Question for Adobe users
 

I have this friend who er........has an embarrasing problem. He would like to buy an XH-A1. What he is worried about is, from what he is hearing, working with HD in premiere then rendering to SD for final delivery is no easy task.

I'm a Vegas user and find it ridiculously easy: Shoot in HD, Capture in HD, Edit in HD render to SD which is burned to DVD.

Did he hear wrong with regards Premiere?

His current way of doing it is to donwvert to SD in the camera, then edit and render as normal which won't give as good a result as staying in HD for as long as possible.

Hopefully a few of you have trodden that path already and have an answer.

What is his primary concern? Easy of use? Quality? Speed?

Anyway, this thread might have some info:
http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/showthread.php?t=70792

Hey...thats a great read, especially for me being a Vegas Evangelist!

I've tried to show him the way, but he's comfortable with Premiere (actually he's more than comfortable...talented git more like!)

The No1 concern is getting the absolute minimum loss of quality from the source HD to final SD DVD.

Heres some videos on working with HDV in PP2 (capturing, Exporting,SD projects and making DVD)..see if they help your...er..friend.

http://www.esnips.com/web/Premiere-Pro-2-Video-Tutes

Work flow is a pain HDV to SD with PP2. I tried the Beta PP3 and am very optimistic. Unfortunately, I had to uninstall PP3 and reinstall PP2 because the beta limitations affected PP2.

Workflow with PP2:
XH-A1 -> HDVsplit (Laptop) -> mpegstreamclip (Desktop) -> PP2 -> Debugmode (frameserve) -> Tmpgenc -> Encore (IMG file) -> Primera Duplicator -> SD DVD

HDVsplit does a nice capture without having to install a full PP2
streamclip fixes occasional timecode problems PP2 can't deal with
debug framserves to save space
tmpgenc resizes better than PP2 and creates the 2 streams Encore likes

When I get PP3 I'll start using Cineform (already purchased). PP2 hates Cineform but the Beta PP3 worked fine. (Relief!!)

PP3 comes with OnLocation (DV Rack) for capture (Nice)
PP3 comes with Encore 3 which can output BluRay. (Cool)
Maybe as player prices drop we won't have to be bothered with dropping to SD anymore. Hey, - want to buy some great Sony VHS duplicators?

My workflow in PP2 is somewhat different.

1. Capture XH-A1 footage directly into PP2.
2. Drop the footage on HD timeline.
3. Edit.
4. Render final product in HDV MPEG2 25Mbs.
5. Drop final product on SD timeline.
6. Scale to 45% to fit SD 16:9 and apply "sharpen" filter (30).
7. Render SD timeline to MPEG2-DVD for SD DVD delivery.
8. Encore DVD for SD DVD authoring.
9. Render final HDV MPEG2 25Mbs clip to AVC 12Mbs for HD delivery.

I end up with two products: SD and HD.
In step 9, I use Nero Recode to render final HDV to AVC. This saves 1/2 the space while maintaining the same quality.

Wow......I feel for you guys using Premiere. Thats sounds like they have you all jumping through hoops to get anywhere. Genuinely, Vegas is a complete and utter pussycat with HDV. Sorry if this is rubbing salt in your wounds.......it just is.

That said....you can all return the favour and gloat when you are all burning your Blu-Ray discs with CS3:-( No sign of DVDA doing anything so far.....I live in hope!

Alastair,

As far as the workflow I outlined above (I call them '9 Steps to HDV Success'), what problems do you see there that are specific to Premier? In which ways Vegas is doing a better job in offering a simplier workflow?

Hey Maksim, do you use cineform at all?
I am just starting to test my PP2 system with my A1 and HDV seems a little sluggish on my system. Its not impossible just seems less robust than DV. Any tips on performance? I am on a dual 2 ghz xeon machine w/1.5 G ram.
I was thinking about getting CINEFORM but I would like to just use PP2.

Hi Jack:

Actually, I am not using cineform. You would not believe me if I told you that my main workstation for now is a 3 years old Toshiba laptop with 17" LCD, 3GHz Pentium IV and 1GB of RAM. I am specing out the next powerhouse system as we speak, but for now that's what I am using. The editing is not as fluid as DV, which is expected, but I don't feel the need for cineform.

With Premier Pro CS3, especially if one was to go encoding AVC and authoring Blu-Ray, I heard that quad-core CPU is a very nice to have. AVC encoding is a killer, but the results are nothing short of awesome!

As far as performance, dual-core or quad-core (or two separate dual-cores), 2-4G of ram, fast disks (or disk arrays), do not use your system drive for capture or editing, and use separate capture drive and separate drive for the final output. Format your hard-drives that you use for video (especially the one you use for capture) with the largest possible cluster size (64K). I can go on...

Maksim, thanks for you answers. You mentioned CS3, is CS3/PP3 supposed to have a performance boost of any kind that you know of?

PP2 doesn't use memory or resources very well, especially multi-core. PP3 is much better.

You don't need Cineform for simple editing, but if you're going to color correct or do anything fancy, you'll want it.

