AVCHD to Quicktime

[travbickle]

I just completed competing in the 48 Hour Film Project in Louisville, and wasn't happy with the encoded film. My film and several others had something similar to film tracers. I'm not sure what the problem is, but here's the details:

Recorded 1080p, 30fps, AVCHD files.
Had to encode to self-contained QT files, Standard Def, with no proprietary codecs. I used DV25 NTSC video codec to encode to a interlaced video.

I'm thinking the problem stems from the video codec I used. I'm going to experiment, but thought I'd ask for any guidance I can get here. Should I encode with H.264 to a Progressive file? Any other thoughts?

[Cornucopia]

Do the LEAST HARM.

What you did was:
1. Downrez 1080 -> 480
2. Convert progressive -> interlaced
3. Convert AVC Codec -> DV codec
4. Adjust framerate 30pfs -> 29.97

Even if you HAVE to downrez, you could still have left it as 30fps, progressive & AVC codec, which would help things.

The list goes in order of decreasing importance. IOW, the 1st item does the most damage, the last does the least.

Scott

[travbickle]

Yep, damn. You're absolutely right. I didn't investigate enough beforehand. Downrez was required, but I should have used H.264 encoding, Progressive, 30fps. Poop. Thanks for the reply.

[budwzr]

Me smellum' apple peel.

[travbickle]

What's the apple peel comment mean?

Yeah, the original footage was 1080p, AVCHD, 29.97fps. So I definitely want to keep the frame rate and progressive. Should I use the H.264 codec or a lossless one like PNG?

[poisondeathray]

What's the apple peel comment mean?

just ignore the anti-mac attack

Yeah, the original footage was 1080p, AVCHD, 29.97fps. So I definitely want to keep the frame rate and progressive. Should I use the H.264 codec or a lossless one like PNG?

What are your requirements for submission to the "48 Hour Film Project in Louisville" ? Usually there will be a set of rules or spec sheet. You said downres was required? what else ?

[travbickle]

- self-contained (that is, without references or links to other movie files)
- Quicktime
- Standard Definition/SD (that is, 720x480 pixels)
- NTSC (that is, 30fps not 24p)
-without proprietary codecs (that is, no Avid or Final Cut Pro codecs)

- and the city producer told us a few days before to turn in widescreen movies as 4x3 with black bars

[poisondeathray]

Yes AVC/h.264 in MOV would work - that comes with standard quicktime .

PNG isn't really lossless in this case (It's RGB, but your original video is YCbCr) , and the festival judges won't like you for using such huge filesizes

As Cornucopia says - don't do all those intermediate steps (especially using interlaced DV) , just use a 1920x1080p30 timeline and project settings, and when exporting use 720x480p30 h.264/aac/mov

[travbickle]

Thanks. Digging on everything you're saying.

My only 1 thing is, I like using a 720x480 timeline so that I can resize the higher res shots. I'm not working with a cinematographer who doesn't want me touching any shot. I'm working with some guys that don't always compose the shot the best way. The SD timeline gives me some leeway for resizing. Will that cause any problems?

[poisondeathray]

My only 1 thing is, I like using a 720x480 timeline so that I can resize the higher res shots. I'm not working with a cinematographer who doesn't want me touching any shot. I'm working with some guys that don't always compose the shot the best way. The SD timeline gives me some leeway for resizing. Will that cause any problems?

No, that would work. There's definitely more leeway in reframing and resizing the content - that's one of the big reasons why people shoot 4k for 1080p

But I was thinking more about future utility - e.g. you can save this project and make HD video (e.g. for vimeo/youtube, maybe blu-ray) . What if another festival wants HD content submissions ? You save yourself a lot of work instead of redoing the entire project

I'm assuming you're using FCP ? or FCPX ?

[travbickle]

Yeah, you're right on limiting future HD submittal. Truthfully, I haven't gotten to the point where our film is good enough for that consideration. I'll keep it in mind next time, though. Thanks for the good point.

I'm using Adobe CS6.

[poisondeathray]

Make sure PP interprets the original AVCHD footage as 30p .

Sometimes it interprets it as 60i , and will deinterlace it - this will degrade the footage and lower the effective resolution. (Because 30p AVCHD from most consumer camcorders is actually encoded interlaced as 60i even though it's 30p content)

[Cornucopia]

And remember, in NTSC-land it should actually be 29.97 not true 30, particularly if it's a CE (consumer electronics) playback chain rather than a PC chain.

Scott

[budwzr]

So the take away is, just do it the usual way?

[travbickle]

Make sure PP interprets the original AVCHD footage as 30p .

Sometimes it interprets it as 60i , and will deinterlace it - this will degrade the footage and lower the effective resolution. (Because 30p AVCHD from most consumer camcorders is actually encoded interlaced as 60i even though it's 30p content)

Yeah, PP was also interpreting my footage as interlaced. Didn't notice that. Thanks.