HD to SD produces Artifacts and Jaggies
 

I'd sure appreciate some help and suggestion(s)

I'm trying to downconvert HD video taken from my Canon HV 40 to SD in order to mix it with video from my GL2 cams. Problem is that when I downconvert the HD, it has lots of minor "flashing" in the background and very noticeable jaggies wherever there are high constrasting objects in the frame.

How can I smooth this out? I've tried downconverting to .avi, .wmv, and other formats. However "DVD" mpg2 looked best, but when burned to a DVD it still has very noticeable picture defects.

What program are you using?

For downconverting or editing?

1, I downconverted with four different programs to get the best pic quality.
First, I tried: Prism Video Converter. -looked pretty good
Scond, I tried another........... freeware program - didn't look as good as the first.
Third, I tried one called Any Video Converter. - this looked best - I thought........
I also tried Handbrake which I use for Viemo but it seemed to be for converting to MP4
and my editing software would not take that format.


2. I'm editing on Adobe Premiere Eements

Found this.. thanks for being patient...http://www.dvinfo.net/forum/what-hap...d-quality.html

Hi Tom. I personally use a system built around a Matrox RT.X2 and for software I use Adobe CS4. With the Matrox system I am provided with a downscaling alternative that works very well. That being said, you are in a different situation. I have heard that many are getting good results using Cineform software. Also this link, http://www.dvinfo.net/forum/adobe-cr...m-quality.html is to another thread that is dealing with using maximum render quality in AME to achieve acceptable results. I am not too familiar with the elements version so I don't know if these options are available to you, but check out the thread as it may help.

Gene,
Thanks so much for the info and links. I will check them out. I just got a new PC with quad core and I have had CS4 for a while. Now I can use Premiere Pro.

Interesting, I have a niece in the wedding videography business in Nashville and she uses the Matrox card. I will have to learn about it.
Regards, Tom

Just be careful if considering Matrox. Make sure your system components meet their requirements.

I think you will find TMPGenc to give the best results of all the downconverters/encoders.

TMPGEnc - Products: TMPGEnc 4.0 XPress - Product Overview

Ron Evans

Thanks Ron........ downloading it now..... Free trial too. I'll give it a try.

The problem is caused by having too much resolution in the HD image that leads to aliasing when down converted to SD without some kind of anti-aliasing pre filtering. The simplest way to do this is to add a very slight blur to the HD footage via a filter prior to down converting. A 3 pixel blur would work very well. I have some examples of this here: XDCAM-USER.com Getting SD from HD and the problems of oversampling.

SOLD !!! Amazing. Thanks Ron..... I've never seen SD look so good......