Originally Posted by BradfordBenn Frame rate is an important thing to make sure that is consistent or at least understood. While this might seem small, over the course of a few minutes it adds up to a frame or two. To be honest it has been so long since I did video that I don't remember the exact rate I think it is two frames every ten minutes. Don't tell my college professors....

Since all editing programs that I know simply transfer the DV footage from your DV camcorder through firewire to your computer, I don't think one can make a mistake with frame rates. As long as you stay in DV, whatever your camera recorded at is what you get.

It's when you start transcoding from one format into another, that's when you have to be aware of special US video-friendly framerates such as 29.97 or 23.976. Transcoding would apply to working with editing-unfriendly H.264 codecs from your 5D or 7D for example - at least on the Mac side.

Question on conversions
I recently started shooting 720p video with a Droid X and noticed that regardless of what method I upload the video the quality and file size is always way less than what the original video is. The videos play fine even though they are a .3gp format, but how do I upload and keep the HD quality? The methods I have tried are using pixelpipe from the phone which I know uploaded full HD quality from my iPhone 4, and I have tried uploading through the browser after putting the video files on my mac but no difference in either way.
Thanks for your time.

Mike

Mike,

Contact me or Tristan through the help desk. We need to take a look at the original videos before upload to see what might be going on. http://www.smugmug.com/help/emailreal

I have opened a few MOV video files from the Canon 7D in Windows Movie Player and the playback is sketchy and garbled. Tried to open in Windows Media Center and she won't even recognize it, not even an option when I looked into default options. Things is a pal of mine has the same programs on damn near the same system and set-up and his read my files just fine. I was told by Dell I need the proper codecs but I am unable to find the correct ones that would allow me to view these MOV videos in those programs. I have imported and opened in Premier Pro and it looks and plays just fine. Any ideas what should be done here? I am starting to go crazy. Pleeeeaase.

Thanks Much!
-John

Originally Posted by vegaguy I have opened a few MOV video files from the Canon 7D in Windows Movie Player and the playback is sketchy and garbled. Tried to open in Windows Media Center and she won't even recognize it, not even an option when I looked into default options. Things is a pal of mine has the same programs on damn near the same system and set-up and his read my files just fine. I was told by Dell I need the proper codecs but I am unable to find the correct ones that would allow me to view these MOV videos in those programs. I have imported and opened in Premier Pro and it looks and plays just fine. Any ideas what should be done here? I am starting to go crazy. Pleeeeaase. Thanks Much! -John

Go to Apple's website and download the free Quicktime Player for Windows. MOV files are quicktime files. The 7D encodes them with the H.264 codec, a standard video codec used by YouTube and many other sites. H.264 needs a relatively fast and new processor. If you're still seeing studdery playback with Quicktime Player for Windwos, it may be time for a comptuer upgrade.

Originally Posted by THX1965 Go to Apple's website and download the free Quicktime Player for Windows. MOV files are quicktime files. The 7D encodes them with the H.264 codec, a standard video codec used by YouTube and many other sites. H.264 needs a relatively fast and new processor. If you're still seeing studdery playback with Quicktime Player for Windwos, it may be time for a comptuer upgrade.

maaan, thats what i'm tryin to avoid. but it worked. I just don't get how a new Win7 i7 doesnt have the brains to read MOV and requires an Apple program.

thanks btw

Originally Posted by vegaguy maaan, thats what i'm tryin to avoid. but it worked. I just don't get how a new Win7 i7 doesnt have the brains to read MOV and requires an Apple program.

Because mov is an Apple invention (vs. wmv for Microsoft) and there are way too many competing options in video. Ask Apple why they don't support wmv. Same issue. Until this standard thing gets worked out, you often have to have multiple players to be able to play all the different formats.

Originally Posted by vegaguy maaan, thats what i'm tryin to avoid. but it worked. I just don't get how a new Win7 i7 doesnt have the brains to read MOV and requires an Apple program. thanks btw

Well, FWIW, h.264 is not a codec that should be used for editing. So if your system plays it fine but chokes only when you're editing, it has more to do with that. Even Final Cut Pro can't edit with it natively, and that's Apples to Apples.