It's hard to say whether Cineform results in an actual loss in quality. The frames look slightly fuzzier but without the obvious artifacts in raw m2t. Kind of a trade-off. Sort of like an NR filter.

Jack,

Only from utilizing processing power more efficiently. PPCS3 has higher system requirements as well.
I do second Brad's input on the fact that CS3 will most likely make better use of multi-core systems.

PP2 System
 

Man I keep seeing all these problems with PP2 and wonder what is different with my system. I'm working on a Indi full length movie and have logged at least 18 hours of footage so far with no problems at all. I have a AMD 4800 dual processor, Dual Nvita video cards (1.5 megs video ram) 4 Gigs ram, and 4 SATA drives, the capture and render drives are RAID 0. We shoot nearly everything is HD 60i and the down convert after render. I have shot 2 shorts in 24f as Canon calls it and it also edits great. I did download the capture preset for Canon 24f and 30f, but we use the HDV 60i for the 60i stuff. The reason we use PP2 and After Effects is that I am lucky enough to have 2 CGI nuts on staff and they do some mind bending stuff. Also there is another thread on here about PP2 that seems to refer to many of the same problems so, I may just be lucky. I just want to say when PP2 works it is an amazing program.

Wynn Bradford

CS3 is coming
 

Reply from Adobe received today

Dan, I have searched for your order and have found that your order is for
Creative Suite 3 Production and the expected delivery date is around July 14, 2007

I posted this in a thread last year, has anyone tried this:

Edit in HDV time line.

Render to DV, doing a deinterlace.

Take the DV out to your DVD creation software, transcoding there.


In my experience, this is what I got best result with Premiere. I don't know why, but a direct transcode from HDV mpg to SD mpg does not work so well....

Personally, I've found that if you use PP2 with an HDV timeline, and then render (using Adobe Media Encoder) to DV, you get a significant loss in quality. It actually looks kind of blurry. I've tested some renders side by side and you can really see a difference. I get a much better picture by doing one of the following:

I've taken my finished HDV footage/timeline and rendered a full-resolution uncompressed HDV movie (VERY large file). Then I import the file into After Effects, render using best settings and stretch the file in the renderer to 720x480 AVI. You can then import this file into Encore or use Media Encoder to convert it to MPG. You could convert directly in AE to MPG, but for some reason, you can only do 1-pass VBR from AE.

What I usually do now, is create a widescreen DV project (either 60i or 24p) and import my HDV footage into this. I place it on the timeline and shrink it to 45%. Edit away and then use Media Encoder to render MPG or AVI. Pop it into Encore and you're done.

I don't know why this is so much clearer, but it is. Maybe something about PP2 and AE doing sub-pixel resolution and Media Encoder doesn't? If someone else knows, I would love to hear an explanation. But trying both ways side by side shows a big difference. Try it and see what you think. Take a small HDV file, put it in an HDV timeline, then use AME to render to DV. Then take the same HDV file, put it into an SD timeline and render. Render #2 will look much sharper.

On step 5 do you open a regular DV timeline? and do you keep the lower fields first? or how do you handle the fields?

Thanks

Steve

Just my 2 cents...
 

Being a "new" Adobe Premiere Elements user, I found this thread to be interesting so I thought I would add my 2 cents worth to it....

Up until the time I bought the A1 (which was about 2 months ago) I have been working with SD analog video and using software like Ulead's Videostudio and Arcsoft's Showbiz DVD and have been happy with the results they gave me. However, since getting the A1, I quickly learned that these applications aren't capable in maintaining the quality of video that the A1 produces and that I need to find a new solution for my workflow. Thanks to this forum, I discovered new applications to try out and at the moment have found a suitable workflow. Keep in mind though, my objectives are probably different than many on here so it might not be suitable for you.

My objective is simple: Keeping it as simple as possible. I want to devote my time to being creative and not spend hours trying to figure out how to do a simple editing task. The interface is very important to me. I have spent a lot of money this year on video/photography equipment so my objective includes doing this as cheap as possible. And finally, because I'm stuck using the Vista OS, this workflow has to be compatible with Vista. So with that in mind...

My first challenge was to successfully capture the HD video off the camera so I could edit it. The applications that I had did not do this. I read about HDVSplit on here and got it. It works perfectly. I can't thank the people who are responsible for this great piece of software enough. When I capture I always have the scene detection enabled and it saves the captures in individual files. That way I can just import the scenes that I want to use into the editing software.

My next challenge was to find editing software that is not only easy to use, but has the rendering capabilities to maintain the HD video, as well as giving me a variety of transitions and filters that would meet my needs. I have been a diehard Ulead user for many years so Videostudio was my first choice. I'm sorry to say Videostudio did not make the grade. Version 11 is full of rendering and capturing flaws.. and now that Corel has taken over Ulead's product line, I fear the quality of their software will diminish the same way Paintshop Pro did when Corel took over that.

