Weekend Betas

[Jake Segraves]

Here's some new betas for you all to enjoy over the weekend.

NEO Scene V1.3.7 Build 122

NEO HD V4.1.0 Build 222

NEO 4K V4.1.0 Build 222

Prospect HD V4.1.0 Build 222

Prospect 4K V4.1.0 Build 222

What's included:
Fixed some conversion issues from new camera formats (mostly AVCHD).
Added Premire Pro CS4 Sequence Presets and Editing Mode in Prospect HD/4K. The RT Engine is still forthcoming. You can read more about that here:

Cineform Tech Blog Blog Archive Prospect HD/4K v4 Real-Time Engine for CS4 Status Update

Since these are betas, we'll obviously want your feedback.

[Jay Bloomfield]

Prospect HD, Vista x64, Intel Quad Core, nVidia 9800GT (190.62 WHQL driver). I didn't test out too much with AE CS4, but it appeared to preview and render about the same as it did with the previous stable PHD build.

I had some free time this PM and I tested the 1920x1080 NTSC presets and they all worked with PP CS4. I also tested the 1440x1080 30p and 720 30p presets and they worked also. Rendering with AME worked only with "Microsoft AVI" using the Cineform codec. The Cineform AME rendering times were very slow, but this has been reported here before. AME does not recognize the "Cineform AVI" setting, but this has also been reported . The AME queue is always blank if you choose that output option in PP CS4. The Cineform "render work area" previewing worked fine with the few clips and transitions that I tested it with.

One little "trick" that I noticed that you can now do is to open an AVCHD clip in PP CS4 with a Cineform preset. Add transitions, etc.. The timeline shows red. Then render the work area and the timeline shows green and previews in RT.

There was a minor problem during installation. I uninstalled the previous PHD build as usual. When I installed the beta build, at the point where the DOS box flashes on screen for a split second, the installation stopped working and crashed. But just running the setup file again gave a complete installation that worked. I'm guessing it's a Vista x64 issue or maybe I have some junk left in the registry that's causing this problem.


UPDATE: I figured out the AME CS4 issue. If I copy CFRenderProc.exe and CFHD_File_Exporter.prm to the AME plugins\common folder, the Cineform AVI option works fine (and much faster). AME must not be "seeing" the versions of those files in

C:\Program Files (x86)\Adobe\Common\Plug-ins\CS4\MediaCore\CineForm.

One thing that I'm going to do when the RT engine is out for PP CS4, I'm going to uninstall all my CS3 & CS4 Adobe software, use Adobe's registry cleaner and then just reinstall CS4.

[Scott Tolbert]

I’m editing a short film that I won’t be able to finish for months because I’m starting a new MFA directing program in the UK.

When I used Final Cut, I wouldn’t upgrade during a project as common sense and as there were very few FC updates.

Cineform has a very robust update schedule and I was wondering if there are any issues updating Cineform (in my case NEO Scene) if I’ve already converted the AVCHD footage.

I will be sending Cineform .avi files back and forth between Vegas and AfterEffects so I will be using the encoder rather often.

Thanks in advance.

[Marty Baggen]

I would only risk it if there is a distinct benefit vs risk. If you're updating simply to have the latest version, my opinion is to not do it.

No disrespect to the hard working guys at Cinform, and I am willing to bet they would be the first to tell you to use a Beta release with utmost caution.

[Graham Hickling]

Seems to be working well in CS4 in Win7. (But sorry Marty, the Project Trimmer is still non-functional)

When I convert 1920x1080 29.97i AVCHD footage from my HD10 using HDLink, the resulting CFHD files import into the corresponding Cineform project preset with a yellow timeline bar - it doesn't go green until I render the work area. Is that expected behavior?

[Tim Bucklin]

Originally Posted by Graham Hickling

When I convert 1920x1080 29.97i AVCHD footage from my HD10 using HDLink, the resulting CFHD files import into the corresponding Cineform project preset with a yellow timeline bar - it doesn't go green until I render the work area. Is that expected behavior?

