Mixing SD and HDV?
 

Quick question. Will I be able to mix SD footage with HD footage and still be able to make it an HD project? I am kind of looking down the road for the Blueray etc days. I do have some footage from my step son's HS grad last night. I have both my HD footage and another angle with a SD camcorder. I want to use mainly my HD footage, some shots from the other camcorder and also some photos. In the immediate future I will make this for SD, but I am wondering what options I have down the road.

Thanks again

Mike

Mike, only you can answer this question. There are significant differences between HD/HDV and SD blown up to HD, and you'll see them for sure.

How significant will those differences be to you? I don't know. Do some tests, check it out, see how you like SD on an HD timeline for a start.

For renders where you're resampling footage to a higher or lower resolution, it's always appropriate to check "best" video rendering in the "custom" rendering dialog.

Mixing the two works well if it's part of the story. For instance, "here is my son today" in HD, and "here is my son at last year's party" in SD. In fact, you can use video effects to purposefully trash the SD a bit.

If the quality change is random, it could be distracting.

Thanks guys. I should have stated that I did not expect to get HD results with the Sd footage. It is more of a history thing of his growing up etc...my concern was any issue of making it an HD render. Would I still get HD quality on the HD section? Sounds like I would.

Also...I have never gone back to tape as of yet. Could I do this with something like this?

I've mixed three formats of footage on a single HD project: SD 16:9, SD 4:3, and HDV. I also added some photo animation to the same project. It looks fine. Vegas uprezzes the SD a little as well. Think of it this way, when you watch TV on an HD station, you are seeing a mix of formats. If it doesn't bother you there, why should it bother you on your own stuff.

Thanks again. I am now thinking I should have shot the SD camcorder set to 16:9. I am assuming it will show 4:3 even in the HD project?

Michael,
you can scale your footage what ever u wanto in Vegas.
Crop it, scale it wide, blacks on top & bottom, etc, whatever you choose.

just experiment with vegas's crop & scale function.

goodluck!

Thanks...I need to get better with Vegas. So I can scale just part of my timeline in vegas or do I need to scale the clip prior to inserting on the time line? It will only be about 30 seconds of material that will need to be scaled.

Thanks

You can scale on the timeline.

You'll want to get familiar with event pan/crop and track motion.

Thanks... I need to work on a lot of items. Will definately take your advice on pan/crop and track motion.

Michael,

If you have your project set up for HDV (widescreen) then all you have to do is click Pan/Crop on the SD event, right-click in the frame and select Match Output Aspect and you will have the proper aspect applied. Adjust the crop rectangle up or down so as not cut off any heads and you’re done. It’s that easy.

Track Motion will affect the entire track and is not how you match aspects. Pan/Crop is the appropriate tool for the job.

~jr

I don't recommend scaling 4:3 SD footage to fit a widescreen HD project, as that will further degrade the SD image quality relative to any HD footage. Keep the 4:3 footage centered with black bars on either side, or some relevant artwork, or put two 4:3 clips side by side with a little cropping to fill the screen.

Thanks John.

I agree, but be aware that with black bars on both sides, you will end up with the footage appearing to be in a box with black all around when you view it on a regular 4:3 TV. What I did on my last project was to make both a 4:3 version and a 16:9 version available from the opening menu. In the 4:3 version, the 16:9 footage was letterboxed and the 4:3 footage filled the screen. In the 16:9 version, the 16:9 footage filled the screen and the 4:3 footage was pillarboxed (black bars on the sides). I chose the 4:3 version as the default since most people still have that kind of TV.

On a larger project without room for two versions on the same DVD, I would go for some kind of matting artwork to fill out the edges of the 4:3 screen and bring it out to the 16:9 frame. The "box in the center of the screen" thing looks really lame IMHO.

Hey Kevin, can you post a screen shot of this, I'm pre-coffee and would like to see it.