Does Premiere Pro accept the HVX files yet?

C

c.g._eads

Veteran
I read through the forum and found a couple of threads that indirectly addressed this question, but I'm still not sure of the answer. If I'm shooting HD on the HVX onto P2 cards, what is the process for getting them onto my PC, into Premiere Pro 2.0? (I just realized how foreign that sentence would sound to someone who doesn't understand computers: HD - HVX - P2 - PC - Premiere Pro 2.0)

Do I need a plug-in?

Someone earlier said their HVX footage was jerky in Premiere. What do I do to avoid this?

I believe the video files are captured in their proprietary HVX format? Will Premiere Pro understand that format or do I need to convert them into a different format?

Any other advice would be appreciated. A client wants to know if I can edit this footage so I have to make sure when I say yes that I can really do it.
 
Yes, you need some other option.

Yes, you need some other option.

I have PPro 2 and it doesn't accept MXF files directly.

To get MXF files into PPro 2, I use Aspect HD, which also comes with a stand-alone app named HDLink.

I prefer offloading P2 files to an external firewire drive. (I'm too poor...er, budget conscious to purchase multiple P2 cards). I've dedicated a portable firewire drive to that purpose. I use it on location to do nothing else but store P2 footage until I get back to my editing computer and transfer the files from the portable drive to my computer.

I follow these steps for HDLink:

1) offload P2 files to a firewire disk
2) connect that disk to my editing computer and wait for it to be recognized
3) Start/All Programs/HDLink. It opens in its' own window.
4) Click the tab titled "Convert".
5) Click " Select"
6) Choose the correct "Source Clips" (I "Browse" as necessary to locate the source location and/or the target location).
7) I then select the MXF files from my portable drive found under the "Video" folder
8) Click "Start" in the HDLink window. The converted clips appear in the bottom drop-down box titled "Converted Clips". I also get messages in a separate window titled "CineForm HDLink Capture Log".
(Note that each "Video" file you convert, results in creation of 2 files:
1 file with BOTH video and audio, and 1 file of only audio. Somewhere I read why that happens, but can't recall at the moment. It doesn't cause problems, other than to use up some space, and can help if you run into a situation where you need only the audio).

Aspect HD is a little different. It serves as a plug-in, and upon installation, all the options will appear when you create a "New Project" in PPro 2. At that time, you'll see "Cineform" listed under "Available Presets". Click on the "+" sign, and it will open up for you to see all the CineForm HD presets.

Both HDLink and Aspect HD convert MXF files into CineForm's intermediate format. Once converted, PPro 2 works very well with them.
Without Aspect HD, I wouldn't be able to bring in any MXF file footage.

There are other options, I think something called "Raylight" works similarly. Also, I believe you can record directly to a PC, but that requires even more - and more expensive - software. I think (could be wrong) that BlackMagic is the most effective/most popular for that.

There are lots of posts that explain how to offload P2 files to an external drive, and it's describe very well in Barry Green's "HVX Book".

Aspect HD works fine for me.

Hope this helps.
 
Whoa, thanks for all that. Very helpful. One quick question: Is Aspect HD expensive? What's the price tag on that puppy? Anybody, for a comparison, know the Raylight price?
 
I'm going to answer my own question.

Raylight = $195
Aspect HD = $500

I doubt there are many people who have used both of these programs so who knows if Aspect is worth the extra $300.
 
The Raylight workflow:

Drag MXF files (from your hard disk or from the P2 card) to the timeline and edit.

That's it. That's all you have to do. You can do more, if you want, but it really is that simple. Plug in your card, drag MXF files to the timeline, and edit. Or, if you've copied the files to a hard disk, just drag those MXF files from your hard disk right to the timeline. Done.
 
Based on Barry's reply, it seems

Based on Barry's reply, it seems

that Raylight is also a plug-in and is similar to Aspect HD.( I don't know if raylight has a stand-alone app similar to HD Link).

Aspect HD also allows dragging directly to the timeline once you've selected the preset appropriate for your footage. Raylight is often mentioned on this board, so I'm guessing it must be as effective. I'm not familiar with the differences between the two that justifies such a disparity in cost, though I do know CineForm has been very good about providng updates. SInce I don't have Raylight, I don't know how its' owners respond to customer needs.

x
 
Raylight is all things a P2 user would need. It's:
1) a plug-in for Premiere Pro and Vegas, which allows direct editing of the MXF files instantly.

2) a file converter that can turn MXF files into AVI files (for use in any program other than Vegas or Premiere, such as After Effects).

