editing HD footage

R

robhaywood

New member
Dear Members,
As a new owner of the XH A1 I have recorded HD 1080/50i footage and have uploaded to Sony Vegas 7 for editing.
Problem 1: clips are uploaded out of chronological sequence
Problem 2: when rendering the project to standard dv and using DVD Architect to create a DVD, all moving footage shows jagged edges
Would be great to hear from anyone with the solutions.
Thanks.
 
The problem you described is a very common one when shooting interlaced video in HD, and then downconverting to SD. If you shoot progressive this isn't an issue. In my tests I've found that Vegas is the worst at this. Premiere Pro does an excellent job with dealing with this issue, but the downconversion is not as sharp as Vegas. The best compromise I've found is to import your file into After Effects, use an SD composition, scale your footage down 45%, then render out your Mpeg-2 for DVD.
My workflow for the time being, edit in Premiere(or Vegas), render out my project at full size, import into After Effects, and render out an mpeg-2 from AE. Now if you open an HD file in an HD composition in AE, and let it do the downconversion, you'll have the jagged lines. You have to manually resize your footage to fit into an SD composition. If you don't have access to After Effects I'm not sure what else you can do. I'm currently looking for a better solution myself so I'll keep you posted to any new developments.
-Kevin
 
robhaywood

I have the A1 in NTSC flavor which shoots 60i. I capture my clips from the tape and Vegas breaks the stream into scene clips in linear format . I edit the footage (generally in a 1280 x 720 template instead of the native 1440 x 1080) this gives me a 1280 x 720 edit master which works fine for my clients. Where I intend to go o DVD or for local cable I render out the 1280 x 720 HD content using the DVD Architect NTSC Videostream (you would use the PAL Videostream)

This gives you a 4:3 frame with letterboxed video (black bars) top and bottom, which preserves the widescreen aspect of the original video. Vegas down converts and scales the image with minimum quality loss.

If you view this output on your computer monitor or on a an LCD TV you will see the jaggies which are caused by the interlacing. LCD or computer monitors are progressive scan. If, however, you watch the DVD on a TV (PAL in your case) you will not see the jaggies since TV's display interlaced format.

If you intend the video for viewing on a computer then set the PAL template to progressive scan by changing the field order drop down menu to progressive instead of lower field first (render as, chose PAL DV Videostream from the template menu, Click the custom button, Click video tab, Select field order menu, Select progressive) and make sure you tell DVD Architect to produce a progressive scan DVD as it defaults to interlaced in either the PAL or NTSC templates.

Best regards,

S Cannon
 
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If, however, you watch the DVD on a TV (NTSC or PAL) you will not see the jaggies since TV's display interlaced format.
Click to expand...
Jaggies will still be there. Whenever there is movement. These aren't the normal interlace jaggies, they are much more pronounced, and it doesn't matter if you render to upper field first or lower field first. I will add that I capture using HDV split, and I haven't yet done tests to rule that out as the potential problem. I'm surprised this hasn't been mentioned more.
-Kevin
 
I convert my M2t files to AVI using Cineform Neo and edit in a normal 720 timeline as I do not have use for the 1080 format at this time. I have not noticed the aformentioned jaggies when I output to 720 x 480 or 720 by 480 widescreen as NTSC DV 29.976.

S Cannon
 
Sacksnack said:
The problem you described is a very common one when shooting interlaced video in HD, and then downconverting to SD. If you shoot progressive this isn't an issue. In my tests I've found that Vegas is the worst at this. Premiere Pro does an excellent job with dealing with this issue, but the downconversion is not as sharp as Vegas. The best compromise I've found is to import your file into After Effects, use an SD composition, scale your footage down 45%, then render out your Mpeg-2 for DVD.
My workflow for the time being, edit in Premiere(or Vegas), render out my project at full size, import into After Effects, and render out an mpeg-2 from AE. Now if you open an HD file in an HD composition in AE, and let it do the downconversion, you'll have the jagged lines. You have to manually resize your footage to fit into an SD composition. If you don't have access to After Effects I'm not sure what else you can do. I'm currently looking for a better solution myself so I'll keep you posted to any new developments.
-Kevin
Click to expand...
Thanks for your quick response Kevin & S.Cannon. Seems a long way round to overcome jagged edges & out of sequence clips.

Not that I wanted to do this(since I eventually require my footage to be HD), it seems the only way to get these projects completed in DVD, is to down convert from HD to SD in the camera prior to capturing to Vegas.

This should solve the problem short term, but how on earth are we ever going to edit and produce something without jagged edges in HD, without involving ourselves in an extremely long winded method?

I'm a new member on the thread, and I too will experiment. If I come up with anything, I will post another message for all to see.

Filming in HD for a few months now, it is noticeable how the background highlights are grossly exagerated. Maybe its the camera, the Canon XH-A1?
 
I just ran another quick test with some 60i footage in Vegas and Premiere. After exporting the same clip from both editors and stepping through it slowly, I could really see how the interlacing in the Vegas clip is messed up. Instead of a fine comb pattern, that would disappear on a television, the lines are very thick. The Premiere export displays the interlacing correctly. I tried Vegas 7 and 8. And after doing a bit of research on different forums, it seems this is a common problem among most editing software. I would shoot 24F if you need HD and you're using Vegas. I'd be curious to see some 60i downconverted footage from S Cannon, he's using Cineform and he's not having any problems.
As far as blown out highlights, use your zebras to control exposure, don't rely just on the image in the LCD.
-Kevin
 
Thanks Kevin. I really appreciate you spending time looking at this for me. I've shot 5 different projects now in 50i, some of them massive jobs, so it looks as though I may not be ever able to offer this work to them in HD. Shame!

When I return home, I will carry out some tests using 24p. Ironic that I was told not to record in this mode as its the progressive scan mode that's meant to give the jagged look! Perhaps I have been ill advised!

I'm sure that we are all going to hear a lot more about this topic in the future!

For now, I think I will have to down convert in the camera before I download to Vegas and ignore HD for the time being, or at least until I've tried 24P.

Thanks for your help with the zebra. I'd just read about it in the XH-A1 manual and realised that I should either adjust that or use the AE shift adjustment.

You seem to have a great in-depth knowledge of capture & editing Kevin!

Regards, Rob
 
robhaywood, sacksnack:

Guys, I am away this week but will shoot a test clip or two when I am back to see if I just missed the jaggaies or my workflow mimimizes them. I shoot in 24f 99% of the time but did 2 projects in 60i. Sorry but I was just the shooter and one of the editors so the tapes and final footage went to the client.

Rob try shooting in 25f, down converting to SD and then make your DVD. I am not shooting PAL so my work flow is different. With NTSC DVD's are generally interlaced. In Sony DVD Architect you can output both interlaced or progressive DVD's. Most of today's DVD players can add interlacing back into a progressive scan DVD video stream when it plays if the player detects that the display (TV) is interlaced and not prgressive.

Unlike NTSC PAL does not have 2:3 or 2:3:3:2 pulldown since the interlaced and progressive frame rate is the the same.

Best regards,

S Cannon
 
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