JVC GR-PD1 for thePAL world

Digital Full Progressive Video Camera

• 1/3-inch 1.18 Megapixel Progressive Scan CCD with Hybrid Complementary-Primary Digital Filter

• Hi-Def F1.8-F1.9 Optically Stabilised Zoom Lens

• MPEG-2 Recording on MiniDV Cassette

• Multi-Format Recording and Playback:

* DV PAL Interlace: 4:3 625/50i

* MPEG-2 PAL Progressive: 16:9 625/50p

* MPEG-2 PAL Progressive: 16:9 625/25p

* MPEG-2 PAL Progressive: 4:3 625/50p

jepp.
 

yes, I have heard of this, but there is no HD on that one.. thanks anyways..

Re: not even ??
 

<<<-- Originally posted by John Eriksson : not even PAL signal from the S-VHS and the composite port? -->>>

Not even. :(

David,

If I created a 5.1 soundtrack, is there a way to export that as Dolby Digital with the Mpeg2 stream so I would have a DVHS with DD5.1 sound?

Thanks,

Jay

<<<-- Originally posted by Jay Nemeth : David,

If I created a 5.1 soundtrack, is there a way to export that as Dolby Digital with the Mpeg2 stream so I would have a DVHS with DD5.1 sound?-->>>

Good question. I know Premiere Pro adds 5.1 support and it comes with a Dolby Digital trial encoder (you can use it three time before you have to buy a license.) I haven't determined yet how that can be added to transport streams. I'll put that on my list of things to learn.

HD to DV PROBLEM
 

First I converted the HD to DV and then when I was going to export it to tape via firewire.. BUT it become anamorphic (vertical strech) And I dont want that!!

I want "the black borders" How can I get that without going in to Afer Effects, And does Aspect HD support that directly?

John,

Firstly anamorphic export to DV from 16:9 HD is normally the desired operation. The black border letterboxing is a feature of analog exporting from your DV deck to a 4:3 display. Basically the black borders are not rendered into you output as downstream DV devices can normally handle 16:9 to 4:3 conversions. When you are exporting to VHS, or formats that generally are not anamorphic, you could dumb from your DV deck (in the 16:9 to 4:3 mode), or play the analog signal straight off the timeline using a Maxtox P750 or Parhelia card. This is the way recommended for Aspect HD also.

Yes, but I dont want to do any special trix..
 

Yes, but how do I make a direct "black borders" -copy out on to DV tape without using After Effects or any special trix in premiere,

I just want it to give the correct black borders on scrub directly?
Is this somehow possible? (with or wihout aspect HD)?? I don´t like the anamorpic idea, cause I have a 4:3 telly! What settings or changes will I have to do in premiere or on the camcorder to get this to work?
/John

It might be a setting on your DV camera (not all have this.) However you can do it under Premiere:

1) Right click on a clip on your timeline.
2) Select "Video Option" -> "Maintain Aspect Ratio"
3) Repeat 1-2 for all clips.
4) Then export the timeline as DV.


If you have a lot of clips, export the whole time line in some interim format (CFHD -- for Aspect HD, or HUFFYUV or uncompressed if not Aspect HD.) Re-import the new one clip, set the fixed aspect ratio, then export to DV.

thanks!
 

thanks!

Aspect HD review
 

Back on the original thread.

Charlie White for Digital Media Net resently completed an online review of Aspect HD.

http://www.digitalvideoediting.com/c...thd_review.htm

It is a nice review of Aspect HD although he is a little hard on the camera itself (maybe unfairly.) Tell me what you think.

David,

I agree with you on both counts.

I’m already sold on Aspect HD. I’m only waiting for my “need” to catch up with my finances before I place an order.

As for Charlie White’s references to the HD1/HD10. I view those comments as the proverbial ……”Is the glass half empty or half full”. Any comments that compare a $2400 consumer camera to a $75,000 + professional camera are …… (IMO) Duh! The fact is that I find it something of a compliment to even begin to compare such cameras. I think it was Paul Mogg who did a somewhat controlled comparison between such camera’s for the purpose of seeing just where the HD1/HD10 did fall into the mix. This I felt had merit and was objective. I think Pauls opinion as is mine is that the HD1/HD10 constitute a lot of bang for the buck.

Cheers!

In the review he states "For example, in some of the test shots I saw, the camera pans across some trees, and the shaky/shimmering moiré effect made the shots almost painful to watch. So if you're looking to show off with a camcorder like this, stay away from high contrast scenes and lots of moving detail"

Is this fair assesment? Could someone experienced with this camera explain what they would do to avoid this problem?
Ken

ANy camera - I mean ANY CAMERA is capable of what Charlie described and others a chuddering.

