AVCHD quicktime wrapper

T

TouchOfClass

New member
Does anybody know whats going on with clipwrap 2.0? check this video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wjN0So-_t9w

It looks perfect. Clipwrap, wraps AVCHD videos and makes them look like native Quicktime videos. Not only can Quictime playback the files but any app that edits quicktime can edit avchd files natively! No transcoding, although I doubt real time effects will work, but I don't care, I am more concerned with archiving and playback then I am with editing.

-chico
 
I just tried the trial version download for Mac of Clipwrap 1.1.1 but it's disguise kinda wobbled at me, then proceeded to fall off as it wouldn't accept .MTS AVCHD files from my GH1... I guess we have to wait for 2.0
 
Divergent Media has a sub-forum at DVinfo.net in the non-linear editing for Mac forum... I started a "any word on ClipWrap 2?" thread...
 
I think it does look very promising.

A big step forward with AVCHD is needed... I mean, Quicktime X on Snow Leopard is even still dumb to raw playback of MTS files... its becoming a bit of a joke.
 
commanderspike said:
I mean, Quicktime X on Snow Leopard is even still dumb to raw playback of MTS files.
Click to expand...
Seriously? Windows 7 plays back AVCHD files, the Explorer shows thumbnails (non-square PAR clips are shown correctly in widescreen); can capture AVCHD off AVCHD camcorders. What it does not do, it does not display subtitles and other metadata, and there is no control over deinterlacing.
 
Barry_Green said:
What specifically is becoming a bit of a joke?
Click to expand...

To clarify - AVCHD has been around as a recording format for years. There are a lot of hardware implementations for raw AVCHD playback, yet the software implementations on personal computers really are lagging behind.

Sometimes I don't want to transcode every MTS file on my memory card. I want to double click and enjoy full screen playback of raw AVCHD video.

In my opinion, it is a joke that after so many years, Mac OS X, Quicktime, VLC Player and others still make such a hash of AVCHD compatibility.

What is it - fear of having to pay too much in licensing fees? I guess that's why graphics cards don't have a dedicated onboard AVCHD encoding chip?

But yet, the PS3 does it, and a £1800 Macbook Pro doesn't. It irks me.
 
Cranky said:
Seriously? Windows 7 plays back AVCHD files, the Explorer shows thumbnails (non-square PAR clips are shown correctly in widescreen); can capture AVCHD off AVCHD camcorders. What it does not do, it does not display subtitles and other metadata, and there is no control over deinterlacing.
Click to expand...

Yes seriously!! Quicktime X has no support for AVCHD playback. Nothing. Naaathing.

VLC Player, which claims to support AVCHD playback - well I have NEVER got this working on my Mac. Maybe I am doing something wrong, but the image always breaks up with full HD GH1 MTS files.

Apparently Toast player does it... but, erm, it'll never be my main playback software. Quicktime player is. Come on Apple...

One more gripe... Premiere CS4 has raw AVCHD editing capability. Wonderful!! Erm, that doesn't work properly either. Maybe it really is JUST me and my Macbook being retarded.
 
commanderspike said:
To clarify - AVCHD has been around as a recording format for years. There are a lot of hardware implementations for raw AVCHD playback, yet the software implementations on personal computers really are lagging behind.
Click to expand...
Only on the Mac. On Windows you can use Nero, or Windows Classic Media Player (or whatever it's called), or Premiere or any number of tools, all of which will use the graphics card acceleration. And all of which will play the native .mts files.

Sometimes I don't want to transcode every MTS file on my memory card. I want to double click and enjoy full screen playback of raw AVCHD video.
Click to expand...
I do that every day. I also then drag those files right onto the timeline in CS4.1 and edit them and zoom in on them and cut and trim and whatever, all in realtime, right from the memory card.

In my opinion, it is a joke that after so many years, Mac OS X, Quicktime, VLC Player and others still make such a hash of AVCHD compatibility.
Click to expand...
That's what I was wondering if that's what you were saying. I do agree, Mac's refusal to work with native camcorder file formats is a complete joke.

What is it - fear of having to pay too much in licensing fees? I guess that's why graphics cards don't have a dedicated onboard AVCHD encoding chip?
Click to expand...
Graphics cards do have onboard native h.264 chips. The Mac just doesn't apparently let you use it, somehow. You can get badaboom or nero moveit or CS4, all use the graphics card hardware to accelerate h.264 encoding and decoding. Look for an nVidia card that supports "CUDA", or an ATI graphics card that supports ATI Stream. It's my understanding that if you've got that, you've got native accelerated h.264 playback on your graphics card.

Tomorrow's already here. It's just the Mac OS that doesn't let you use it. So complain to them, make them change their shortsighted policy.

But yet, the PS3 does it, and a £1800 Macbook Pro doesn't. It irks me.
Click to expand...
And me as well, but that's a discussion that flares up here every once in a while, so we'll just leave it as that.

