Editing short AVCHD video, are these settings OK?
 

Hi,

Purpose is to edit AVCHD files in Vegas Pro 8, footage is from Canon HFS100. Output will be HD content on a SD DVD disc, length about 10 minutes, hopefully playable on a standalone BD player. I have some questions:

[1] Is the Field order setting OK?
[2] Pixel aspect ratio?
[3] Full-resolution rendering quality?
[4] Deinterlacing method, which of the 3 options to select?

My PC specs:
XP MCE SP3
Quad CPU 6600 2.4 GHz
3.25 GB RAM

Thanks,
Please see attached screenshot.

Norris,

If your intention is to create an AVCHD DVD (not an SD DVD since a true SD DVD will handle only standard-definition content), then yes, the field order should be Upper Field First (all 1080i high-definition content is UFF), the pixel aspect ratio should be 1.0000 (Square Pixels) and the deinterlace method should be None. When it comes time to do the render, choose the AVCHD 1920x1080/60i 15 Mbps or the AVCHD 1920x1080/60i 10 Mbps template in the Sony AVC encoder and don't make any changes to the template settings (AVCHD DVD is limited to a maximum overall bitrate of 18 Mbps). (Or, if your source video is only 1440x1080, then the pixel aspect ratio should be 1.3333, and the choice of rendering templates should be one of the 1440x1080/60i templates.) The encoder in Vegas will recompress the video if the original source bitrate is too high.

On the other hand, if your original AVCHD video is actually shot in a "24p" mode (on that model it means 24p encoded in a 60i stream), then the footage must be IVTC'd in a program specifically designed for that purpose (two of the most commonly recommended freeware software programs are AVISynth with the Decomb plugin and VirtualDub) before it can be imported into Vegas as a 24p video. Otherwise, Vegas will detect it as a 60i video. (Vegas alone supports pulldown removal only on standard-definition DV-AVI files.)

Randall,

There are only 2 choices with regards to bitrate, 16 and 10. Initially, I tried rendering at 16 mpbs, Vegas froze. Then I dropped down to 10 mpbs, didn't see any progress at all after 15 minutes. Now I'm rendering out to standard DVD quality, just so I can have a playable DVD. Do you have any clue as to what the problem is?

Thanks,

Norris,

Not all computer systems have sufficient horsepower to edit AVCHD or re-render to HD AVC.

Also, your AVCHD recordings may have been encoded at too high of a bitrate for Vegas' AVC encoder to handle. In this case you might have to purchase something from Cineform to convert your AVCHDs to a codec which can be more easily handled on your computer system. Search the Vegas forum for "Cineform".

Original footage recorded at 24 mbps. The camcorder allows other bitrate options of 17, 12, 7, 5. I'll try recordingaat 17 and see if Vegas Pro can handle it. If I see that the video quality is not good enough, I'll stay at 24 and explore the Cineform option.

Thank you,

Update: I was able to burn the HD footage to a BD disc as well as a SD DVD. Both discs play on the computer, but only the BD plays on the standalone BD player. The SD DVD is recognized as "incompatible" by the standalone BD player. Previously, Vegas froze because I selected Sony AVC, but this time I selected MPEG-2. Both times the templates were 1920 x 1080 60i.

MPEG-2 HD content burnt onto standard DVD is actually not compliant with the BD9 standard, which requires video to be (re-)encoded to AVC format. There is no official standard for BD5. BD9 requires the use of dual- or double-layer DVD media (DVD-R DL or DVD+R DL). And the video intended for authoring to BD9 must be re-compressed to a bitrate of below 18 Mbps and the video encoding changed from MPEG-2 to AVC in DVD Architect Pro before it can be written to DVD. And make sure that you set DVD Architect Pro to force re-compression of the video after you change the bitrate and render settings when authoring HD content onto standard DVD.

Wow, that's quite a mouthful of info for me to chew on. Let me digest all that.

