How can I view? Help needed Please
 

I apologize for the lengthy post. I also want to Thank those of you in advance who’ve taken the time to help me on this. Coming from Still Photography, I’m quickly seeing the jump into HDV includes a steep learning curve.

Question: Can I watch my VEGAS PRO 8 EDITED HD footage on my HDTV based on my equipment and situations as listed below? And if so what is the best way to accomplish this? Here’s my gear followed by what I need the help with.

Vegas Pro 8 with DVD Architect 5
A Dell XPS420 PC with Windows Vista Premium 32 bit OS, 4 GB Ram and a 2.66 processor with a Bluray burner/player and in the 2nd optical bay sits a CD/DVD burner/player
A Canon XHA1 Hi Def Camera, I shoot HD in 60i
In the living room I have a Sharp 52” LCD HDTV in full 1080P connected to a brand new Panasonic Bluray player that says it plays just about all the formats including DVD’s and even CD’s.

After scouring the archives and gathering as much input as I can regarding my objective I am more confused than when I started. Here is where I’m at so far….,

I’ve captured and edited my HD 60i footage with Vegas, I have all of that (sorta) down so far but now I wish to make a disc (DVD or Bluray) to watch my finished projects on my HDTV using my Bluray player in as high of quality or as near as possible. Should be pretty cut and dry right? Ever see the Disney flick Fantasia where the numbers dance off the page and around the room while Mickey is perplexed and in a daze? Well I can relate. My head is spongy with so much new terminology.

Based on my gear, what are my best options to accomplish this?

I see all kinds of threads about using Regular DVD’s to burn HD video using the Bluray feature in Vegas but you need a PS3 to playback. I see threads about downgrading from HD to SD, I see where you can watch everything from your PC, I see threads that talk about many other things but none relating to my specific situation as of yet. I read a few lengthy threads with problems close to mine but with different playback methods. I See threads that say you can download all kinds of freeware to accomplish this but I wish to use what I have if possible, that being Vegas Pro 8. Can anybody point me in the right direction? What am I missing here? What do I need to do to render to disc, then view my project on my HDTV via the Bluray player I have hooked up to it.

I have not yet tried rendering to an actual Bluray media disc and have not yet bought any blank Bluray media but will if it is my only option. It seems a waste to burn a few 2 minute trial clips on a BD disc. I have tried the various combinations I have read about to render HD onto DVD’s to play using the bluray render in Vegas but they do not play on anything but my PC so far, quite possibly I did something wrong in the render but surely there must be an easier way to accomplish this with the equipment I have?

I can play my footage from the camera via one of the many HDMI inputs the TV has but it is not my edited footage. It looks incredible but again, it isn’t my edited stuff. What about printing my edited project back to tape? This defeats the purpose of Bluray in my eyes. I could sure use some help.

Long story short, all I want to do is watch my edited footage on my 52” HDTV using the gear I have.

Thanks,

Tim

Western Digital Media player sounds like the ticket for you.

Look it up, buy it!

I haven't bought it yet, but it is popular and seems amazing.

I'm not sure what format you'd render to, but you render to a external HD or some USB thing, hook it to WD media player, hook media player to tv via HDMI, and it will play. The player has a menu like a DVD player, and I may go buy mine today.

It will play m2t files, mpeg, etc. I love the fact I can put together blue ray quality video and not have to burn anything.

Available at B and H, Newegg, and amazon. Reviews at newegg and amazon might be helpful for you.

I'm sure you could find it at Best Buy, etc., also.

How much does it cost and wich model is Jeff?

thx

About $100 and I don't if they have more than one model. You would obviously want the latest one, other than that, you'll need to look around. I'm going to Micro Center for mine. I like to buy locally whenever I can if prices are similar.

If u'r talkng about the model that has HDMI connection and not component it's WDTV and costs about 100 euros here in Spain 2.....
So if u suggest to buy it on tuesday it will bw mine!
:)
have a nice sunday my friend!

The easiest way to watch your edited HD footage is to record it back to the camera. Vegas can do this and you don't need any new hardware.

