Sync problem - help?!?
 

Hi,

I've imported a whole bunch of clips from video camera and put together a family documentary which is about 1-and-a-half hours long, with audio from various sources. This is really my first video editing project. I'm using Adobe Premier Pro 1.5.

Inside Premiere, the video looks fine when I play it, perfectly in sync. However, when I export the project to a DVD the sound and vision goes out of sync, with the audio ahead of the vision. It seems to start in sync and gradually go further out of sync so that by 1 hour in, it's noticeably out of sync.

I have tried exporting in a number of ways. I did an export to DVD straight from Premiere, not going through any other programs. I also exported as an MPEG from Premiere and imported that into Adobe Encore, and then built a DVD using that. (The video seemed to be in sync when previewed through Encore, but the same thing happened with the final DVD.)

I'm using 25fps as it's for a PAL output. I read something that made me wonder if I'd stuffed up the sample rate. I was using 48,000 for that and 16-bit. My only guess was that I had some audio I imported from CD using Sound Forge, which I did at 44,100. However, once I imported that into Premiere, I was under the impression that it conformed the audio to the correct sample rate.

Any ideas what the problem would be? Could this be a problem with the DVD burner? (I have burnt other discs without this hitch, although never anything with a single video file that runs for so long.)

The other strange thing I notice with the final product DVD is that if I watch it straight through for an hour, it goes out of sync but if I then fast-forward or rewind at, say, 5x speed for a little while and then play again, it has started back in sync again.

Also, I'll note here that if I do an export to tape, it works fine - no sync problems.

Thanks for any advice you can offer!

Matt

Export to AVI, let Encore transcode
 

Not sure what the problem is but it would be better for you to export to AVI, bring that into Encore and let Encore transcode the AVI. This allows you to get the maximum bitrate available.

If you have chapters in your DVD, you should create them in Premiere. The export will have them and Encore recognizes them. It's easier to set chapters in Premiere than Encore.

Size limits
 

Thanks for the advice.

However, isn't there a file size limit with AVI files? When I was capturing with Premiere, it would only let me capture about 15 minutes of video and then said the file size limit had been exceeded.

Is there some way around this as my project is much larger?

Are you using NTFS or FAT 32? There is a 2 gig limit with fat systems.

Agree with David.
 

Export your work as an avi file. The file size limitation dissappeared when fat32 file structure gave way to NTFS in WinXP. Send this file to your second hard drive, freshly defragged.
Then drop this in to encore.
Be patient waiting for the transcode... It'll work.
The above assumes you are not working with win98 which is fat 32 with the scurge of editing limitations ... the 4gig file size limit!
Hi Keith ... I was keyboarding when your post dropped in ahead of mine ... Agree with Keith!

It pays to be brief ;)

Sounds like FAT32, but it has to be NTFS
 

Premiere Pro requires Windows XP, so the file system has to be NTFS. So it should not be the 2/4 GB file size limit, right?

I don't use XP, but I think it was an option in Win2k to use either. This may be the case with XP, which means Premiere wouldn't care what file system you use.

Matt,
Just to verify...did you actually capture the clips to AVI within PPro? If they were mpeg files that you imported into PPro, that could be the problem; PPro doesn't handle imported mpeg files properly.

File system
 

I have Win XP. I've just checked out my hard drives and found my boot drive (c:) is NTFS but my second drive is Fat 32. Guess it was just set up that way when they installed it. That second drive is where I captured the video (as .avi), so I guess that's why I ran into the file size limit.

I read on the Microsoft site about how I can easily switch the drive to NTFS. I'd try that but the next problem I'll run into is that I don't have enough space on that drive to export such a large .avi file anyway.

I was hoping to avoid buying a new hard-drive, which is why I exported from Premiere as an MPEG, and then imported into Encore.

But it sounds like I might have to try the new hard drive option. I'll just be hoping the same thing doesn't happen when I do it that way.

Thanks for the advice. Keep it coming if you have other ideas...

Matt

Drives are cheap
 

Go with the new drive. Hard drives are very cheap. Besides, things will go faster when you read the raw video from one drive and export to another.

Hi Matt,
I've had a similar sync problem with Premiere, and though I haven't found the definitive "why," I do know that it only occurs when there are both 48kHz and 44.1kHz audio tracks in the timeline. One fix is to convert any mp3/44100Hz tracks to 48kHz before importing them to Premiere. I think CoolEdit can do this. Maybe someone else knows other good conversion programs. I don't know why Premiere can't deal with mixed rates. This may only be an issue with PAL (which is what I'm using too)--I haven't heard of the problem showing up with NTSC projects.

Mixed rates
 

Thanks for that Dan. Now I'm undecided about whether to go for the new hard drive or try to convert the rates.

Is there no way to convert the rates within Premiere? I'm reluctant to have to re-import them as I've already done considerable mixing (though I guess I should have just got the rate right the first time).

(Thanks again for all the advice coming in. I'd tried asking on other DV forums before I found this one ... but you folks are by far the most helpful!)

Premiere Pro converts all audio to 32-bit, 48 Hz upon import, so it's odd that this problem would occur. Obviously a bug of some sort. In any case, if one needs to convert the audio before importing and you don't have an audio editor you can use Audacity, a free audio editor.

http://audacity.sourceforge.net/

Update
 

Okay, here's the latest.

I finally got around to buying a new hard drive and exporting the full movie as an AVI. No dramas there and playback seems fine when I play the AVI with Windows Media Player.

However, now when I burn a DVD using Adobe Encore I get a sync problem right from the very start of the movie!

So I'm completely stumped.

Any more ideas?

Matt