It occurs when you use too slow a shutter speed for the scene you are shooting.

Most people recommend locking the shutter speed on this camera when shooting an action scene.

We will be dealing with this in the JumpStart Guide to HDV aquisition and production. How to avoid it, when to use a slow shutter speed, etc.

I also did a controlled comparison of a Cinealta vs HD1 vs HD10U and you can read a complete review of it by looking through the threads. Safe to say, the bottom line was that the Cinealta is a better camer, but for the bucks, the HD1/HD10U does a great job.

Cheers

Darren,

Sorry! It may have been your review I was thinking of. I did indeed think it was very objective. The bottom line is the "bang for the buck". I have seen more professional use of the HD10 as a suppliment to the high end Cinealta etc. But it certinally shouldn't be thought of as replacement.

When you can't afford a CineAlta it is a replacement ;>)
Ken

It sounds like he didn't shoot the HD video so who knows how it was shot. Frankly, I think if he didn't shoot it -- and if he didn't know HOW to shoot it -- he should not have commented on the HD10's quality. That's just bad reviewing.



Sounds like the laptop didn't have letterboxed NTSC output. It's not HD, but it helps.

David might want to comment how much resolution is available "inside" Premiere. The displayed Premiere window is typically about 384x216. Is Wavelet decompressed to this size? Is it decompressed to 1280x720 and then scaled to the RGB window?

What rez is the "overlay" that feeds the Matrox board?

The point is that if Wavelet is decompressed to 1280x720 and is available within Premiere, some PCI card might be able to grab the image and output as YPbPr in HD.

Charlie didn't shoot it I know for a fact. JVC did not have a loaner available, so he got a tape that someone else shot and provided on a DVHS machine.

I guess he thought that was OK to comment.

Steve,

Aspect HD certainly has clever solutions to get to its performance level. Some of which does reduce the data rate load on the system (although not as low as your window size would suggest -- plus I run my display much bigger than that.) For competitive reasons we don't discuss the details on how CineForm achieves what it does.

Full resolution HD over PCI is impractical (the standard PCI bus in PCs is too slow.) However the AGP bus is plently fast enough for 720p30 (it is a little loaded with 1080i30 or 720p60.) However, I haven't seen an AGP video card that has YPrPb outputs and supporting overlay trick Maxtrox supports (but I haven't looked much.) The Maxtrox output via DVI does produce a nice HD picture -- so if your HD monitor uses DVI that should work fine.

<<<-- I haven't seen an AGP video card that has YPrPb outputs and supporting overlay trick Maxtrox supports (but I haven't looked much.) The Maxtrox output via DVI does produce a nice HD picture -- so if your HD monitor uses DVI that should work fine. -->>>

I think you meant to say "nice SD" picture.

The PCI HD cards for the Mac output analog and HD-SDI from an uncompressed HD 1080i60/720p60 FCP Timeline. So it's possible. Of course, they may need fast PCI which may or may not be be present on PCs.

How big can a Premiere window be?

Most PCs only have 32bit 33MHz PCI. Of course faster PCI is available on PCs, I just don't have one of those on my desktop. :(

Note: I did mean "HD" not "SD". True, the real-time preview is not full HD (although is not SD), yet you can playback full resolution HD CFHD files out to an HD monitor, through any playback tool like MediaPlayer.

It is possible that future versions of Aspect HD will support HD-SDI cards for direct HD playback and export from the timeline (we just don't have that today.)

The Premiere window can be a big as you like. I run mine to fit half (horizontally) my desktop. Around 800x450 on a 1600x1200 display. On a 1280x1024 LCD I tend to use around 640x360. Note: I don't like "dual" editing modes, I prefer the single view, so I can have the high-res image quality. The desktop picture within http://www.cineform.com/products.html is snapshot on my workspace, so you can see how I run my editing environment.

<<<-- Originally posted by David Newman : Note: I did mean "HD" not "SD". True, the real-time preview is not full HD (although is not SD), yet you can playback full resolution HD CFHD files out to an HD monitor, through any playback tool like MediaPlayer. -->>>

The original poster wanted to see video on an HD monitor WHILE editing in Premiere. So that means using the Matrox overlay feature which only goes out as NTSC.

You can move the Premiere Program monitor to the second or third Matrox monitor at SXGA rez. Then pass the DVI to an HD monitor. Alternately, output through a converter to HD YPbPr and then to an HD monitor.

But this assumes Aspect HD will output 1280x720 to the Premiere Program monitor. Can it?

<<<-- Originally posted by David Newman : Note: I did mean "HD" not "SD". True, the real-time preview is not full HD (although is not SD), yet you can playback full resolution HD CFHD files out to an HD monitor, through any playback tool like MediaPlayer. -->>>

The original poster wanted to see video on an HD monitor WHILE editing in Premiere. So that means using the Matrox overlay feature which only goes out as NTSC.

