Help with rendering a x64 video in Sony Vegas

[bigbangnet]

Hello guys, <---- I'm just a noob here

I need help with a video that I made. Heres the situation. I use dxtory with the x264 codec with those settings below:



Once I have the video, I view it to see if everything is OK and it is, quality is very good and excellent, no problem in anything.

So I fire up Sony Vegas and this is where the problem starts. I have a hunch what the problem is but I don't know what to do.

Heres a picture of the video when I view it in Sony Vegas. The quality is really ugly and its like that all the time. I have a guess its because the video is already compressed and coded so when I go in Sony Vegas, it compressed or encode it more so it losses data or something



Is there a way to render the video in Sony Vegas without looking that ugly ? Btw if I view the file before I go in Sony, it looks wonderful but when inside sony and rendered, its very ugly like this above

[DB83]

Well it may depend on the variant of Vegas that you are using. Certainly Vegas Pro has a setting "Set format as first clip" or words to that effect.

Even so, I see no reason why you could not recreate those settings directly in Vegas as all codecs as far as I recall are configurable within the program.

You can easily check the settings for both the original (not that they should alter) and the edited clip by loading both in to mediainfo and select text mode.

By all means post the two reports here.

[poisondeathray]

@DB83 - I think he's saying the preview is already messed up, before exporting

That suggests it's a decoding issue, especially since other programs don't have the problem (means video is actually OK, not corrupted)

@bigbangnet

A workaround you can try to salvage this is to wrap it into a MP4 container e.g. using yamb beta 2, or mymp4boxgui then import that into vegas . But if you used PCM audio, it won't work in MP4 container with open source muxers, so you'd have to import audio separately . Alternatively, you can try re-encoding it to another format (preferably I-frame) for import into vegas. Since it plays ok in other programs, this should work)

Or in the future, it's recommended to use I-frame for recording only if you're going to be editing it. It will be more stable, and smoother to edit. The negative is it's less compressed (larger filesizes for similar quality). You would enter --keyint 1 in the extra commandline box

Also, You should have the virtualdub hack box checkmarked

[DB83]

@pdr

He did say "and rendered"

But we only really know if we see the encode settings for both.

A short sample of both will also not go amiss.

[bigbangnet]

Wow, so many questions as I feel lost when you both responded to me. But thanks for the quick reply though. I do have questions regarding what you both said

Certainly Vegas Pro has a setting "Set format as first clip" or words to that effect.

I only have 1 clip so that won't work in this particular case.

Even so, I see no reason why you could not recreate those settings directly in Vegas as all codecs

do you mean if I used x264 in dxtory to capture the video, i should use the same "settings" in sony vegas ? if not how should I render the video in sony vegas so it doesn't look ugly like the picture I posted ?


Thats the text file from that video I did (look in attachments)

SpaceEngineers 2015-09-06 11-01-30-098.txt = original untouched video...the one that looks good
space engineer - unexpected surprise.mp4.txt = the butt ugly video version

@DB83 - I think he's saying the preview is already messed up, before exporting

That suggests it's a decoding issue, especially since other programs don't have the problem (means video is actually OK, not corrupted)

thats exactly whats going on. the video is fine if I look at it using vlc for example. But inside vegas, its already messed up. So when I render it still looks messed up. I'm pretty sure its my setting in vegas. I'm sure I can use some kind of setting to "fix" it.

A workaround you can try to salvage this is to wrap it into a MP4 container e.g. using yamb beta 2, or mymp4boxgui then import that into vegas . But if you used PCM audio, it won't work in MP4 container with open source muxers, so you'd have to import audio separately . Alternatively, you can try re-encoding it to another format (preferably I-frame) for import into vegas. Since it plays ok in other programs, this should work)

If I use the x264 codec in dxtory, it saves it under a .avi. For the i-frame thing, you lost me. I did some research and its suppose to be for apple. I ususally use Utvideo for a codec or lagarith and use that in dxtory then use sony vegas to render the video. You'll have to give me more info or tell me how to do it...I'm lost in here with iframe and all lol. sorry

virtualdub hack box

Uhh I don't use virtualdub. Should I check it anyways ?

[aedipuss]

there is something weird going on in the vegas render as it's video is 13 seconds longer than the original.

UTvideo is a better choice as it's a lot less compressed than the x264, the files size will be extremely larger though. you could try using a high bitrate cbr with x264 instead of crf, if you need to use it.

