MiniDV render to hard drive for editing later?

[Charlie Webster]

Hi Everyone

Silly question probably.

I have a big MiniDV project I'd like to render in a way that it can be opened or "captured" and edited further in any major NLE program with no quality loss. Size is no issue.

I know I can render to tape, but I have some segments which are over 1:05--would be nice to just put it on a big hard drive.

I see "sony MXF" and wonder if this might work.

I have Vegas Pro 11

Thanks so much,

Charlie

[Mike Kujbida]

If your source files are NTSC DV, then render to that format.
Any FX applied will be re-rendered but everything else will be left alone.
The encoder for this format is long recognized as being one of the best and you will not lose any quality.
The quality loss for the portions with FX applied will be minimal.

[Charlie Webster]

Mike, thanks so much for your reply.

I captured from a sony PD170 (and vx2k).

By default in vegas 11, when you hit render as, I get the output format "Sony MXF (*.mxf), then under that is selected "NTSC DV." The footage is NTSC, not PAL.

So this looks like it should be the best format--correct?

I just have never heard of .MXF

thanks again

[Don Bloom]

Simply render to AVI and you can then use any NLE that reads SD-DV AVi material which is pretty much all of them.

MXF is a Sony wrapper codec and has nothing to do with Standard Definition material.

Don't render to Uncompressed though, it would be a hugh file.
Rendered to AVI (from the drop down menu) is 13 gigs per hour of material.

[Charlie Webster]

TY Don.

AVI would be better, since then they can easily review the footage on any PC/mac. File Size is not an issue.

There would be zero quality difference in footage rendered to MXF vs AVI?

[Don Bloom]

Well, again if it's SD material which it has to be if you captured from a 170 then mxf wrapper is meaningless to the material since mxf is an HD wrapper and the material isn't HD.

To keep it simple render to DV-AVI (NTSC) and your good to go.

[Charlie Webster]

Ha! I'm seeing uncompressed would be 70gigs per hour---but is there really no quality diff?

Lastly just for good quality viewing--not editing (again it's DV NTSC from PD170) what would be the best way to render so as to end up with a smaller file? It's vegas 11 :) That would be to watch on a PC or Mac

TY so much Don

[Don Bloom]

The main reason I've ever rendered to uncompressed was if I needed an alpha channel for work later on such as making a transparent channel to drop in a background For 99.9% of the work DV-AVI will work fine which is 13 gigs per hour.

As for why the quality has dropped, since you stated that the camera settings are the same as you've used before then I can only imagine that it's something eithr in a setting for the monitor which is degrading the image OR something in Vegas. Look at the PREVIEW settings... Look at the PROPERTIES settings both for the instance of Vegas and the clips themselves.
I can only be the camera or the computer. Other than thatI can't think of a reason why the look of the image would be different from previous footage you've done.
Sorry I can't be of more help.

[Charlie Webster]

Hi Don--no I have not seen the quality drop--I have not yet rendered the project out. The client has access to some serious DVD production in Cali. So I just want to be sure I send him with the best I have. Originally I was just going to print back to tape, but instead we will just use a 500gb USB 3 drive for everything. There are several "movies", the longest about 1:06.

Since I have lots of space, I just planned to make 2 prints of each movie, one for easy watching that even an old PC can handle, and one as a studio quality master for DVDs (the guy is a producer).

I've shot many weddings over the years and made the DVDs myself--but while I never get complaints, I know they could be better. Going forward I'm concentrating on computer consulting---leaving the new complex DSLR HD work--the booms and dollies to the young :) So this is one of my last projects.

I love to learn about all the new stuff, and shoot stills with a Nex and my collection of about 60 lenses. But I won't miss the stress of live production.

What would be the "easy watching" render settings? H264ish?

All the best
Charlie

[Don Bloom]

Hey Charlie,
Sorry, I got caught between your thread and another asking about quality drop from an SD project. Man I hate getting old, I forget too many things like which thread I'm in. :-)
Yep, moving a HDD with DV-AVI from one computer to another is no problem and NTSC DV-AVI is about as small a file as you can get without messing with the quality.

As for easy watching, H264 is an HD codec, you've got SD material. Better off to leave it DV-AVI or simply make it MPEG, burn a DVD and watch it where ever you want.

[John Cline]

MXF is not an HD-exclusive wrapper and h.264 is not an HD-exclusive codec. MXF files can contain SD material compressed with the DV codec and h.264 can be any image dimension as long as both the vertical and horizontal dimensions are evenly divisible by 8.

[Don Bloom]

John, of course you're right but for what the OP wants I think a simple DV-AVI render would work the best. Why go to another codec when the material is already AVI?

[John Cline]

Yes, if the source material is in DV .AVI format, it would be best just to render it as a DV .AVI file. Any of the original footage that has been edited but otherwise unmodified (i.e. added filters or titles) will simply be copied to the new file and will be identical to the source material with no generation loss whatsoever.

Anyway, my original comment was to correct the misstatement that MXF files and the h.264 codec are HD only, which they are not.