Use MPEG Streamclip to transcode the footage into something suitable for editing. I'm not sure what that is in the Windows world. For me it'd be Apple ProRes 422.

Originally Posted by DavidTO Well, FWIW, h.264 is not a codec that should be used for editing. So if your system plays it fine but chokes only when you're editing, it has more to do with that. Even Final Cut Pro can't edit with it natively, and that's Apples to Apples. Use MPEG Streamclip to transcode the footage into something suitable for editing. I'm not sure what that is in the Windows world. For me it'd be Apple ProRes 422.

Nah, seems to work fine in Adobe Premiere Pro but just wouldn't play in Windows... QuickTime worked however.

Originally Posted by vegaguy maaan, thats what i'm tryin to avoid. but it worked. I just don't get how a new Win7 i7 doesnt have the brains to read MOV and requires an Apple program. thanks btw

What's wrong with using an Apple program on a Windows machine? It's free and works great.

Originally Posted by jfriend Because mov is an Apple invention (vs. wmv for Microsoft) and there are way too many competing options in video. Ask Apple why they don't support wmv. Same issue. Until this standard thing gets worked out, you often have to have multiple players to be able to play all the different formats.

Quicktime is not a proprietary video format - Microsoft's WMV is - that's why almost nobody in the professional video and film world uses it. Quicktime on the other hand is just a media wrapper that can play back a large amount of video compression codecs natively (H.264, Motion JPEG etc.) and can even handle WMV files on the Mac side (via a free plugin).

Flash video, by the way, is a media wrapper too that can handle various video codecs for playback. Most of the flash videos that you find on the web these days were in fact encoded with H.264 (Youtube for example). So your Windows machine needs an Adobe program to play back that Youtube file. Yikes.... ;-)

Originally Posted by THX1965 What's wrong with using an Apple program on a Windows machine? It's free and works great.

Because once you install it, it bugs you regularly to install an update and there's no way to get it to stop doing that and when you do accept the update, it tries to put lots of other Apple crap on your computer (Safari, MobileMe, iTunes, etc...), puts icons in places I don't want them on my computer, installs stuff in my startup folder, etc... It also tries to take over for other video types which work perfectly fine without it. The fact is that having lots of video players competing on your computer to be the preferred player is far less reliable than having fewer.

Originally Posted by jfriend Because once you install it, it bugs you regularly to install an update and there's no way to get it to stop doing that and when you do accept the update, it tries to put lots of other Apple crap on your computer (Safari, MobileMe, iTunes, etc...), puts icons in places I don't want them on my computer, installs stuff in my startup folder, etc... It also tries to take over for other video types which work perfectly fine without it. The fact is that having lots of video players competing on your computer to be the preferred player is far less reliable than having fewer.

A valid complaint. But I am sure there are preferences that can be fine tuned to prevent that kind of behavior.

WMV is not your alternative to Quicktime - AVI is, which is the Microsoft competitor to Apple's Quicktime. To my knowledge, Quicktime is more advanced and versatile than AVI, plus it's cross-platform. That may be one of the reasons why it's more widely used in the professional post production world.

Originally Posted by THX1965 A valid complaint. But I am sure there are preferences that can be fine tuned to prevent that kind of behavior. WMV is not your alternative to Quicktime - AVI is, which is the Microsoft competitor to Apple's Quicktime. To my knowledge, Quicktime is more advanced and versatile than AVI, plus it's cross-platform. That may be one of the reasons why it's more widely used in the professional post production world.

Yes, you are likely right about WMV/AVI/MOV - I'm not an expert in this stuff - just a frustrated user that's pissed that so much of this complexity is foisted on end-users because the big boys won't agree how to do things in the way that's best for all end-users rather than in the way that serves their own selfish agenda. Microsoft is just as guilty as Apple in this regard.