[DB83]

I am no expert on x264 so I will pass on any direct comment on the difference between the two videos. The obvious ones are the original is baseline 4 whereas the edit is high 4.2. Another obvious observation is that 60 fps has now become 59.94. Could that account for the time difference in the two clips ?

"First clip" means just that. If you have only one, then that naturally becomes the "First clip"

I'll raise one question for the experts. Could the output mode in the original being VFW, which I assume to be 'Video For Windows', make any difference ?

[MaverickTse]

@bigbangnet

Can you check if your very first source is interlaced?
and
Did you enable any filter or deinterlace handling in Vegas?

[poisondeathray]

If decoding is a problem in vegas, forget about encoding. The errors will just propagate into the encoded export. You have to fix that first before anything else

Vegas uses different decoding pathways based on the input file container. h264 in AVI is decoded by the system installed VFW installed decoders. It's the least stable and most prone to errors in vegas, especially when b-frames are used. In the screenshot , "ultrafast" is used, which disables b-frames. However, it's still using default --keyint of 250. This large GOP size can cause decoding problems in vegas, hence the recommendation to use I-frame only. (I frame only means each frame is encoded completely, without relying on adjacent frames - there is no temporal compression. This is similar to what lagarith and utvideo use - that's one big reason they are more stable). To do that in x264vfw, it was already mentioned enter --keyint 1 in the box

If you re-wrap the AVI into MP4, then vegas will use either the mainconcept decoder or quicktime decoder. Both are better , less prone to errors than the h264 in AVI decoding pathway for vegas. If the major brand is "mp42", usually mainconcept will be used. That's the preferred one, but both are better than AVI . This is why re-wrapping was suggested as a "quick fix" workaround to salvage what you have. Re-wrapping is like taking the video out of one "box" and putting it into another "box" . It's very fast compared to re-encoding , and no quality loss.

[bigbangnet]

alright so I did some tweaking to the settings like using --keyint 1 and selecting a high10 profile. That alone seems to fix all the problems. Quality isn't perfect but I do have utvideo to choose if I'm really not happy with x264.

If decoding is a problem in vegas, forget about encoding. The errors will just propagate into the encoded export. You have to fix that first before anything else

I didn't use vegas to render the video yet so vegas rendering isn't a problem yet. I used the preview to view the video to see if all was good. The first screenshot I gave here was problematic and I didn't even render anything in vegas.

but you talk about mainconcept. I usually use "sony AVC". Is there any diference that I should be aware compared to mainconcept ?

Can you check if your very first source is interlaced?
and
Did you enable any filter or deinterlace handling in Vegas?

I don't use interlace and no filter about interlace as well.

I am no expert on x264 so I will pass on any direct comment on the difference between the two videos. The obvious ones are the original is baseline 4 whereas the edit is high 4.2. Another obvious observation is that 60 fps has now become 59.94. Could that account for the time difference in the two clips ?

"First clip" means just that. If you have only one, then that naturally becomes the "First clip"

I'll raise one question for the experts. Could the output mode in the original being VFW, which I assume to be 'Video For Windows', make any difference ?

Uhh is the slight fps drop made by the recording, dxtory or the recording software or the game you mean ?!? It feels like its made by the recording from the way you say it. I do notice some "lag" if I can call it that. Maybe stutter would be more appropriate under the right conditions. For example, if I play gta5 and use the faster preset in x264 then the game recording stutters but my game runs fine at 60fps. Its like dxtory can't keep up. I have to use ultrafast and if not then it stutters but its not for everygame though.

thanks for the help guys, I really appreciate it. lol I feel like a noob sometimes lol

[poisondeathray]

alright so I did some tweaking to the settings like using --keyint 1 and selecting a high10 profile. That alone seems to fix all the problems. Quality isn't perfect but I do have utvideo to choose if I'm really not happy with x264.

You can increase the quality by using a lower CRF value (in the first screenshot you have it set to "20", lower values will increase the filesize and quality). The compression is much lower with smaller keyframe intervals. With I-frame only , on average you'd need about >50% more bitrate for roughly similar quality as your "normal" settings. (That's a very generic statement, that value will vary on the type content)

but you talk about mainconcept. I usually use "sony AVC". Is there any diference that I should be aware compared to mainconcept ?

I was talking about the decoder used, not encoder .