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  1. Dear friends of Video,

    In company where I work, we have a lot of clips taken by camera Panasonic LX3(MJPEG) and now there is Sony AX53(XAVC-S). Last two weeks I could read many infos about those codecs and formats. My boss wants best output image quality from that...(who does not want ). And now I know there is no way to have smart render or smart copy with Vegas or AP with these codecs and formats. I could read something about intermediate codecs and very very low degradation of video when is video re-coding to ProRes or DNxHD. Then edit this and then export. But what format and codec? But both codecs are 4:2:2 and both my codecs are 4:2:0 8bit.
    MJPEG(.MOV) is I frame, 1280x720, 24p, XAVC-S(.MP4) is M=1,N=12, 1920x1080, 50p.

    Most often videos from camera and camcorder are not mixed together.

    What is best workflow with these formats and codecs? In AP and in Vegas it is ,i guess, the same. How to set up sequence setting and export? I know I can not have straight same output as source(XAVC-S and MJPEG(4:2:0)), when I will use AP or Vegas.

    My boss gave me choice what NLE do I want edit our clips. So I try trial Premiere Pro CC 2019 and Vegas Pro 17. Both looks similar. I have some experiences with Premiere 6.5 so for me is better to handle AP. But I could hear Vegas is more friendly for users. I do not want to "set on flame". But... My boss likes Adobe has monthly cost...(i am not sure about vegas yet) which is pretty fair for us. But if is Vegas more suitable for our case, Boss will pay Vegas and I will learn up Vegas. There is no problem with this.

    Most often it is played on PC/NB. Or from PC on FullHD TV.
    I want to cut out unwanted scenes. Some stabilisation, denoise, join clips from a event together. Title. Sometimes add music, comment, photo between 2 scenes, transitions and improve colores.... Usually I used max 2 tracks.

    Output wrapper? MP4, MOV, MKV... Format? I am not sure with this. Please, could anyone give me advice with this?

    thank you very much
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  2. This is not really a technical issue. Either NLE is fully capable of handling this. It comes down to which one best compliments your workflow. Try both.
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  3. Member Cornucopia's Avatar
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    And
    The best workflow compliments your overall goals (audience, devices, timeline, budget...)

    MOST pro people follow those same documented suggestions:
    Transcode to common digital intermediate, or to lower rez proxy, for ease of editing.

    DI formats are commonly: lossless, like lagarith, huffyuv, etc; virtually-lossless ("visually") like prores, cineform, dnxhd/hr, edius hqx, etc; or slightly-noticeably-lossy like dvcpro100, intra-avc, hi-br intra-mpeg2, etc.

    Similarly, proxy formats are lo-rez version of any of the low-bitrate but low latency/complexity i-frame formats (dv, mpeg2, mjpeg, etc).

    Pick which ones which work best for you equipment & their subsystems, which work most smoothly with your workflow, or the workflow/equipment of those whom you share projects with.

    Choose full DI or proxy, based on what your equipment can handle (storage capacity, throughput/bandwidth), and time constraints (takes slightly longer to conform full rez clips against a proxy edit, rather than work directly w DI material, but proxy editing can be FAST).

    Always save your masters in those same full DI formats (making use of smart rendering when you can). Obviously, however, it makes little sense for your masters to be proxies as well, other than as dailies thumbnail checks.

    Then and only then would you consider making compressed copies in those various distribution formats you mentioned.

    You can do what you like, but this suggested method has been proven to give the best quality while giving the best pro work experience.

    Scott
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  4. Hello and thank you for your answers.

    Last day I explored AP Pro 2019 and Vegas Pro 17. I have tried workflows. For me it is easier to handle AP. I will edit our clips in Premiere.

    I have some questions.
    I have read this article https://blog.frame.io/2017/02/15/choose-the-right-codec/ . There is explanation many infos about re-encoding original files to DI codecs (for example ProRes or Dnx HD) and these are loaded into NLE. In Premiere there is Sequence setting. I can set Edit Mode or Preview format. I can see there is Dnx too. Is it the same? If I choose DNX 1080p(or DNX 720p for MJPEG files), and then I give Render In-OUt? Is it the same as I would re-code original files in different program to a DI codec and then load it to AP?

    MJPEG is I-frame only. Is it better to transcode it to DI codec too?

    Why to store DI files too? From my point of view, in future if any changes will occurs, anybody can originals transcode to DI again.

    What my boss intend do with the output? Probably only archive or sometimes to watch it on PC/FullHD TV. He wants keep original clips and the output separately. Original files from camera and camcorder+saved projects from AP will be on one HDD. And output will be in his PC on different(another) HDD. If any changes will occurs, anybody can load original files through AP and HDD. Make some changes and export it again.


    Thank you very much. Your answers are very helpful.
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  5. Member Cornucopia's Avatar
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    Re: what app to use?
    You can use AP to do the transcoding, or you can use another app. Results might vary in quality.
    If you have AP, you most likely also have Adobe Media Encoder as well. No need to look much further.