Originally Posted by jfriend Yes, you are likely right about WMV/AVI/MOV - I'm not an expert in this stuff - just a frustrated user that's pissed that so much of this complexity is foisted on end-users because the big boys won't agree how to do things in the way that's best for all end-users rather than in the way that serves their own selfish agenda. Microsoft is just as guilty as Apple in this regard.

Ah yes... Sorry I'm late. :P

AVI is a contain only, not a codec. Containers are often confused with codecs especially by Windows users who consistently associate a file's extension with it's contents or purpose.

AVI files can have the same exact guts as a MOV file (e.g. you can have an AVI and MOV that both have H.264 video and AAC Audio). It's not really about the container...

Vegaguy, my biggest recommendation is to get shark007's FREE codec package for windows 7. Not only does this contain all the direcshow filters needed for just about every container out there, it also contains many advanced 3rd party splitters and codecs. Best of all, it sets them all up without stomping on your system configuration. You'll then be able to play any type of media file except for the really weird ones like RIFF right in Windows Media Player or Media Center (Yes, it'll tweak WMC to open MKV/MOV/AVI/TS, etc containers).

Windows 7 DOES come with an H.264 "compatible" filter but it doesn't support all profiles.

Now, I saw someone talking about not wanting to edit in H.264. Obviously, as with photography you want to do as much with the raw file as you can before you have to convert it. I happen to be blessed with a serious workstation and can work with 100's of gigs of raw H.264 off my 5D MKII and they both play fine in windows and scrub and cut fine in Premiere. That may be due to my storage, an OCZ 512GB PCI-E SSD card (4x 128GB NAND flash module in connected to an LSI RAID controller via SAS in RAID0. 1.2GB/s sustained transfer rate). Your storage is always going to be your biggest bottleneck in any recent computer. Even a single SSD or a reasonably fast mechanical drive will make these big files easier to work with.

So while I think it's always a good idea for windows users to have quicktime installed as it is the defacto standard these days, that codec package will make your day and it requires zero configuration (just click the "use Shark007's recommended settings"). Also if you're an Adobe user you should also have a number of codecs installed along side Adobe Media Encoder though because of my setup, I'm not sure which codecs other than private class commercial codecs get installed.

Again, I hope that helps. I'm sorry I'm late but I did get your PM!!!

Cheers!

Originally Posted by DI-Joe Now, I saw someone talking about not wanting to edit in H.264. Obviously, as with photography you want to do as much with the raw file as you can before you have to convert it. I happen to be blessed with a serious workstation and can work with 100's of gigs of raw H.264 off my 5D MKII and they both play fine in windows and scrub and cut fine in Premiere.

DI Joe -

Canon H.264 files are not "raw" files. We all wish they were. They are your originals, if that is what you mean, but they are heavily compressed and on top of that they are limited by an 8-bit color space (4:2:0). That's why H.264 is not an ideal editing format, even if your computer can handle it.

Other than saving time for not having to convert those files, your'e not really gaining anything by editing natively in H.264. On the contrary. Any color manipulation with - let's say - slightly underexposed material in H.264 is going to bring out the worst in your footage. If you have to render any effects, you're further degrading the material. It's like working with (heavily compressed) HDV files natively in your timeline. That's why, for example, Apple's Final Cut Pro by default renders any effects (dissolves etc.) in its lossless high quality ProRes format when dealing with native HDV sequences - to prevent a loss in quality of the rendered material. With H.264 you're running into the same kind of scenario.

By converting those H.264 camera files to a lossless format with a better color space (4:2:2 or 4:4:4) before editing - you're "freezing any compression artifacts" and prevent them from getting worse.

Your most convenient high quality format on the Mac is ProRes (4:2:2 or 4:4:4) since it ships with Final Cut Pro. Another highly regarded format is Cineform http://www.cineform.com/products.php Their codecs can be used on both Macs and Windows machines with Final Cut Pro and all Adobe products.

All of course depends on what you expect from your material. Do you just quickly want to cut a few shots together for the web without much color grading? In that case you may as well stay in H.264, if you have a machine that can handle it.