Rick is correct; using the gear you have, which is what you originally asked about, you could use tape for your edited footage, but what a hassle that would be to me. Fast forwarding would be slow, as would rewinding to rewatch something you missed; plus having to hook up my camera everytime I wanted to watch footage. Not to mention wear and tear on your camera heads.

With a media player you could have many different movies, and they would show up on a menu, and you could pick and choose what to view. Much nicer IMO.

Personally, I stream my edited videos wirelessly using Media Center to a Linksys extender connected to my 46" display. That is, when I'm not burning them to a BD disc for playback on my Sony BD-350. But that's just me. ;)

Thanks Rick, I forgot to mention I also have an HV30 for capture and playback so I guess I will start reading up on capture to tape.

Care to elaborate on this a little more? It sounds as if this may be my other option other than printing back to tape.

Options for HD Playback
 

Just to support Rick and Jeff's suggestions, I use both methods below:

Western Digital WDTV is a fantastic little box as others have mentioned. Coupled with an inexpensive 2.5" portable drive such as the WD Passport series it makes a great play back device with HDMI out. I simply write an out an HDV file from Vegas using the HDV 1080i template and copy the resulting file to the small drive and attach it to the WDTV and playback on my TV.

I also have a Network Attached storage device and I can copy the same output file to that device and then stream it across a 100Mb Ethernet network to a Sony Playstation 3 which produces a beautiful HD picture on my TV.

I don't yet have a Bluray burner, but unless I want to give someone a copy, the two methods above are by far the least hassle possible for watching HD content output from Vegas (assuming you have the equipment).

I have to say the WD device is superb and given it's portability you can take it and a small drive without you so display on some one else's TV (assuming they have an HDMI input).

Okay Peter, you have my attention. I looked into this WDTV thing and it looks pretty doable for my situation.

Thanks you guys for that bit of info.

Q- What exact render set up would I use for this?

Q- Can any external Hard Drive work with this?

You can render to most any format that will play on your PC and it will play on the unit.

MP4, avi, mpeg, wmv. Go find it and read the specs and you can see the list of what it will play.

Any usb should work.

Very simple device.

Wdtv
 

As Jeff has said, you can use quite a few different formats that the WDTV will play.

Check out the manual on the Western Digital website for the detailed listing.

I personally use the HDV 1080 60i render preset in Vegas and it creates M2T files that play perfectly on the WDTV.

I use a small Western Digital 2.5" external drive. Although it is a 5400RPM drive, the videos play without any glitches. The nice part about those drives is that power comes from the USB port, so you only need to use the WDTV power supply making one less thing to carry.

Could someone who has the Western Digital box let me know if you can set it to repeat a movie, like for continual playback?

Thanks!

Yes, the WD TV can repeat videos. While playing videos you can bring up the option menu and set the video to repeat forever until you hit the stop button on the remote.

Check out the user manual on Western Digital's web site. You'll get a a good idea of all the functions this little box can do.

Thanks Peter-

Jeff Harper....A little help Please?
 

I am having a little trouble finding the render preset exactly as what you refer to below in my version of Vegas which is 8.0 Please keep in mind this is all new to me but I bought the WDTV today and am trying to render as you suggested. If possible, could you walk me through this based on me being pretty much lost here at this point?

Another question is that the format supported list as I noted below mentions nothing about what I shot the footage in which is 60i, will this make a difference? will I still get a full screen playback in HD on my TV via the WDTV? I see that in 60 I it says 1280x720, my footage is full 1440x 1080, my apologies for my newness here but I just wanted to ask you for the advice and help.

Thanks, I apppreciate the help if you can manage.
Tim

Supported Format Specs are: MPEG2/4, H.264, and WMV9 supports up to 1920x1080p 24fps, 1920x1080i 30fps, 1280x720p 60fps resolution

[QUOTE=Peter Greis;1038006]As Jeff has said, you can use quite a few different formats that the WDTV will play.

I personally use the HDV 1080 60i render preset in Vegas and it creates M2T files that play perfectly on the WDTV.
QUOTE]

Just choose any supported format and render!

I personally would start with WMV template 8mbps HD 1080 30p and see how it works. Just do a short clip for a test. If that plays back well, then do your full project.