Thanks Randall,

You mean to say that MPEG2 and VC-1 aren't BD standards?

Actually, both MPEG-2 and VC-1 are Blu-Ray compliant; however, MPEG-2 HD is officially supported only in the 25GB and 50GB varieties of Blu-Ray. What I was talking about was BD9 and BD5, the two Blu-Ray compatible disc formats which use normal red-laser DVD instead of actual Blu-Ray blanks. And yes, MPEG-2 encoded HD video can be authored onto BD9 or BD5 -- but then, the maximum practical video bitrate for MPEG-2 HD on BD9 or BD5 would have been low enough to result in noticeably degraded image quality (in fact, significantly worse than either AVC or VC-1 at the same bitrate with most material), and encoding MPEG-2 HD at even a slightly higher bitrate than that would have resulted in a BD9 or BD5 that's very prone to skipping or stuttering on even the most forgiving BD player (yes, BD9/BD5 has a maximum supported bitrate of 18 Mbps for AVC or VC-1 encoded material but a maximum practical overall bitrate of only about 10 to 12 Mbps for high-definition MPEG-2 encoded material).

By the way, I did not include VC-1 because neither Vegas nor DVD Architect includes such an encoder -- nor does DVD Architect currently support the authoring of VC-1 Blu-Ray discs. (I checked my most recent version of Vegas, the Pro 9.0c, for that.) Or if Vegas does, it might not have been included in the download edition of the program - only in the CD/DVD distribution version of the program. And yes, VC-1 would have been compliant with BD9 (and by extension, BD5) if only the NLE comes with such an encoder and the authoring software program supports such VC-1 encoded videos.

It's a dodgy business, for sure. A look around the net will give you conflicting information and the general feeling that no-one intends to support format in a stong way. Almost an afterthought.

Now I understand it a little better. I did burn the MPEG-2 HD content on a 25 GB rewritable BD, and as you stated, it played. I'd appreciate it if you could comment/confirm on my questions below:

[1] So there are 4 varieties of blank Blu Ray discs? 25 GB, 50 GB, BD5, and BD9?
[2] The BD5 and BD9 discs are playable (depending on the contents of course) in either a standard DVD (red laser) or Blu Ray player (blue laser)?
[3] If MPEG-2 HD content was put on a BD5 or BD9 disc, the bitrate would need to be dropped to a very low level, so the content would not be really HD anymore, correct?

Thanks,

No, BD5 and BD9 is Blu-ray file system burned to a DVD.

Remember, there are two issues when talking about DVD and BD. One is the physical disc. The other is the logical file system present on (or burned to) that disc.

So, BD5 is not physically a BD (Blu-ray Disc). It is physically a DVD but with the same type of file system Blu-ray discs use. It could, in theory, be played by a DVD player but only if the player understands the logical file system used by Blu-ray. Most of them do not.

On the other hand, it should play in a computer with a DVD drive as long as you have the right software for it. And it should play in a Blu-ray player because most (or is it all?) of them can read DVD (red laser) and they do understand the Blu-ray file system.

The main reason to burn a Blu-ray file system to a physical DVD is to save money because the DVD blanks are much cheaper than the BD blanks.

That may be true on a per-disc basis. But in the past several months the prices on BD blanks have been dropping quite a bit faster than the prices on DVD blanks. As a result, dual/double-layer DVD ("BD9") is now the most expensive (by a small margin over both BD-R and BD-R DL) of all of the physical optical disc formats which can handle HD video on a per gigabyte (GB) basis. Single-layer DVD ("BD5") remains the least expensive, not only per disc but also per GB; however, it cannot hold much HD content unless you're willing to accept noticeably inferior image quality.

In that case it may be best to use full-fledged BD. The only reason to stay with BD9 would be if the client does not have a Blu-ray player and wants to watch the video on computer with a DVD player and the right software.

Another reason may be if you need to replicate a large number of discs and do not want to deal with the Blu-ray licensing fees.