Help with 24p file with interlace artfacts?

[starcentral]

I have 24p MOV H.264 file from friend I'm trying to help burn DVD's for (with fancy menu, bonus features, etc..) and I use Adobe Encore CS6.

Before any burning business when I watch his footage on my computer I see terrible blended frame artifacts every 2 frames out of 5. So 3 frames in a row look normal, then 2 frames in a row look like two interlace frames blended together. ie. there are interlace artifacts going through the image very noticable when there is movement of course.

The file specs of his file are 864x480 24p.

I know his editor created the file out of Sony Vegas. Not sure what version.

When I drop this to my Encore timeline no matter how much I play with various transcoding settings, etc.. the DVD gets these jumping frames throughout the DVD. I'm pretty sure that because his frame rate of the file is 24p that Encore is de-interlacing it to conform it to 60i to store it on the DVD. (DVD's are not "truly" 24p and have a 2-3 pulldown applied to be stored in 60i right?)

Just wondering if anyone can shed light on this. I know from my XL2 days and working with 24p advance and not advance that if your NLE does not remove the pulldown and you go ahead and edit on a 24p or 29.97p timeline some weird things can happen on the output..

Thanks for any help

 

[Bruce Watson]

I have 24p MOV H.264 file from friend I'm trying to help burn DVD's for (with fancy menu, bonus features, etc..) and I use Adobe Encore CS6.

Before any burning business when I watch his footage on my computer I see terrible blended frame artifacts every 2 frames out of 5. So 3 frames in a row look normal, then 2 frames in a row look like two interlace frames blended together. ie. there are interlace artifacts going through the image very noticable when there is movement of course.

The file specs of his file are 864x480 24p.

If the file looks as you describe it, it's not coming to you as a 24p progressive scan file. It sounds like the transcode he did from his NLE to this file applied 3:2 pulldown, and likely converted to 60i which is why you're seeing interlacing artifacts. I'd start troubleshooting by looking his export settings.

What you should see in Encore is 24 progressive frames every second. No more, no less. And no interlacing artifacts. If they are in the file when Encore gets them, Encore isn't going to take them out.

...Encore is de-interlacing it to conform it to 60i to store it on the DVD. (DVD's are not "truly" 24p and have a 2-3 pulldown applied to be stored in 60i right?)

Not any more. Modern DVDs can be recorded with the 24p flag (I've long since forgotten what its actual name is, it was implemented a long time ago). This tells a progressive scan player to pick up the recorded 24p frames whole without doing the 3:2 pull down and converting to 60i. Encore does this automatically when it sees a 24p source, IIRC. The progressive scan DVD player then hands that 24p file to the TV, no pulldown and no interlacing. If the TV is also progressive scan, it can show it as 24p without converting. Otherwise, the TV has to convert to whatever it's default playback is, probably 60i.

All that said, many DVD players and TVs also, don't default to allowing 24p. You have to wander through the setup menus to find that setting and turn it on. I don't know why.

 

[starcentral]

Thanks for your reply, at least it confirms my speculation.

 

[David Jimerson]

I have 24p MOV H.264 file from friend I'm trying to help burn DVD's for (with fancy menu, bonus features, etc..) and I use Adobe Encore CS6.

Before any burning business when I watch his footage on my computer I see terrible blended frame artifacts every 2 frames out of 5.

You are watching the files given to you? What are you watching them with? Premiere? If so, what kind of a sequence?

So 3 frames in a row look normal, then 2 frames in a row look like two interlace frames blended together. ie. there are interlace artifacts going through the image very noticable when there is movement of course.

That would be standard 2:3 pulldown.

The file specs of his file are 864x480 24p.

According to what?

When I drop this to my Encore timeline no matter how much I play with various transcoding settings, etc.. the DVD gets these jumping frames throughout the DVD.

Either the file isn't actually 24p, or Encore is inserting a pulldown and creating 60i files that it's burning to the disc.

I'm pretty sure that because his frame rate of the file is 24p that Encore is de-interlacing it to conform it to 60i to store it on the DVD.

Did you mean RE-interlacing, not DE-interlacing? Because there's nothing to de-interlace from a 24p file, and if you de-interlace, you don't get a 60i (interlaced) file.

If you mean RE-interlacing, as in inserting a pulldown, then yes, Encore may be doing this.