OR -- you can move the Premiere Program monitor to the second or third Matrox monitor at SXGA rez. Then pass the DVI to an HD monitor. Alternately, output through a converter to HD YPbPr and then to an HD monitor.

But this assumes Aspect HD will output 1280x720 to the Premiere Program monitor. Can it?

<<<-- Originally posted by Steve Mullen : <<<--
OR -- you can move the Premiere Program monitor to the second or third Matrox monitor at SXGA rez. Then pass the DVI to an HD monitor. Alternately, output through a converter to HD YPbPr and then to an HD monitor.

But this assumes Aspect HD will output 1280x720 to the Premiere Program monitor. Can it? -->>>

Sort-of. We can output the overlay to SXGA as you describe, but because you are running in preview mode for real-time editing, not all the definition will be there. At that resolution the image will be a little softer than the final full quality export. There is enough definition to still look great on a now common place 42" plasma screen. Technically 4 channels of full HD is not possible today, not enough CPU (this why AVID $200k+ systems only do two streams.) We needed to make sure that there was both high enough performance and image quality that a editor could play a work in progress off the timeline for customers; allowing edits on the fly while seeing flawless 30 fps playback. No one else can match this.

So if I drag the Premiere monitor to it's own Matrox output window and connect an "HD" monitor of some type, I'll see full-motion playback that folks are asking for.

And, while this has higher rez than NTSC it is not true 1280x720. It's softter.

Now about the SXGA overlay. Are you saying the internal Premiere overlay HAS the 1280x720 full-motion, real-time video?

If so, is the problem that Matrox only outputs the overlay via NTSC? Or, can the user send the overlay out one of the RGB/DVI ports as SXGA graphics.

While I'm happy with a letterboxed NTSC output to an ordinary monitor -- I think if I could hook-up my HD projector to the computer and see the Preview monitor in HD I would be even happier. And, for some this is essential.

You don't need to do all that. The Matrox card will already support full screen SXGA output of the overlay without having to drag the overlay onto another screen. This is how Applied Magic orginally set up their system, so I have seen it done (and it looks nice.) Although I haven't played on the Maxtox config much, so I can't help you there. I'm sure it is easy enough to work out.

<<<-- Originally posted by David Newman : You don't need to do all that. The Matrox card will already support full screen SXGA output of the overlay without having to drag the overlay onto another screen. This is how Applied Magic orginally set up their system, so I have seen it done (and it looks nice.) Although I haven't played on the Maxtox config much, so I can't help you there. I'm sure it is easy enough to work out. -->>>

Are you saying that IF I had connected my RGB HD projector to the second Matrox output instead of connecting an NTSC monitor to the third Matrox output -- I would have seen the overlay output in HD?

David, it may be easy to work out, but I've reviewed the Matrox board and I never saw anything about the overlay not being NTSC. This is important information that should, if true, be included with Aspect HD docs. Who would know HOW to do this?

I'll check with Matrox.

The overlay is not inherently NTSC, I only refer to the overlay as being the YUV channel on the video card -- it can be very large (bigger than HD -- although I haven't tried more than 1280x720 with the Matrox Parhelia.) I think there is a setting to copy to YUV overlay and send it to the SXGA/DVI output instead of the NTSC output. This has nothing to do with Aspect HD -- purely a function of the Matrox cards.

<<<-- Originally posted by David Newman : The overlay is not inherently NTSC, I only refer to the overlay as being the YUV channel on the video card -- it can be very large (bigger than HD -- although I haven't tried more than 1280x720 with the Matrox Parhelia.) There is a setting to copy to YUV overlay and send it to the SXGA/DVI output instead of the NTSC output. This has nothing to do with Aspect HD -- purely a function of the Matrox cards. -->>>

This really should have been fully documented as it's an essential part of using Aspect HD in the real world.

If we shipped the Matrox cards yes, but every end user will have a different setup. Basically if you set up your video card so that MediaPlayer (which will use the YUV overlay) outputs to an external display, Aspect HD will do the same. This would be explained in the manual that comes with the video card.

The P750/Parhelia manula is available here:
http://www.matrox.com/mga/support/user_manuals/parhelia_pseries/home.cfm

This thread has got a litttle off topic discussing a third party card that I have never set up (although I use one occasionally at the office.) We recommend it for it very easy and high quality NTSC preview, yet this is a tripple head card so I sure clever users can do some excellent things with it.

Looking over the Matrox manual myself I couldn't find out what is the maximum resolution it can directed via the overlay to an external monitor. Maybe its hardware is limited to SD resolution, therefore scaling whatever you sent to it.