3) a P2 exporter program that can author an AVI back out to a P2-compatible MXF file.

Raylight is not limited to having to convert files. File conversion takes up time and hard disk space; Raylight can do it that way but it doesn't have to. If you were out in the field shooting for several weeks and came back to the studio with 500GB of P2 files on a hard disk, Raylight lets you begin editing immediately. Other utilities (like CineForm) or other programs (like FCP) would require you to get another hard disk, and copy/unwrap/convert all your source files to translate them into new files on that new hard disk, before you were able to work with them. Raylight can also do that type of workflow, but it doesn't have to. Don't underestimate how powerful and cool it is to edit the native MXFs, the way they were always intended to be.
 
although Barry has pretty much summed up how cool Raylight is, im going to chime in and say that raylight is 100% worth the cost, and works beautifully. once youve installed it and the plugin, its the same as if you had naitive .mxf support within PPRO. completely seamless and transparent to edit your HVX material directly without any additional steps whatsoever needed if you dont want. but it also lets you do more as Barry illustrates. three suggestions for you.. get it, get it, and get it.
 
It could be me but I get better realtime multi stream performance out of Aspect HD than the demo version of Raylight set at RED. Dual core P4 3GHz 2gig.

Any body else benchmark them?

Newbie Anne
 
I too seem to get a little slower realtime using raylight, but I get this with any raylight setting, not just red. Could be a vista problem.

Exactly what happens, is when the clip first starts up, it starts at like 20 fps, and about 3 seconds into the clip, I'll be at real time. This happens with each new clip in a timeline.

No clue if it's a raylight problem or not, it's not a big deal to me, and for the price raylight is a pretty amazing program.
 
I have been using Aspect HD for nearly a year, and have mixed feelings about it. Yes, it is fast, since they have replaced Adobe's render engine, it is very good about getting multiple streams. The image quality is great.

Now the downside- having to transcode my MXF files to Cineform compressed AVIs is a pain in the butt. It almost negates the time I'm saving by shooting to P2 card- since now instead of capturing tapes, I have to babysit the Cineform HDLink transcoding software- which in my experience is pretty buggy.

The other big downside, is since they have replaced premiere's rendering engine, that seems to make premiere more buggy as well- which really sucks. It's not like PPro was bombproof to start with- now it's pretty bad.

This has lead me to start looking at my options- I do like adobe's interface, and the easy ineroperability between ppro and aftereffects. This is the only thing that keeps me from jumping to Edius. Raylight seems like it would be a good alternative- keeping premiere's interface, and allowing drag/drop w/ MXF files- so I could really have that DTE workflow that I wanted in the first place. The only question is- how buggy and slow will it be? Time for me to find out.

-Tom
 
Jmtasu said:
I too seem to get a little slower realtime using raylight, but I get this with any raylight setting, not just red. Could be a vista problem.

Exactly what happens, is when the clip first starts up, it starts at like 20 fps, and about 3 seconds into the clip, I'll be at real time. This happens with each new clip in a timeline.

No clue if it's a raylight problem or not, it's not a big deal to me, and for the price raylight is a pretty amazing program.
Click to expand...

Here is a table showing expected performance for Raylight.

http://dvfilm.com/raylight/raylightSpeed.htm

If you get performance a lot different from this, taking into account CPU speed and the number of cores that you have, DVFilm Support would like to hear from you.

One thing to keep in mind is that virus scanners can delay the opening of every file and application while it checks for viruses. Also a highly fragmented file system, or a disk that is also used for the operating system (particularly under low memory conditions) can also exhibit delays on accessing files.
 
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i have no problem running HD at the full quality setting @ full frame rate. it also depends on whether you have the PPRO engine set at full quality or automatic. but on top of that (same as with aspect HD) once you add correction or effects to anything your going to possibly get slowed down as far as frame rate. but for the most part i do all my editing @ the medium medium raylight quality setting and PPRO set to automatic. this gives me most effects and transitions in HD at full or close to full fps. then if i really need to check something precisely..or to do the final render i have the raylight control sitting off the to side so that with one click I can check full quality ..same as if i was just changing a setting in PPRO.

as far as SD its pretty much a non issue from what ive used it for so far. i dont know if theres much that wont run full FPS effects and all in SD anymore.

and yes. as MVB points out.. people shoud not be running antivirus or anti spywar softwer when they are editing/compositing. ..you really shouldnt be running anything else period. no gadgets or VOIP or any of the other lead weights that people like to fill their computers up with.
 
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