A transcoder friendly to Mac and PC?

S

shawn.w

Active member
Hey Everyone,

I'll soon start transcoding my footage to edit in PProCS4 on my PC, but im working with a friend who will be doing the green screen keying and motion graphics for the project on his Mac. I think he said he was going to use Shake for the keying if this makes a difference for what transcoder would be best.

Anyways, im looking for a transcoder that is easy to use, as this will be my first time both transcoding and managing a HMC150 work flow, and also one that will output files good for keying green screen and that can transfer well between a PC and a Mac.

It would also be a big bonus if the transcoder could work from just the .mts files as there will be situations where ill be unlikely to retain the original file structure. Let me know what you think, thanks!

- Shawn
 
Cineform neoscene seems like the easiest option. Can the Mac programs for motion graphics and green screen keying use both the AVI and MOV files it transcodes to or is one choice better than the other?

I have the free P2 transcoder downloaded, but would prefer something nicer as ive heard cineform transcoding can help for green screen keying as it makes it a 4:2:2 color space (i dont really even understand what this means).

Plus there's going to be a lot of .mts files i can trash from this long term project after i review them on my PC, so i would much rather be able to use a transcoder where i can trash .mts files and organize them individually, moving them around into different folders and renaming them. Obviously after i mess up the original file structure the free P2 transcoder wont work as it requires it right? But cineform should work with just the .mts files, and all i would be loosing would be the ability to put the files back onto the camera, and the meta data, which i dont use anyways.

unless there's some other downside to me renaming and organizing just the .mts files and using cineform to transcode?
 
as far as i know, macs can only handle MOV, while PCs can handle both. so i'd recommend using MOVs.

yes, the cineform codec can upres the color sampling to 4:2:2 which is better for keying and extensive fx and coloring, but depending on what you're outputting to, you may never notice the difference.

i understand the desire to organize and clean up clips. that was my main reason for doing the same thing.

i recommend saving the original avchd folder structure as an archive. you can still delete individual clips, just be sure to also delete the corresponding .cpi files from the CLIPINF folder as well. you just can't move the clips around or put them into any sub-folders.

however, unless you plan to edit the transcoded cineform files and later replace them with the original .mts to render your final export, there's no reason you can't just do all the same clip deleting, renaming and sorting with the cineform files instead of the original avchd files.

basically, keep a copy of the card intact for archive or re-transcoding in the future and do all your asset mgmt and editing on the transcoded files.
 
I am pretty sure (I'm not at my editing computer) that my PC version of NeoScene only produces AVI. Some of Cineform's more expensive PC products may give you a choice, but not NeoScene.
 
looks like neoscene does both AVI and MOV:

"Files created: 10-bit CineForm Intermediate (4:2:2) with either AVI (Windows) or MOV (Mac) wrapper."

However it lists that on the neoscene page, under a Neo HD heading... so im not sure if you have to upgrade to get those features or not. Can anyone with neoscene confirm or deny?
 
humm this is confusing because on the cineform neoscene site:

http://www.cineform.com/neoscene/

They Say:

"You see, camera formats are designed for recording, not editing. With Neo Scene you will convert your difficult-to-edit HDV, AVCHD, or Canon 5D Mk II camera footage to CineForm AVI or MOV files and then benefit from the same theatrical quality format and real-time editing performance as professionals."


whats the deal?
 
if that's true, its dumb.

in that case i'd buy TMPGEnc or Adobe Media Encoder and use the free Avid DNxHD codec to transcode to DNxHD .mov.

no gamma shift, 4:2:2 and works on mac and pc.
 
Another option is to use avid DNxHD, there are 10-bit and 4:2:2 options, it's nearly lossless, and it's free.

You could access it through any front end that has Quicktime (e.g. AME CS4)

^same posting time :)
 
"in that case i'd buy TMPGEnc or Adobe Media Encoder and use the free Avid DNxHD codec to transcode to DNxHD .mov."


I dont understand how TMPGEnc and Adobe Media Encoder work with the codec. Is it that you need one of those two programs to transcode, then you can download the DNxHD codec for free somewhere and that plugs into the transcoder program? What does DNxHD stand for? Man i really wish cineform for PC would just output to something that could work between PC and Mac.

oh does DNxHD need the original file structure or can it just work from .mts files?

So now it would seem the only options for transcoding to allow for a PC and Mac transferable workflow are the free P2 encoder and DNxHD?

Thanks!
 
shawn.w said:
I dont understand how TMPGEnc and Adobe Media Encoder work with the codec. Is it that you need one of those two programs to transcode, then you can download the DNxHD codec for free somewhere and that plugs into the transcoder program? What does DNxHD stand for? Man i really wish cineform for PC would just output to something that could work between PC and Mac.

oh does DNxHD need the original file structure or can it just work from .mts files?

So now it would seem the only options for transcoding to allow for a PC and Mac transferable workflow are the free P2 encoder and DNxHD?

Thanks!
Click to expand...

DNxHD free from avid, not sure what the acronymn stands for

You can access it with any application that can access quicktime, so you don't need TMPGenc or AME CS4 necessarily, but since you already have AME it makes it easier. Since it exports in a .mov wrapper, it is intercompatible with PC/Mac

You don't need the folder structure to encode, individual .mts files are fine

Other options are uncompressed, animation codec, png, but they all have to be wrapped in mov to make Mac users happy. Any platform that has QTPro can access these options, but they are true lossless, and larger in size than DNxHD. If you need alpha channel preserved, animation and png are often used.
 
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