I read a lot about Sony Vegas on here.. it seems to be very popular among the population so I gave that a try. There is no Vista version yet so I tried it out on my Windows XP "workhorse." I am sorry to say this but as far as editing goes, Vegas is horrible. Unless I'm missing something here, the interface is not user-friendly at all. Just trying to do simple tasks... like setting a transisition or placing a 5 sec black image to fade out on was a major task. Maybe that’s because you only work in a timeline, there is no sceneline to break it down and make things easier when working with many scenes. I read a lot about the advantages of Vegas, like how you can keep/edit a 24fps timeline, but this can be done in Videostudio and Premiere Elements, too. The only good thing I can say about the Vegas Suite is their DVD Architect 4 software.. it is the only DVD authoring software that I found that produces the best video quality when it comes time to burn the final product. Unfortunately you have to buy it in a package, they do not sell it separately.

I ended up using Adobe Premiere Elements 3.0 for editing and rendering. The interface is simple and it has everything I need as far as transitions and filters goes. One of the nice features Elements has, it puts a checkmark on the scenes you use in the timeline. That alone is a big plus for me as I can look in the media window and see what scenes I am using. When I'm done editing I render it to an mpeg stream and there is no loss of video quality at all.

From there I will either burn the video on DVD using DVD Architect or use Windows Media Encoder to render the video to a HD WMV file. The DVD plays nicely on a SD television with very little loss in video quality.

I have yet to try outputting the final video to a HD DVD because like a lot of people, I do not own a HD DVD player. They are very expensive right now and it will probably be another a year or more before they become more affordable. It’s for that reason I am not offering this service to my clients, so I need to produce the SD video the best way I know how. So for now my workflow is as follows:

1 - Capture HD video using HDVSplit (scene detection enabled.)
2 - Edit HD video (24 or 30fps) using Premiere Elements 3.0.
3 - Render edited video to m2t mpeg stream using Premiere Elements 3.0.
4 - Output m2t mpeg stream to DVD using Sony’s DVD Architect 4 software, (well at least for the next 24 days, that’s when the trial version expires.)
5 - Output m2t mpeg stream to a HD windows media file to play on computer using Windows Media Encoder.

Because Sony doesn’t sell the DVD Architect software separately, I may have to purchase the Vegas Suite if I can’t find another solution. If I have to though, I will wait until they release the Vista version, and hopefully when they do the new version will be more user friendly.

Well I hope this post will be helpful to some, just wanted to share some of my experiences with you.

Cya,

John

I agree, I do not trust PP2 with a re-size or scaling of the footage. In my experience AE does a better job with scaling down footage (more complex math). As far as the Uleads and othe DVD progs, they feel kind of rough and tumble when it comes to compression quality.

My experience with PP2 with the Matrox RTX2 card has been very good. My workflow is:

1. capture in Matrox HDV.
2. Edit in HDV timeline
3. export using Matrox/Adobe export for 720x480 SD or 1080 HD mpgs
4. For SD mpg import into Encore and make DVD
// for Blu-ray import HD mpgs make BD Disk

Blu-ray disks are incredibly awesome in 1080 on a 1080 screen - clients say it is like being there.

Playing the DVDs made using the NTSC 720x480 widescreen mpgs from PP2 on my 46inch SAMSUNG 4665F LCD HD monitor have been excellent - obviously not 1080 HD footage, but superior to any SD from miniDV camcorder I have put out in the past. As good as SD coming from a cable provider.

I used to export a single avi in my older Matrox system as that would go in real time, then use cinecraft encoder as it produced good results and was quicker than PP2.

Bill in Ohio

Bill,
I've been hoping a Matrox user would post. I'm a current RTX100/PP1.5 user. I have a love/hate relatioinship with this combo and was wondering if you find RTX2 stable.

Also, if you don't mind could you outline your computer spec? I'm leaning towards the Dell XPS710/XPPro with Core 2 Extreme and 768MB NVidia GeForce video.
Bob

The best way to see which combo of moboard and other cards is to go to their site and see the approved list. Otherwise they will not honor support or warranty.

I have
Titan 550 server case
Intel D975BX mobo
Intel core 2 duo E6600 2.4 GHz
2 GB DDR2 667 RAM
WD 320 GB HDD
Three WD 320 HDD as RAID 0
Audigy 4 OEM sound card
GEFORCE 7950GT 512 MB PC-e video card
Pioneer Blu-ray
Win-XP Pro
lots of fans.

If you want to go dual duo core that would be even faster.

For HD, most is in RT, in SD almost anything you can dream of doing in multiple layers of video and graphics is RT. Rendering to final mpgs depends on what you start with. I shoot 1080 and go from there, so renders take a while. The experiments I did in SD just zipped along ultra fast.

I do miss some of the effects (especially particle effects), however in general almost all of my transitions are crossfades. I just love the softer transition that gives over a straight cut in the wedding videos we do.

I would strongly strongly recommend you go to the matrox site. www.matrox.com and review the recommendations they have for both systems that are preconfigured and moboards that allow for custom built.

I have done numerous projects and the only time it seems to have problems is when I do hundreds of jpgs or stills in 2 hour long video and stills mix where I resize and do scales and moves with most of the stills. It does a timeline update and then crashes if you aren't patient. Otherwise it is very stable and I am enjoying the editing.

Bill