How necessary is converting to ProRes

N

neetster

Member
If I have a couple of hours of footage with hundreds of clips, it seems kind of like a huge time killer to have to convert each clip one by one in MPEG Streamclip. At least, that's what I'm doing right now. Any better workflows?
 
morgan_moore said:
I assume you have found the batch list facility in streamclip - takes time - but you are in bed
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Great. I will do that. I actually haven't shot this current film yet, but with some test footage from today, I was converting the 3 or 4 6 minute clips one by one and I was getting pretty restless! :kali:
 
I can edit h264 files from the Canon 7d native with a 3ghz i7 processor. Though I am using Premiere, Final Cut can be a bit wonky.
 
How about multicam like 2,3,4 cameras editing at once?

neoscene w/ four different cameras, same codec, is a cake in Vegas w/ core 2 duo 3.0ghz.
maarek said:
I can edit h264 files from the Canon 7d native with a 3ghz i7 processor. Though I am using Premiere, Final Cut can be a bit wonky.
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Are i7 imacs more powerful than my 8 core mac pro? Cuz editing h264, although doable, isnt very convenient with the constant need to render. I've also noticed that it crashes a lot more often.
 
I tried to edit some Pro Res 422 footage in Final Cut last night but it was extremely choppy and slow. Maybe my computer just can't handle it. I'm using a Mac Book Pro with 2 GB of RAM. Do I need more RAM?
 
The question isn't how necessary is it to convert to Prores, but rather are there any other codec's which procuce a lighter output and preserve better image quality in FCP for instance. (aside from Prores LT)
 
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My comp can run the 45mbps h.264 file now problem, less converting and exporting the better.
 
marlontorres said:
Are i7 imacs more powerful than my 8 core mac pro? Cuz editing h264, although doable, isnt very convenient with the constant need to render. I've also noticed that it crashes a lot more often.
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Which 8 core do you have? The current 8 core MacPros are Nehelam which is the same as i7.
 
abteen said:
Hmmm maybe it's because I had selected Pro Res 422 (HQ)? Ill try the non-HQ version later today.
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Unless you're doing heavy color correction, ProRes 422 HQ is useless. The only difference between the HQ and the non-HQ mode is that one is 10-bit and the other is 8-bit. Many users even use ProRes LT without complaints.
 
ydgmdlu said:
Unless you're doing heavy color correction, ProRes 422 HQ is useless. The only difference between the HQ and the non-HQ mode is that one is 10-bit and the other is 8-bit. Many users even use ProRes LT without complaints.
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Great insight thank you.
 
ydgmdlu said:
Unless you're doing heavy color correction, ProRes 422 HQ is useless. The only difference between the HQ and the non-HQ mode is that one is 10-bit and the other is 8-bit. Many users even use ProRes LT without complaints.
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Not really. Unless your original footage is 10bit or more, there is no benefit to using a 10bit intermediate. If you want your project to hold up better, you just need to set your project to a higher bit depth, not your intermediates. Your intermediates should be the same bit depth as your source(8bit for 5D/7D/T2i). Anything more is just wasted overhead. You can't get something from nothing.
 
ydgmdlu said:
Unless you're doing heavy color correction, ProRes 422 HQ is useless. The only difference between the HQ and the non-HQ mode is that one is 10-bit and the other is 8-bit. Many users even use ProRes LT without complaints.
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Wrong, all Prores resolutions are 10-bit.
 
mcgeedigital said:
Wrong, all Prores resolutions are 10-bit.
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Whoops, you are right. I am embarrassed for not double-checking before posting.

Here's an answer that I just found regarding the difference between ProRes and ProRes HQ:

"ProRes HQ is forcing the data to completely fill out the entire 10bit space that is 4X as levels of gray as 8bit. (256 vs 1024 levels) where as the "plain" version of ProRes allows the 8bit camera file to just float inside the 10bit color space - only adding the extra information to the video file when it is needed, rather than forcing all of those 768 additional levels of gray to be occupied all the time like the PRHQ version does."
 
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