Re: optimum codec for CCTV vid to DVDSP

From: Allison Holt (email suppressed)
Date: Mon Nov 24 2008 - 15:59:46 PST


Thanks for your help, Flick!

Believe it or not, the "fastest" setting works like a charm.
It seems as though, with "best" or other settings, Compressor is trying to
justify its second pass to the first, which, with very detailed black &
white footage, winds up with horrible loss. With "fastest," Compressor says,
OK, you know what you want, and the single pass looks great.

Allison

On Fri, Nov 21, 2008 at 5:01 PM, Flick Harrison <email suppressed>wrote:

> There's a bit of a mystical, trial and error element to encoding.
>
> Take a ten or fiteen-second segment that causes you the most trouble.
>
> Try a bunch of different settings in compressor. Remember them or make new
> saved settings for each attempt and keep track of which is which.
>
> Two-pass, variable bitrate, 5.5 - 8.2 mbps is the best you could ever do.
> I've heard it suggested to set motion estimation to "good" instead of
> "best" so it's not using up bandwidth trying to render every twich of a
> half-pixel.
>
> If that doesn't work, put a 0.2 pixel gaussian blur on the footage before
> you output it to compressor (do a 10-second test again, and export from fcp
> "using compressor" and "re-render all frames").
>
> I went through hell on colour-correcting this film:
>
> http://www.waitingforsancho.com
>
> because the first shot of the film (of course) was an extremely wide, shaky
> handheld shot of a vast field of tiny pebbles of varying colours, beneath a
> smoothly-shaded sky. In other words, a shot requiring more bandwidth than I
> could muster with all kinds of fcp / compressor settings.
>
> the producer eventually got a high-end hardware conversion done at a post
> house (hey! they still exist for a reason!) though I haven't seen if it
> actually looks as much better as he says it does (ha ha).
>
> If all else fails, various rock and roll methods are available (test with
> short clips first):
>
> 1. upres to an hd timeline and then do your export;
> 2. shoot the final cut off a monitor and see if that improves things
> (re-analogizing)
> 3. drop the full-quality timeline into toast and see what toast's
> automatic, best-quality settings do for you (never know - idiot-proof is
> sometimes the best solution!)
>
> Of course you'll need to be aware of how much can fit on a dvd...
>
>
>
>
>
> Allison Holt wrote:
>
>> Hi everyone,
>>
>> I'm working with very soft, beautiful CCTV footage-- on miniDV-- in FCP
>> and I'm having trouble getting a high quality mpeg2. I've experimented with
>> several codecs alongside the "DV/NTSC - 90 minute - best quality" settings
>> in Compressor, but all result in some aliasing, which this low-res footage
>> exaggerates terribly. It's been suggested that I try "fastest" setting
>> instead of "best"; any opinions? Anything will help at this point!
>>
>> --
>> ALLISON HOLT
>> www.oillyoowen.com <http://www.oillyoowen.com>
>>
>> __________________________________________________________________ For
>> info on FrameWorks, contact Pip Chodorov at <email suppressed>.
>>
>>
>
> __________________________________________________________________
> For info on FrameWorks, contact Pip Chodorov at <email suppressed>.
>

__________________________________________________________________
For info on FrameWorks, contact Pip Chodorov at <email suppressed>.