soemthing I have not sat down and tested and really itr would depend on your workflow.

If all you will really be doing is basic edits and than outputting you might consider this - you can't output 24p HDV without some sort of outside help in PPro 2. If you want to output an HDV "master", so to speak, at 24p right now you would need HDlink (cineform I/O utility) or the MainConcept Mpeg pro plug-in. In that case the main choice would be the question I asked before.

I guess I would say if you are doing a lot of re-rendering/compositing that Cineform might be better for you.

[Daniel Patton]

Originally Posted by Bart Walczak

Try deleting the render files and allow premiere to re-index/re-conform files. Don't mess with the files (view, edit) when they are being conformed, or you'll risk the same corruption again.

If it does not work, try recapturing the tapes. It might be that something was not captured correctly, it happens to me from time to time. To avoid this risk, do not do anything on the computer while performing capture.

Audio out of sync for a couple of frames unfortunately happens sometimes but I don't know what's the reason.

BTW, I capture with HDLink from Aspect HD, but I think it would be the same in Premiere itself.

Bart has hit the problem on the head.

We also use Premiere Pro 2 and have had the same issue with odd looping audio from day one... but only when scrubbing the timeline before Premiere Pro has had a chance to conform the audio from the recently captured or imported video. You can re-create the looping audio issue/error very easily. Just be patient and let it do it's thing before editing and all is fine.

We also found that capture through Premiere was unstable with Cineform, and that by using the HDlink provided with Aspect HD we had better results. The audio looping error can and does happen with both digitizing methods, but you will find additional problems if you digitize through PPro and not HDlink

Aspect HD can work flawlessly, and does most of the time with Premiere Pro, but it's not without it's share of issues still the same. We found more than a few support applications don't play as well with Cineform's encoding methods, like Flash 8 and Ultra key. Sometimes they work okay with Aspects HD files but this has become more rare than regular. We are training a new editor / compositor, and he's struggling to comprehend the messy workflow.

[Mike Morrell]

Originally Posted by Jay Yellamaty

If you end up having to recapture here are a few things that might help:

1) If you are using the firewire port make sure the small, almost hidden switch on the side of the camera to select firewire output is set to HDV ( and not DV )
2) Confirm that the tape is actually shot in HDV 720 30p. Must say so on the LCD during Playback. Set up your project accordingly. Try using both the standard PP2 HDV 720 30p template as well as the JVC HD 100 presets, to see which works better for you.
3) monitor both video and audio coming out of the analog outputs on the camera during capture.
4) capture and check a few short clips first.

BTW my PP2 and HD 100 working perfectly together.

Hope this is helfull

I am sure that the tapes were 720-30phdv as this is what the LCD said during playback.

I am fairly certain that the camera firewire out was set to HDV. I called the camera owner and he checked and said that he had not used it since I had.

I did not monitor the analog outputs to see sync for myself.

I tried a few short clips and it looked "ok"

I was not running anything else at the time of capture.

For one tape, I did interrupt the conforming process, not knowing what was going on at all (I did not notice the progress bar). But for the second tape, I was sure to leave everything alone for the duration. This was the tape where the audio repeated every 13 minutes.

[Mike Morrell]

Originally Posted by Marc Colemont

My workflow to capture is with AspectHD, and then import the files into PPro 2.0. Never had audio problems so far.
Did you use the new presets which are available on the Adobe website?
http://www.adobe.com/support/downloa...atform=Windows

Yes, I loaded the new presets before capture and this is what I used.

[Mike Morrell]

Originally Posted by Daniel Patton

Bart has hit the problem on the head.

We also use Premiere Pro 2 and have had the same issue with odd looping audio from day one... but only when scrubbing the timeline before Premiere Pro has had a chance to conform the audio from the recently captured or imported video. You can re-create the looping audio issue/error very easily. Just be patient and let it do it's thing before editing and all is fine.

We also found that capture through Premiere was unstable with Cineform, and that by using the HDlink provided with Aspect HD we had better results. The audio looping error can and does happen with both digitizing methods, but you will find additional problems if you digitize through PPro and not HDlink

Aspect HD can work flawlessly, and does most of the time with Premiere Pro, but it's not without it's share of issues still the same. We found more than a few support applications don't play as well with Cineform's encoding methods, like Flash 8 and Ultra key. Sometimes they work okay with Aspects HD files but this has become more rare than regular. We are training a new editor / compositor, and he's struggling to comprehend the messy workflow.

Aside from deleting the preview files, I opened a new project and imported the captured files back in. Wouldn't this do the same thing? It looked like it reindexed and then conformed. If a new project is the same thing as deleting, the loops are the same and the problem still happens and thus this solution does not help. If not, I can try and delete the old project files and see what happens.

[Mike Morrell]

Someone somewhere gave me some advice to try this free program called DGIndex to demux the audio.

I ran this on the captured PP2 files, and Viola! All of the audio is there in the demuxed version. The problem is that it cannot be synced to the video file perfectly. I could sync at each edit point, but this would be tedious and problematic trying to find a sync point for each edit. But at least I know that all of the audio is really there.

So I downloaded Aspect HD trial. I created a new project based on AHD's 720-30p preset and imported the footage captured before. This still gives me looping audio. But I took the audio created from the demux program and I can get it synced up with about the last 30 minutes pretty good, but it is off on the first portion of the timeline.

So what to try next? I guess that I rent the camera and try and capture everything all over again using Cineform Aspect HD and see what happens?

Are there any tips about when you are recording in HDV 30p for what timecode format you need to use, DF, NDF, etc? Could there be bad timecode on the tape? I know that the tapes were not striped before being used. Are there best practices for this sort of thing in HDV?

[K. Forman]

I tried deleating the preview files, and even checked the captured mpeg file, and it was still looping. I ended up recapturing the sequence. Glad it worked out for you though.

[Mike Morrell]

Things have not worked out yet for me. While I could work with what I have for this project, it is way less than ideal. This is why I am going to try to recapture using Aspect HD

[K. Forman]

So far, I've only had that glitch happen once using Premiere. Chances are, I had something else going on at the time of capture.

[Daniel Patton]

Originally Posted by Mike Morrell

Things have not worked out yet for me. While I could work with what I have for this project, it is way less than ideal. This is why I am going to try to recapture using Aspect HD

Ideal...? You mean standing on one foot, chanting and capturing at the same time is not ideal to make a project work? All joking aside, I feel your pain. Welcome to the wonderful world of early adoption and nightmares delivered in the form of first year consumer beta code. No single developer should take this statement too personal as we have found this to be the issue with not just Adobe but Cineform, Serious Magic, Flash, On2, etc., etc., etc.. It's funny how you can quickly find yourself taking totally stupid steps just to get an application to work as it should and as stated. I believe it's called "workflow", although more times than not it's just work with very little flow, at least for the first year or so.

I do find it odd however that you are still having these audio issues even after deleting all of the conformed reference files. Are you sure you have deleted the 3 main support folders that PPro creates when starting a new project?

Question:
- Do you have many breaks in the time code on the tape or is it a continuous recorded tape?
- A lot of start and stops maybe?

Not that these should kill your audio, but again we are talking early adoption stuff so anything goes.

- Also, whats the cost of the camera rental?
- How many tapes are we talking about?
- Whats the time frame for needing to edit and deliver (besides the obvious yesterday).

We have the camera, deck, Cineform and are also located in the South-East. We might be able to help you out. You would need to send a drive with the source tape and cover at least some of our time. It's still cheaper than renting the camera and buying an encoder at short notice.