Getting to the bottom of the noise complaints - is it h.264 uncompression software?

PDR said:
The hypothesis is that some part of the PC/MAC software might be causing playback differences. For example, the quicktime AVC decoder might be doing the RGB conversion differently than ffdshow using ffmpeg (or whatever decoder)
Click to expand...

Exactly. Somewhere along the line, I suspect that there are pieces of software that are performing much better than others. I'm trying to see if we can figure out what the weak links are. Someone else said that on the OSX platform, Quicktime 7 will play h.264 files slowly, but accurately, whereas Quicktime 10 will tap into the graphics card and play files much more quickly, but not looking as good. Someone would have to verify that for us (someone who had both QT7 and QT10 installed on the same system) but if true, that's exactly the kind of thing I'm looking for in this thread.
 
Barry_Green said:
Philip's stuff was graded, and Leo's was edited; did he even post unedited clips?

IINM, the PS3 allows you to play footage directly off a memory card, right? I will post a few clips in original SDHC memory card format, if you would be kind enough to download that and copy it to a freshly-formatted SDHC card and then plug that in the PS3 and play it, I think it would be very helpful.
Click to expand...

How about a SDHC card image file that we can copy to a SDHC card.

Then I can play it using the card slot in my Panasonic blu ray player out HDMI to a Pioneer Elite.
 
FYI, for those that have Quicktime 10 installed when they upgraded to Snow Leopard, can also have Quicktime 7 stalled by popping in the Snow Leopard install disks and I believe it's in the extras or utilities folder.
 
How about if there's more noise on Apple vs PC or vice verse? I for one have not any noise to speak of when viewing on a plasma or LCD telly but a computer always displays a lesser image with more noise.
 
See the original post, or post 24, for instructions on how to download some sample footage so we have a common reference point.
 
You'll know it. These clips should look good. If you put it in and look at it and say "hey, that's good-looking footage" then you don't have the issue. If you put it in and say "whoa -- what's wrong with this footage?!?!" then yeah, you've got it, and we would need to explore further.

Specifically I'm looking for folks who have nasty noise on their computers, but on their blu-ray or PS3 it looks great.
 
Barry_Green said:
Exactly. Somewhere along the line, I suspect that there are pieces of software that are performing much better than others. I'm trying to see if we can figure out what the weak links are. Someone else said that on the OSX platform, Quicktime 7 will play h.264 files slowly, but accurately, whereas Quicktime 10 will tap into the graphics card and play files much more quickly, but not looking as good. Someone would have to verify that for us (someone who had both QT7 and QT10 installed on the same system) but if true, that's exactly the kind of thing I'm looking for in this thread.
Click to expand...

Well, we already know QT7 decodes AVC differently than just about every other decoder. Specific to this thread, it adds noise. A lot of testing was done on 5D, 7D samples (which as we know uses a different type of AVC compression) and on the 5DtoRGB threads here and on other forums. I don't want to derail this thread - as it deals with AF100 specifically, but if you want me to explain more or post screenshots I can.
 
Here's what I did.

Formatted a new SDHC card. Copied the PRIVATE FOLDER to the card.

Inserted it into our Panasonic blu ray player, and played the two motion clips and two chart/bars out HDMI to a Pioneer Elite 42" plasma.

I saw no noise.

Neither did spouse.

Also converted two mts files of dancer and candlelit scene using ClipWrap2 with no transcode, just rewrap to h264. Viewed in QT 7 Pro Player with MacPro and NVIDIA 4800 to ACD.

Same thing.

May be my eyes are old, and we are on the fence about the AF-100, but this is what we viewed (or didn't view).

Happy to test more, but I didn't see any noise.
 
well i must be in the category of bad viewing. the low light of the girl, over her shoulder is awful, even slight CC to the other well exposed clips degrades fast. the fact that you say it should look fine scares me barry. but it looks that same as the vimeo file, no change for me. heres my viewing setup (which for HDV and HXV P2 looks awesome).

macbook pro 17"
2.5 duo 4G memory
viewed on FCP 7 timeline
DVI-HDMI on 42" Samsung 1080p(colour is configured to get consistent results)

again, i have never had an issue with more noise on my setup. granted it is not studio ready, i coloured our P2 footage on it and when burnt to blu ray and shown on an HD projector, it looked amazing(nature doc of water falls and fall forest), same what i saw. i am puzzled and worried about buying this camera, but i do have to say scene files and custom presets can drastically change noise and exposure levels in camera. many tests and issues with noise on my xha1 until i configured a good custom preset, night and day. this footage is also pre-production? not sure if that will have an effect. anyhow, thanks for the files barry, ill have to wait and see when my camera comes to do a definitive test for myself. for now ill keep my order in=].
 
Out DVI from the canvas DOES NOT provide an accurate high resolution image. Out using EC/34 Matrox MXO will, but not DVI from the canvas.

Nor is the canvas anything more than a low res proxy in FCP.
 