But for more serious work with effects and color grading down the line, transcoding to either ProRes or Cineform before editing is a must.

Originally Posted by THX1965 DI Joe - Canon H.264 files are not "raw" files. We all wish they were. They are your originals, if that is what you mean, but they are heavily compressed and on top of that they are limited by an 8-bit color space (4:2:0). That's why H.264 is not an ideal editing format, even if your computer can handle it. Other than saving time for not having to convert those files, your'e not really gaining anything by editing natively in H.264. On the contrary. Any color manipulation with - let's say - slightly underexposed material in H.264 is going to bring out the worst in your footage. If you have to render any effects, you're further degrading the material. It's like working with (heavily compressed) HDV files natively in your timeline. That's why, for example, Apple's Final Cut Pro by default renders any effects (dissolves etc.) in its lossless high quality ProRes format when dealing with native HDV sequences - to prevent a loss in quality of the rendered material. With H.264 you're running into the same kind of scenario. By converting those H.264 camera files to a lossless format with a better color space (4:2:2 or 4:4:4) before editing - you're "freezing any compression artifacts" and prevent them from getting worse. Your most convenient high quality format on the Mac is ProRes (4:2:2 or 4:4:4) since it ships with Final Cut Pro. Another highly regarded format is Cineform http://www.cineform.com/products.php Their codecs can be used on both Macs and Windows machines with Final Cut Pro and all Adobe products. All of course depends on what you expect from your material. Do you just quickly want to cut a few shots together for the web without much color grading? In that case you may as well stay in H.264, if you have a machine that can handle it. But for more serious work with effects and color grading down the line, transcoding to either ProRes or Cineform before editing is a must.

You make a very compelling point there about color space that I've up until this point overlooked... I'm definitely going to have to experiment with that. Thank you so much for pointing that out.

Lemme expound on my previous messages...

Yes, I meant original, I know they're not raw..

More importantly, I just had a huge AHA! moment with regards to color space and I'm currently transcoding an entire movie's worth of clips to DNxHD. Fortunately, I can just replace the containers and they'll open right up in Premiere. I can't believe I didn't think of that. I know about color space... I know about H.264 being harsh to any changes in color. I just didn't put 2 and 2 together until you said something. So thank you!

You guys know of any in depth reading on the web regarding some of these facts? These file types are new to me as is Premiere. Sounds like I got my hands full : )

thanks for the feedback to all!

Great Info Thanks !
What do you suggest in my case. I work with Sony Ex1, the files out of the camera are Mp4, mpeg 2 codec, those are the files that I drop on the timeline in Vegas 10.0. Should I convert those files to something else (like cineform) before I start editing? and why?
Thanks !!

Originally Posted by ramirot Great Info Thanks ! What do you suggest in my case. I work with Sony Ex1, the files out of the camera are Mp4, mpeg 2 codec, those are the files that I drop on the timeline in Vegas 10.0. Should I convert those files to something else (like cineform) before I start editing? and why? Thanks !!

Work with it natively in Vegas 10.0. It's all going to stay in the Sony family, if you have a computer that's powerful enough to handle it. The XDCAM format has a better color space than what the Canon cameras record in.

But even for the H.264 footage that the Canon cameras record, I have somewhat changed my mind, now that all the latest NLE's can handle these formats natively. If you have a powerful computer, don't bother converting the H.264 footage. FCP X, for example, will automatically use Apple's high-end PreRes codec for rendering, so you're not further going down in quality. I am assuming other NLE's do a similar thing. FCP X even has an added bonus: you can start editing with your H.264 footage (even while importing it) and at any point later transcode your footage to ProRes in the background, if you choose to do so. FCP X will then automatically relink your newly transcoded material with all your clips.

But on the other hand, if you're really concerned about squeezing the best possible quality out of your DSLR footag, then I'd still say - convert to a higher quality editing codec.

But for XDCAM and Vegas, I'd stay - save yourself the trouble and work with it natively.

--- Markus ---