Identify where the actual culprit is, and then target your inquiries towards those who can fix it. Install Windows/BootCamp on your system, and download the trial of Nero, and see if you don't get full-screen, 1920x1080, 24fps playback in realtime by double-clicking the native .mts files. If you do, then you've got all the hardware you need, and you need to start nagging Apple to allow you to use what you've already got.
 
I just checked; the Apple MBP site is bragging about the new MBPs having an nVidia GEForce 9400M integrated graphics processor, and the 15" and 17" have an additional 9600M discrete graphics processor! That thing should be able to play multiple streams of AVCHD simultaneously.

Try BootCamp. Seriously. I am now curious as heck about this.

That 9600M should have 32 parallel processing cores, and the 9400M has 16 parallel processing cores. I think my card (NVS 140M) only has 8 cores, and it can handle 720/60p in realtime, and almost handles 1080/24p in realtime in editing. It can display 1080/60i in Nero in realtime, fullscreen. Those Mac cards should be firebreathing dragons on AVCHD.

Try it in BootCamp. Somebody please try AVCHD in the Windows version of Premiere Pro CS4.1, running under BootCamp. I'd seriously love to see the results. I have a very strong suspicion that you'll be shocked.
 
Yes my 'joke' situation is all from my Mac perspective. But I'll never return to Windows again. Even if it does handle AVCHD a whole lot better.

Final Cut Pro was the reason I went to the Mac for video. It's performance is still better than Premiere, I think.

JUST THAT DAMNED AVCHD PLAYBACK ISSUE!!! Come on Apple... and come on VLC Player...
 
Playback of 720p GH1 footage on the PC remains quirky here (on a quad core PC). Fine in Nero, Premiere Elements 7 struggles with it (eg after dragging it to the timeline, PE then has all cores thrashing for some minutes, and then will usually play it if you wait patiently for the PC to settle). Pinnacle Studio 12.1 works fine with the 720p clips if you have a 1080i file on the timeline first, otherwise I tend to get video freezing at transitions though the sound continues. PowerDirector also gives video freezes with the 720p clips unless you tell it (clip by clip) to treat the clips as interlaced, top field first - go figure - which then makes it quite happy. I've even written a little utility to help speed up the process of going along the timeline clip by clip setting the clips to interlaced.

All in all, for maximum flexibility to use the footage easily in whatever app seems right at the time, transcoding to high bitrate mpeg2 (I use MediaShow Espresso which uses CUDA to do the job very quickly, and I'm on PAL so no pulldown concerns) makes life a whole lot easier. Or I can use the proxy way of working using a text editor to alter the project files between editing and rendering.

YMMV. Some people don't seem to have any problems at all with native AVCHD on the PC. The GH1 1080i stuff seems less problematic. (Why?!).
 
Maybe they're waiting to implement it till OpenCL support gets added to the Pro Apps?

In any case that might also mean faster transcoding...aside from the wait I actually like how stable editing with transcoded footage is and how it gives me a lot more flexibility to move around to different applications with ease.

I would never boot into windows for video editing...it just seems so wrong to me... :) I like the fact that when using a mac there is a certain amount of consistency inbetween applications and the operating system, and I think the lack of such consistency would (and does) drive me crazy when I use windows...but yes I do use it from time to time.

Hmm...I love final cut pro so much also...but I do have Premiere CS3...maybe I'll futz around with it a bit more as I have to support people on premiere (and Vegas but with those users it's mainly explaining to them stuff like why their footage is ghosting all over the place because they don't know anything about dealing with combing footage shot at different framerates...etc) on a pretty regular basis so I should probably learn a little more about it...but for now I don't mind transcoding anymore than I minded ingesting P2 cards with the HVX...it's all the same to me, and while it might take longer by GB it doesn't seem to take too much longer by minute (ok maybe a fair amount longer but again I'm used to planning my edits knowing I'l be waiting for footage to ingest....not that htat's a good thing or a feature...I'm just saying I already am doing it before i got this camera.)
 
Last edited:
Ben, I think you need Premiere 4.1 to get smooth performance with AVCHD 720p60. Am running it on a MacPro 3GHz Dual-Core and playback is nice and smooth when dropped into a 24p timeline. My graphics card my be a factor -- NVIDIA Quadro FX 4500 w/512MB VRAM.
 
Last edited:
TouchOfClass said:
Does anybody know whats going on with clipwrap 2.0? check this video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wjN0So-_t9w

It looks perfect. Clipwrap, wraps AVCHD videos and makes them look like native Quicktime videos. Not only can Quictime playback the files but any app that edits quicktime can edit avchd files natively! No transcoding, although I doubt real time effects will work, but I don't care, I am more concerned with archiving and playback then I am with editing.

-chico
Click to expand...

Why wait for Clipwrap, you can already do it with ffmpeg. There is no magic behind it.
 
pailes said:
Why wait for Clipwrap, you can already do it with ffmpeg. There is no magic behind it.
Click to expand...

Does FFMpeg simply transcode the footage or does it actually "wrap" it the way this software claims to, wherin you don't have to wait and the file sizes don't change?

Also suggest to mod that this be moved to "Workflow."
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top