Editing AVCHD .mov files straight up in Vegas

[TigerSoul]

Hi!

I know I know... I'm trying to edit AVCHD .mov files straight up in vegas without converting into a more editable format first. I've gotten as far as putting things on the timeline which works fine, but when I get to transitions thinks screw up like hell. Can I do anything to fix this to not have to do this conversion before editing the files, or is it a dead idea? Is any other editor better than vegas in this regard?

Kristian

[guns1inger]

There are no editors that like AVCHD at the moment. It is a very poor choice of format for editing, which is why people use intermediate formats for editing.
It might help to know where the AVCHD file came from - if it is camera, make and model - as some editors work better with the footage from some cameras.

It would also help to know exactly what your issue is, as

when I get to transitions thinks screw up like hell

is meaningless as a diagnostic description.

[poisondeathray]

There are no editors that like AVCHD at the moment.

Actually there might be 1 right now: edius 2.5 neo booster

I haven't used tested it myself , but there are dozens of reports (from consumers and professionals ) and it looks to be the real deal (real native editing 3 streams with a quadcore, no intermediate low quality conversion, edits almost as smooth as DV-AVI). Apparently lots of folks are using 1-2 streams fine even with dual core laptops.

CS5 looks like it will be able to do this as well

Seeing as how pratically all consumer HD camcorder models , and many entry level prosumer models are using this format , or derivatives of this format, it's about time software companies started paying attention

[TigerSoul]

I'm considering intermediating to hdv for lazyness or dmxhd for more important things.

Oh well the thing is that putting AVCHD clips straight in the timeline works just fine, but when I attempt to crossfade between two of these clips everything just stalls and the preview pane gets 1 fps at most if even that. So the problem arises when more than one file of this format is handled at the same time. If going one file at a time things run smooth as silk so maybe MAYBE in the future the developers will make it possible to edit these files directly, one can only hope.

[edDV]

What is your hardware and Vegas version?

With a single stream on the timeline, Vegas decodes AVCHD playback with available codecs. When you specify a transition, both streams need to be decoded and then the transition is applied. This will bog down preview until you render.

HDV will be faster but not much. dmx hd won't help.

Vegas Pro includes an older 1440x1080 VFW Cineform codec. Cineform Neoscene would be better.

[TigerSoul]

I'm gonna have to correct that abit.

HDV in 1280x720 works fantastic in my vegas even in transitions, no problem what so ever, smooth as silk. dmx hd I haven't tried either, and it sounds weird because if it woudn't help transitions much, why would it be used? Maybe I'm just the dumb beginner here expecting thins that doesn't work, but HDV in 720p works fantastic. If I just convert my clips to HDV first, even transitions are just fine!

[edDV]

I'm gonna have to correct that abit.

HDV in 1280x720 works fantastic in my vegas even in transitions, no problem what so ever, smooth as silk. dmx hd I haven't tried either, and it sounds weird because if it woudn't help transitions much, why would it be used? Maybe I'm just the dumb beginner here expecting thins that doesn't work, but HDV in 720p works fantastic. If I just convert my clips to HDV first, even transitions are just fine!

By converting 1080i AVCHD to 1280x720p HDV (29.97 or 59.94) you are degrading the video. Sure it will preview and realtime decode faster.

[TigerSoul]

Maybe I did a typo or misunderstood something about AVCHD, but the original footage here is 720p 29.970fps in AVCHD, it's not in 1080 resolution, so I'm not taking down the resolution but of course I am loosing some quality in the switch to HDV but as far as I can see it looks quite ok. The problem with vegas to edit it right away isn't cpu, ram or harddisk limits, it's some kind of "codec limit" which makes me hope they will be able to do something about it in the future.

[edDV]

1280x720p/29.97 AVCHD would be the new "AVCHD Lite" format used in recent digital cameras. Not all software has been updated for that format yet. Which version of Vegas are you using?

See this thread.
https://forum.videohelp.com/threads/316576-Adobe-Premiere-Elements-and-AVCHD-slow-perfo...ght=AVCHD+Lite

[TigerSoul]

Well my camera shoots 1080i too, so it's not a "Lite cam" per say. I'm using the latest version. Is there any different between AVCHD Lite and AVCHD Full apart form resolution?

[poisondeathray]

Well my camera shoots 1080i too, so it's not a "Lite cam" per say. I'm using the latest version. Is there any different between AVCHD Lite and AVCHD Full apart form resolution?

AVCHD Lite doesn't use b-frames. This means lower compression, which implies lower quality at a given bitrate. I believe the "lite" spec also uses a lower bitrate, and typically uses frame repeats (720p60 is really 720p30)

From your other post, are you still referring to EX-F1? It doesn't shoot AVCHD strictly speaking. It shoots a derivative based on h.264

[TigerSoul]

Yes I'm still referring to the EX-F1, oh but the format being shot is referred to in the manual as AVCHD, let me see... H.264/AVC Standard, oh, guess it never said AVC[HD], I put that in as I assumed AVC in 720p = AVCHD.