Which cards out there have YPrPb outputs? Maybe one of those hold the key to what you are looking for.

I just read this post and thought it might be relavent. It is a Matrox tech support posting, reposting:

""Premier Pro has no overlay support and as a result, it will not work with the DVDMax feature.
As for Premier 6.5, ONLY video clips in DV format are overlayed properly and make use of the DVDMax feature."

I hope this is wrong!
Ken

Not good news about PPro!

However, the overlay does work with AspectHD's wavelet video. It ouputs letterboxed NTSC video.

The question we need answered from CineForm is if the overlay carries full rez 1280x720 video AND if the overlay can be output via an RGB/DVI connection.

Regarding Aspect HD and Premiere Pro...
 

Hey everyone--So I'll probably be getting Aspect HD, but I need to confirm something. We currently have Premiere Pro, no 6.5, and of course Aspect is not compatible with Pro. If I purchase Aspect will they include 6.5, or will I have to purchase 6.5 as well? Thanks!

Peter

If you contact us directly we might have a solution that will work for you. Try salesinfo@cineform.com or give CineForm a call.

Thanks David, I'll send an email, or call, or both. :)

Peter

Sorry I put the wrong email address (now corrected.) salesinfo@cineform.com should work.

I use Matrox Parhelia card, and what I see is the following:

- Parhelia outputs Video Overlay signal via both S-Video *and* DVI connectors (S-Video is just another cable adapter on top of this card's 2nd DVI output);

- However quality of the overlay signal in either case seems to be SD as it is much softer than the original HD video.

In my setup, I have HD monitor as Second monitor that is fed by Parhelia's DVI output. (First monitor is 19" CRT traditional computer monitor.)

When I'm viewing video overlay signal on that HD monitor, the image is soft.

If I move the application's Preview window onto my Second (HD) monitor, then the image is super-sharp.

Now, not only Adobe Premiere/Pro does not produce overlay, but neither does AfterEffects.

To rectify this, Parhelia has special driver that you download for free from their web site.

Currently, it only supports AfterEffects, and produces the same output as if the program itself had video overlay feature.

Matrox promised the same driver for Premiere, but none is available as of this writing - bummer!

Now, as I said, to view my timeline in HD resolution, I stopped using the overlay, but rather I move the preview windows onto my Second, HD monitor.

Premiere Pro allows for the preview image to Fit into the window, so when I resize the preview window to fit my 1280x720 display, the internal picture resizes and fits accordingly. (Obviously, without overlay, I cannot use the whole 1280x720 area as part of it is lost to display the windows' borders.)

Question: how to Fit the preview inside the window in AfterEffects? It only seems to allow 100% and then 50% step, where 100% cuts the lower part of the image in the window, and 50% is too small to be useful.

Any ideas?

The Premiere Pro version for Aspect HD will have its own solution for supporting the Matrox overlay (for external monitor previews) as well as it works under Aspect HD for Premiere 6.5.

<<<-- Originally posted by Alex Raskin :

When I'm viewing video overlay signal on that HD monitor, the image is soft.

So that implies the overlay is NOT 1280x720.

To Adobe, what is the max rez of the Overlay?

The question for CineForm, what rez is CAN be sent to the Overlay?

And to Matrox, is the Overlay no matter HOW output, limited to NTSC rez?


Matrox promised the same driver for Premiere, but none is available as of this writing -- bummer!

Which implies PPro does support an Overlay, but that it is different enough that Matrox doesn't yet support it. Good!

But the same three questions apply to this NEW PPro Overlay.



How to Fit the preview inside the window in AfterEffects? It only seems to allow 100% and then 50% step, where 100% cuts the lower part of the image in the window, and 50% is too small to be useful. -->>>

I remember that from AE on a PC, but on my Mac the size is fully adjustable by its corner.

Why not post a question on the Matrox site?

I asked this question @ MURC (Matrox users resource center) Desktop Video Forum ( A great place for nle in general, but esp. if it involves Matrox hardware)

http://forums.matroxusers.com/index.php?

Q-"What is the maximum resolution Parhelia can directed via the overlay to an external monitor? Is it hardware limited to SD resolution, therefore scaling whatever you set it to? Or can it do true 720p on external overlay?"

A-"I think that Parhelia's overlay surface is hw limited to 1600x1200 therefor it shouldn't have any problems displaying 1280x720.
G4x0 and G550 also had limitation regarding size of video displayed via DVDMax. Width of the video must be divisible with 16. Don't know if it still applies to Parhelia."

Alex, you might want to repost in that forum and see if you can get any answers. They know the Parhelia inside and out in that forum. Just don't mention VIA and you will be fine.
Ken