(DVD's are not "truly" 24p and have a 2-3 pulldown applied to be stored in 60i right?)

No. DVDs store 24p files as 24p. Well, they're actually stored as 24p with the frames as 48 field pairs, but everything sees it as straight 24p. (If you take the .vob file straight from the disc, everything will read it as a 24p file, not an interlaced file.)

What the file has is a set of flags which instruct the DVD player to repeat fields when playing the video out to an interlaced TV. The player, following the instructions, inserts a 2:3 (or 3:2, same thing) pulldown as it plays to the TV. The TV doesn't add it; the player does.

The player does not extract 24p frames from a 60i file on the DVD; the opposite happens.

If the TV is progressive and the DVD player is set to display progressively, it will not repeat field pairs and will play the progressive frames.

Just wondering if anyone can shed light on this. I know from my XL2 days and working with 24p advance and not advance that if your NLE does not remove the pulldown and you go ahead and edit on a 24p or 29.97p timeline some weird things can happen on the output..

Yeah, you don't want to try to edit on a 24p timeline if the pulldown isn't removed, and you never want to edit 24p footage on a 30p timeline.

In any case, I need to know more about the file you're working with, per my questions above regarding the software you're using, where you're seeing what you're seeing, etc.

If it's an Encore issue, and it really seems like it might be, then I can't help a whole lot, because my experience with it is very limited.

 

[starcentral]

I just step through the frames using Quicktime player on my PC, or same dealeo if I step through in After Effects.

AE and QT player report the file is 24p, 864x480 so he even removed the aspect ratio from being either .9 or 1.2

I don't have his edit file from NLE and even if I did once you edit on wrong timeline frame rate without removing the pull down you are pretty screwed me thinks.

 

[David Jimerson]

That is odd.

The only kind of file I can think of that could behave that way if you exported from Vegas would be a 24p DV file, which would be just like 24p video recorded on DV tape by the DVX100 or XL2. Because it would be a 60i file, it would probably behave that way in QT and AE. And it might read as 24p because the software might detect the embedded pulldown flags. But that's not what you have; you said it's H.264, right? And also 864x480 instead of 720x480?

Have you tried removing pulldown in AE (through Interpret Footage)? If it's got a straight 2:3 pulldown, which it would if it behaves as you describe, you might be able to.

 

[Bruce Watson]

AE and QT player report the file is 24p, 864x480

Really? I can believe 854, but I can't find a reference anywhere for anything that's 864. 854x480 is almost a 16:9 ratio sometimes called "Full WVGA" and is used, when it's used, as a computer graphics resolution. Doesn't have anything that I can find to do with DVD, Blu-ray, youtube, vimeo, etc. I'm thinking it's a games thing, but I don't know for sure.

Interestingly (to me anyway) is that 720x480 is called WVGA (wide VGA) in computerdom, but it's only 1.5:1 ratio, so when used on DVDs it has black bars. This is the recognized resolution for wide screen NTSC DVD as specified in REC.601. I don't know why, but it is what it is, and I don't have to know why just to use it.

I'm just saying, your source file is screwed, unless you're using it for a computer game. If that's true, I've got no idea how you should use it. It's certainly not a normal DVD resolution. And from what you said about it in the OP, it's perhaps best to start over with a new file that's exported correctly.

 

[starcentral]

Pretty sure 864 is what you get when you take 720x480 and change the pixel aspect ratio to square. Which can be useful for effects work, or other composting.

Well its been a long while since I dealt with this stuff.

The pulldown in the original file is not consistent, or, I might have been able to pull it out. So it seems to me this issue is linked to each clip and how it was put in the timeline but these are just theories at this point.

In the meantime I've told him I can't make his dvd for him. No matter what I tried using encore the final dvd has frames jumping around like Mexican jumping beans.

 

[David Jimerson]

You actually get 854.

He really should have rendered out DVD-compliant 24p MPEG-2 files for you.

Tell him to do this -- render them again, and look under MPEG-2 for the DVD Architect 24p Widescreen DVD template, choose that, go to the audio tab, check the box to include the audio stream -- and that is the ONLY change he should make to the template -- and then render.

You should get 24p files which Encore won't have to do anything with. They should be DVD-ready, and 24p. That should solve your problem.