That should be a fine place to start, you know it will work with WMV files, and the 8mbps should be a great quality.

I have read that MP4 is great, but I haven't yet tried it. Sorry I couldn't be more specific, but I feel confident the wmv format will at least get you up and viewing HD with your new device!

What kind ofHard disk(specifics i mean) do you suggets to use with the WDHDTV?
thx

I'm not sure what is recommended, go to the western digital site and see what they say. USB is the main thing.

Thanks Jeff, I had assumed you already did some testing and new of the optimal settings to render. I will experiment and see what happens here on my end. I will post my findings.

Marcus, As for a Hard Disc, any USB will work. I have chosen a WD My Book 500GB as it holds quite a bit. I have this dedicated to HD Video alone for use only with the WDTV.

I bought one a couple of days ago and am using a spare 500GB laptop drive in an Icybox enclosure I bought. I have to say it works really well, the best thing is I can now render back out to interlaced 50i mts footage and it looks great on a progressive display. Saves converting everything to progressive. I didn't have hdmi on my tv but hdmi to dvi-d seems to work well using the optical out for audio.

Just 2 let u know that i bought mine 5 minutes ago!
It's your fault!
LOL

I Just got to watch mine. It is awesome! So simple and looks great on the big screen to finally watch my footage with edits.

Can anybody recommend what is best format for less loss and higher quality to render to for viewing on the WDTV Player? ? My choices are

MPEG 1
• MPEG 2
• MPEG 4 (ASP, AVC HD/H.264)
• WMV9
• AVI

So far my test footage was rendered in WMV9 which looked great but was wondering if it gets better with one of the above formats.

I would have thought it depends on what you film in. Whichever one involves the least compression probably, I've been using mts.

WMV9 is one of the better choices here. Great performance for the bitrate, great look, flexible for playback, easy encode in Vegas with good templates...

MPEG4 would be the other one worth testing, it has the potential to give even better results but may be a little more work to find what works best.

I'm suggesting "good" means picture quality for the bitrate. In order, best performance first:
1) MPEG4/AVC/h.264
2) WMV9
3) MPEG2
7) MPEG1
And AVI is a bit of a wildcard.

And, as Jon points out, with a few more bits MPEG2/MTS can look just fine as well.

AVI is a bit of a mystery in this context, as it can be a container for any number of codecs, but the box probably doesn't decode them all?

For blueray in vegas. Go to tools, burn disc, blueray. Vegas will burn your rendered video on a standard dvd with a standard dvd burner. No menus. Video just starts in the blueray player.

WD media player works or record back to the camcorder. For WD media player, I render to match the raw footage. If it's HDV, then I render mpeg2 HDV. A plus to doing this is the same rendered file can be used to record back to tape on your camcorder and the render process will be quicker since it has less conversion to do. Less conversion the better.

Just an FYI, you're limited to about 20 minutes of video per disc using this method.

Just done my first test on a FULL HD Samsung,here is my first impression:

I 've rendered a clip in Mpg2 hdv1080 50 i template:logos a little bit with shaky borders, but an overall image good (not excellent).

Then i rendered in WM9:logos were perfect but the pan camera moves are shaky.

Suggestions?Maybe i'm messing up with the settings.
Thank u guys!

Yes, but still a great option for those without a blueray burner.

No doubt, just wanted to note the limitation.

Thank You Seth for a direct answer, I appreciate that!

Marcus, I used the WM9 default template with excellent playback in logos and all other aspects incuding edits and all. I will experiment a little with Seth's suggestions and see what happens.

All in all this little unit kicks a$$, it even decodes Ipod tunes so you can blast your music through your home theater nicely while simultaneously watching something else and does a great job with my photos even though I did not get it for any reason other than my HD Video.

So guys how's going with your wdhdtv?
Any trick to teach?

I can't find how to set the loop option...
thx

The loop option is in the settings, it is the world wide recognized icon of the loop.

Not many tips I can share as this thing is incredibly easy. It is amazing that such a low price investment has solved so many of my HDV viewing woes.

I applaud WD for this product. In a time with more technology than knowledge to use it, the WDTV solves problems with such simplicity.