Best Format To Capture DigiBeta

[gloriouscitizen]

Hi, I've just joined a post production house and my boss was asking me to do some research on the best format/codec to capture our videos in. We normally receive movies and videos in DigiBeta and encode them to multiple system such as for trains, aircraft and tablet. As such, we always want to keep the master source file with the highest quality, do some editing and transcode them into system specific formats.

With this, can I ask what is the best format to capture in using DRC Stream 3.7? I heard it's H.264 but also heard that it's difficult to do editing with it (including subtitle, cutting out certain scene, etc.).

Also read somewhere that I can actually ingest the video in mpeg2 format with a high bit rate. That way, when I convert them to MPEG4 for some of the system out there, I won't lose quality. Is this true? Please help! Thanks.

[yoda313]

I'm assuming the digibeta is standard def right? I don't know all of the variants it can come in.

With standard def I would not capture in h264. That would be a destination format not a capture format in my opinion.

I don't know what DRC Stream 3.7 is but if you have the option of using any codec you want i would suggest using dv-avi. That would have the most support and flexibility for your editing needs. For standard def material it should be more than adequate. And just about any video editing software should be able to import dv-avi without any problems.

Dv-avi comes in at 13gb/hour. SO plan accordingly.

Yes you could capture at a high bitrate mpeg2 but you probably would be better off with dv-avi as its a more editable format.

Since I don't know the details of the hardware you are using I am only giving suggestions based on my history with consumer grade video tapes and 8mm analog camcorders. Edit - and using home desktops and capture cards, not industrial equipment.

I'm sure others here can provide more insight to the actual equipment you are using. Good luck.

[NJRoadfan]

Sounds like its this software/hardware: http://www.digitalrapids.com/en/Products/StreamZHD.aspx
Codec support: http://www.digitalrapids.com/en/Products/StreamZHD/SupportedFormats.aspx

DigiBeta is 90Mbit/s 10-bit 4:2:2 video with 4 channels of 48khz/20-bit uncompressed audio. Its likely best to capture the tapes via a SDI connection and store it in an intermediate codec that has proper 4:2:2 support like DVCPro 50.

[Brad]

DVCPro is a step down from Digibeta quality (40Mbps vs 90Mbps) and would involve recompression. Unfortunately I don't believe it's possible to get the compressed data stream off the tape, only the decompressed form by SDI.

If the question is truly about "highest quality" then the answer is uncompressed 10-bit 4:2:2 720x486 (or lossless with same specs, but I don't know if there are lossless 10-bit codecs around). You will need 27MB for every second of uncompressed video, not including audio.

The list found by NJRoadfan seems to imply you could capture this to AVI or another container if you have proper 10-bit codecs on the system.

[NTSC Refugee]

With this, can I ask what is the best format to capture in using DRC Stream 3.7?

May I assume that the post house is using a digital file-based workflow? If that's indeed the case, you'll want to use whichever lossless video format that your NLE software and/or editing staff are currently using. IME with TV production, these are the people who you want to keep happy by giving the file format(s) they want. Find out what they're using.