Yes. There is no real-time engine yet. The presets and editing mode do offer a couple benefits, though...
1) Easier setup of projects to ensure the correct editing mode and that the frame rate and field order match your source for the best performance.
2) CineForm AVI preview files instead of I-frame MPEG or uncompressed AVI.

I've noticed on faster machines that are able to play clips in real-time, if you just let the timeline play through a clip, it will remove the yellow bar if it is able to do so without dropping frames. If it drops frames, it turns red.

Careful with rendering the work area if you are using First Light. Once you render a clip on the timeline, you won't be able to see the changes from First Light in Premiere unless you delete the preview files or do something to the clip to convince Premiere it needs to be re-rendered.

[Ian Lewis]

Prospect 4K, CS3, Win 7 64, installed without any special tricks (no compatibility mode, nor "as admin"). Seems to work fine - except I still have this problem with trimmed audio being just a buzz. (Haven't yet submitted a ticket, but will do when I get a round tuit.)

[Simon Zimmer]

Thanks for the update on the RT Engine. I hope it works well with Windows 7 because by that time (November 6) it will be officially released I think.

Good luck!

Simon

[Johnnie Behiri]

Actually 2 problems I had in the last build and never got to the point reporting it..

1-When converting full HD to SD avi PAL the output is 4x3 and not 16x9
2-The "old" Nvidia YUV level bug is back.


Win XP
Premiere CS2 and CS3
Prospect 4K


Thanks!

Johnnie

[John Palaganas]

Any Mac version of Neo HD? I for one can't even convert any of my AVCHD files :(

[Graham Hickling]

Hey I just noticed that all the ProspectHD 1280x720 presents are labelled as Anamorphic HD pixel ratio 1.333.

Not sure if its just the label that's wrong, but in any case it should be square pixels!

[Leo Baker]

Hello Graham,

Yes I found this as well about the presets, I set them to Square Pixel now when I created a new preset based on 1280x720 24p they are the correct PAR. As the prests as they are the PAR is in-correct like you stated.

[Tim Bucklin]

Originally Posted by Graham Hickling

Hey I just noticed that all the ProspectHD 1280x720 presents are labelled as Anamorphic HD pixel ratio 1.333.

Not sure if its just the label that's wrong, but in any case it should be square pixels!

You're absolutely right. The templates were made after making the 1440x1080 ones (which do require 1.33 PAR) and it must have stuck.

We'll get those fixed for the release build. Thanks for the find.

[Simon Dean]

I have a problem with Windows 7 - and because you don't officially support it yet I thought I'd pop it here.

Using: NEO Scene (Beta), Windows 7, After Effects CS3 and Vegas 8
Keeping everything on default settings in 8-bit mode and rendering a test image I created (A chip chart effectively) going from;
Vegas -> AE: Looks like image has been clipped to 16-235 & then stretched back out to 0-255 within AE. Loading the same image back into Vegas looks fine.

AE->Vegas: Image is squashed into 16-235. Same file back into AE looks fine.

As an update: In Premiere CS3 I can see that the Vegas footage comes in at 16-235, but stretched to 0-255. I can then recover the highlight with max bit-depth on, but can't seem to recover shadows.

I'm checking this using scopes (It's obvious by eye, but the scope tells you what is happening better).

I noticed it first on footage, but created a chart to help figure it out. Surely simply moving 8-bit footage between applications should be straight forward? Are there some settings to change?

Many many thanks to whoever helps!

[Graham Hickling]

Something is screwy with audio during framerate changes in HDLink within PHD4. (Not necessarily new to this version - I havent used the feature recently).

My situation last night: applying a 25 -> 23.976 rate change to some PAL DV footage. The video clip changed in duration correctly from 2:56 to 3:04. But the audio changed from 2:56 to 2:01! Checking/unchecking 'preserve pitch' made no difference.

Didnt try other rate-change options so not sure if it's a wider problem.