Last edited:
quicktime files, on both 10 and 7 look the same as the canvas. in the first sentence do you mean it doesnt? yes, i understand the connection is not ideal, for my budget it is. though i have gotten great results with my setup, so i dont think the fix would be to spend more money. i think the footage was flawed from the beginning, timurs footage looks great on my end.
 
Made the correction in previous post.

Do you have HQ enabled in QT 7 and 10?

What codec are you using to the view the files? Have they been transcoded to a specific pro res codec?

Specifics are important.
 
bgundu said:
FYI, for those that have Quicktime 10 installed when they upgraded to Snow Leopard, can also have Quicktime 7 stalled by popping in the Snow Leopard install disks and I believe it's in the extras or utilities folder.
Click to expand...

correct! I am waiting for my wife to let me take over that computer so I can test the difference, cause I have both and hate QT10 ! I think Barry is spot on with his suspicion. We need to find the best transcoder and be done with this ASAP. So if what Barry is saying is right, the same should be valid for GH1 and GH2 right? For any AVCHD footage right? not only AF100...
 
Hmmmm...I am definitely in the "bad" category

I checked the footage on 2 desktops and 2 laptops. Operating systems were Windows 7 Ultimate 64 and XP Pro. Graphics cards were Nvidia 1GB (x2 - 1 Laptop/1 Desktop) and on board. Processors were i7, Core 2 Duo, AMD Phenom Quad Core.

All results were not favorable, with that said...I have viewed plenty of AF100 footage on these systems that looked great in the dark areas, including the ProRes files from "A Verse Before Dying".

I will view these files on my WDTV Live tonight and see if there is a change.

My guess would be this was caused by in camera settings and is not noticeable when darks are even slightly crushed...
 
Barry, I downloaded the AVCHD files and runned them on my Dell Vostro on it's screen, a Philips external LCD-TV (connected to my Dell's HDMI output) and my Pioneer plasma. Both the LCD and plasma were calibrated.
When I watched it on my plasma I used a Panasonic Bluray-player with SD-card slot in 1080p via HDMI. My Dell has a Nvidia GT330M graphics adapter. Noise looks the same in both Media player and VLC.

On my Dell's screen using VLC player/WIN7PRO64 blacks are not as great as either the LCD or plasma and in clip 1 there's alot of noise. There's also noise on the LCD and plasma. About the same amount of noise but a bit less apparent than on my Dell's screen.

On the bellydancer there's some noise in the black skirt on my Dell's screen, a bit less on the Philips LCD and nothing I can see on the plasma. But the background is noisy on all screens to the far left and right, or is it compression pixels dancing around?

On the testpattern there's little noise in the blacks on my Dell, less so on my Philips LCD and nothing I could see on the plasma.

I don't know what this tells us about noise in the AF since I don't know which ISO they were shot in. But I do not consider my Dell's screen to be anything worth as a reference monitor but I do rely on my Pioneer plasma to show a correct image.
Noise aside resolution and colour is top notch and on my plasma the only thing distracting is the pixels on the bellydancer clip.
 
ah yes sorry david. transcoded to proresHQ. seems some other people are having the same issue. thats all i have tried, wont try more until i get the camera to try myself. HDSLR footage has fluctuated tremendously, thus ive learnt; until i have my own settings in the camera to try, i cant make a judgment call. ill keep checking back to see how the discussion builds.
 
Formatted a new SDHC card. Copied the PRIVATE FOLDER to the card.

Connected card reader to USB port on a Sony blu ray player, connected to a 46" Sony Bravia LCD 1080P via HDMI. Saw no noise in the blacks or any where else for that matter. *Edit: A little where her arm goes from the bright side to the dark. Footage overall looked great.

Next, and I've never touched AVCHD footage before. On my 17" MBP, 2.8 ghz Intel core Duo, Anti-Glare screen, 8 GB of ram, NVIDIA GeForce 9600M GT 512mb vram card. In FCS2, I created a new project in 1080 ProRes(Regular) 24P, Log & Transferred with the AVCHD plugin. Of course the footage looked better on the TV but it looked fine in the Canvas window. The first scene by candle light was noticeably "noisier" for lack of a better word in the shadowed part of her arm and a little in her face but not the black background. The charts looked good as well, full black was black and all the shades leading to it seemed to be where they should be. My monitor/screen is NOT calibrated btw.

Next I exported the sequence in to a Quicktime ProRes movie. With Quicktime 7 player it looked the same to my eye as it did in the FCP canvas window. Then I played it in Quicktime 10 and it was noticeably noisier on her near arm, face, table in front of her drink and the background just to HER left, our right.

While I saw slight differences between the three different ways I viewed the footage, none of them gave me any concern that I just dumped 5 G's on a lemon. I expect the TV to look better out of the camera; it does with my EX1, my 5D and now the AF100. Hope this helped..


**My Quicktime 7 player is set to HQ and "Enable FCS color compatibility" is checked.
**Just played the native file with VLC ver. 1.1.5 and it was the noisiest of the bunch but not by a lot. Belly dance shot looked the same as Quicktime to me.
 
Last edited:
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top