    Re: which DI, Use mpeg directly?
    Figure out what your system likes. If it works w mjpeg smoothly as-is, and you don't need to do some major reworking of the image anyway (incl. scaling, complete color correction, compositing), it doesn't hurt to leave edit natively - also 1 less generation. Note, however, that this very likely will NOT be the format you want the final masters to be.
    The xavc stuff, you are going to HAVE to use an intermediate for. Do NOT use mjpeg as a full DI format to replace xavc, however. It is noticeably lossy (like DV).

    Re: archiving
    Keep everything that you cannot quickly and easily recreate (hopefully automatically). So certainly all your original recordings, your artwork. Your EDL & FX setups. If re-collection/re-assembly & re-rendering takes long, also archive the master(s). Same with DI's, but ONLY if re-encoding the originals isn't quick, or easy. Thumbnails/proxies would almost never be archived.
    Rarely would you need to archive your distribution copies, but certainly keep a record of your encoding settings.
    Gather & organize within each project folder, based on whatever filing/naming system you have devised (client, id#, date/time, etc).

    Scott
    Last edited by Cornucopia; 3rd May 2020 at 18:37.
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  6. I have tried a lot of clips last week. I can edit direct XAVC-S. I have changed the preview format to DNX 365 1808p 50. And I chose Voukoder x264 for export. There are many settings. But I don't know which setting is most similar to the XAVC-S quality. The original is without B-frames. It's 50 Mb / s. GOP is N = 1, M = 12. It's probably a closed GOP (there are no B-frames). It's 50p FHD, 8bit, 4: 2: 0.

    I want to keep the quality very close to the original files. Not just what is seen(what is visible). I do not want to export larger files than the original (50 Mb / s). So what setting is closest to XAVC-S quality? What bit-rate? Thank you very much.

    The original files will be stored with the saved projects and EDL. On two independent HDDs in two different places. So exported files do not have to be saved in archive format.
    For the first time, I thought I will export from the Premiere (or Vegas) again XAVC-S. However, it is not supported(only import is supported) So I chose x264 and Voukoder. My boss allowed to export the size of 50Mb / s. We believe that higher bit-rate does not mean higher quality.

    thank you again for your help
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  7. Originally Posted by Divok View Post
    I have changed the preview format to DNX 365 1808p 50. And I chose Voukoder x264 for export.
    Given the optics on that camera, DNxHD365 is almost certainly overkill. (BBC accepts 220.) Don't worry about matching the exact specs of XAVC-S. Set Voucoder for CRF rather than constant bit rate. Set it to 16 or 18 (anything lower than 20 is pretty transparent. See what file sizes you end up with.
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  8. Thank you,
    DNxHD365 I chosed for preview only. I do not render to this format whole timeline. Only sometime extra difficulty efects or color. I do not send preview to my boss. He sit in same room. I can show it to him on my monitor. I gues the AP exports to final format and codec direct from original source, or maybe it first render to preview format and than to x264. So it is reason for DNxHD365. I could choise an Uncompress format, but it is realy huge.

    I have one more question. In Export setting, there is Format MXF OP1a and codec XAVC HD Long GOP 50M 50p. When I take a clip to timline and export it with the codec, it has aprox.the same size as the original clip. It is not .MP4, but .MXF. But it is 4:2:2, 10bit, and M=3, 24.
    What is better? To have .MXF with 4:2:2, 10bit and M=3,N=24, or .MKV with x264, 4:2:0, 8bit and M=1, N=12? Which file will have less loss of quality of image?
    We can playback both on any our computer.
    Thank you very much.
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    Hello! I am not a professional, so I cannot comment about professional solutions, but if any amateur like me is interested, I recommend a lossless or very little compressed digital intermediate. I prefer using VirtualDub for simple trimming (taking out unwanted scenes), resizing, cropping, etc and also because it has a lot of interesting filters. I have used Adobe Premier in the past, but unless you are an advanced user it is far more difficult to use than consumer grade application such as Nero Video or Pinnacle Studio Pro. I would use Huffyuv for the inrmediate format or MJPG with very little compression. Since you mix 4K and HD footage, I would have to decide if I want to keep everything 4K or HD. In the first case I would have to convert the HD footage to 4K, so be careful with the resizing filter to have the best result. I would first deinterlace (if needed) and then resize. If I wanted everything HD, I would scale 4K footage to HD which should give much better image than native HD footage. If all videos are converted to the same specifications (size, video codec and bitrate, audio codec and bitrate), you can trim them and then connect all segments to a single video file. After you have this final file (your master), you can convert to any other format you want. I would use an application such as Avidemux to extract the audio stream to a separate file and then import it to Adobe Audition for normalizing and then saving to the desired format (PCM or AC3). If the two cameras have different audio levels, I would normalize footage from each camera separately to have uniform level on the final video. I can then use Avidemux or similar application to create the final video master from the video stream and the normalized audio file. If I wanted the final file to fit on DVD-R disc (about 4480MB), I would use AVCHD Calculator to set the proper video bitrate. For SD DVD-Video I use the formula V=(2048*4480)/(15*D)-A, where V is the video bitrate in Kbps, D is the video duration in minutes and A is the audio bitrate in Kbps. I hope that helps.
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