HVX frustration

B

bigox

Well-known member
Well I've given the upgrade from DVX to HVX a try.

Headache city.

For footage to work in Vegas, I need to buy another program, raylight. Honestly, once i pull the footage into Vegas, i see no difference in quality between DVX and HVX. I see other people's HVX footage on here and see that it's HD, when I see it on the preview here, it just looks like SD DVX footage to me. I shot 10 minutes of test footage in 720/24pn on a p2 card. Also, the HVX files aren't thumbnailed as images. Not sure if that would change with a conversion AVI or not.

I'm using a PC and editing on Vegas.

Anyhow, I'm finding the whole the pretty frustrating.

By the way, am I right to assume that a featuer shot on HVX p2, is going to be too big to fit on a 4.7 DVD once I get to the rendering process?

I'm real close to just going back to DVX at this point.
 
am I right to assume that a featuer shot on HVX p2, is going to be too big to fit on a 4.7 DVD once I get to the rendering process?
Click to expand...
no. youre not right. if youre putting it on a widescreen SD DVD you have to downconvert anyway. and if you are making an HD disc, it will be a bluray, which is sufficient for a feature-length HD program
 
Will it still appear HD on a standard 4.7 DVD? And shouldn't I see a significant difference in the footage in Vegas (NLE) on the preview screen from the HVX compared to the DVX? I can pull footage from the HVX and DVX, put them on the timeline together to compare and I see no difference.
 
Will it still appear HD on a standard 4.7 DVD?
Click to expand...
im not sure what you mean by "appear HD", but no. because its now an SD deliverable. it will typically look better than something you shot on SD. but thats not a rule.

I can pull footage from the HVX and DVX, put them on the timeline together to compare and I see no difference.
Click to expand...
a few things MAY be happening here:
1. are you sure you were shooting HD with your HVX? it does shoot SD. and it may have been set in SD mode...
2. ive never used vegas. but in some other programs, the first clip you drop on your timeline establishes the setting for that program. so if you dropped the SD clip on first, your vegas timeline may be SD?
3. again, i dont know vegas. but your preview settings may be set to SD and its dumbing all else down... again, just a vague possibility
 
How do you know if you're set in SD mode or HD mode? I thought it only shot SD if you used tape.

I dropped the HVX footage in the timeline first and there wasn't a difference once I pulled DVX footage onto the same time line.

I'm confused on the DVD situation. So are you saying that if you shoot in HD and render it, once you put the media on a standard 4.7 space DVD, the rendered picture is no longer going to be HD? I watch movies on DVD all the time that aren't bluray, but are HD. I'm totally confused by this. I know there's always going to be a loss in quality once you put media on a DVD, but how would it drop something from HD to SD? I don't get it.
 
DVD is a standard-def medium. DVD players are standard-def players. If you output to DVD, you're outputting a standard-def, MPEG2 video file.

And yes, the HVX can record standard-def to its P2 cards. You have to go into the recording setup menu and choose a recording format of 1080 or 720 to get HD.
 
That's what I thought. I shot my HVX test footage using 720/24pn, so that should be HD ?

So as far as DVD's go, if I'm outputting a feature onto a DVD, is the final image shot on HVX HD going to look much different than the final image would shot on a DVX? Or since the media is going to a Standard DVD, is it going to look pretty much the same regardless?
 
The 720 footage from the HVX will be better than the DVX footage, absolutely. Even if it weren't for the increased information the frame size gives you, the 4:2:2 color vs. the DVX's 4:1:1 makes a huge difference.
 
SHouldn't I be able to see a big difference between HVX footage and DVX footage in the vegas timeline? Granted, my HVX footage is a test run, I didn't do a huge light set up, I just shot it in a spot where there was a lot of good natural light. Honestly, side by side on the vegas timeline, I couldn't tell a difference. The person with me thought they could tell a little bit of a difference. Shouldn't there be a significant difference between the two ? I mean, I'm talking right up on the computer PRE-render, PRE-DVD etc.
 
Of course you should see a big difference. So check your timeline -- is it set to HD? Check your preview monitor -- is it set to best quality?
 
Vegas defaults to an NTSC standard def timeline.

When you shot 24p on your dvx (assuming you ever did), didn't you have to tell vegas to make it a 24p timeline? Because otherwise, you were conforming 24fps to NTSC's 29.97, which would have resulted in very jittery and unnatural looking motion.

Its sounds to me more like your frustration is based on your editing software rather than your camera.

Also, the whole DVFilm raylight debacle... That has to do with politics between Sony and Panasonic. There are two emerging standards in HD compression, and Sony is refusing to recognize Panasonic's. That is why you need to either convert the footage or get a plugin like raylight.

Personally, I've used raylight and have been extremely pleased with it. But you could also use neoscene or others to convert into a more standard and manageable format for you.
 
How do you know if your timeline is HD or SD?

I always shoot in 24p. That's all I ever use. After I capture the footage, all I have to do is drag it into the timeline to edit. Maybe I have a 24p timeline as my default, because I can't recall every having to tell Vegas to make it a certain kind of timeline and I've never had a problem with jittery, unnatural footage.

How do I check to see if it's a HD or SD timeline and if it's a 24p timeline? I can't seem to find anything like that. I'm running the latest version of Vegas 9 Pro by the way.
 
OKAY! I finally got it! I've been editing everything in 24fps from the DVX for so long that years ago I defaulted my project properties to the 24p timeline. I forgot all about that option even existing since I always shoot in the same mode.

So, trying the timeline in the HDV 720 23.976 mode e & putting the preview window at Best. Honestly, it still doesn't seem to make much of a difference. if they were side by side, maybe I could tell, but it's certainly nothing like some of the HVX HD Screen Grabs or test video footage I see on here. And those are rendered. I'm still right on the timeline. Pre Render, which should be the best version there is.

Is there something else I'm supposed to be doing with settings? Like Pixel format etc? Are there other things I'm supposed to change to get the HD to show?
 
M. Gilden said:
When you shot 24p on your dvx (assuming you ever did), didn't you have to tell vegas to make it a 24p timeline? Because otherwise, you were conforming 24fps to NTSC's 29.97, which would have resulted in very jittery and unnatural looking motion.
Click to expand...

It wouldn't. It would just play it as a straight 60i file, which is how Vegas captures it from tape. It only removes pulldown on a 24p timeline, so there's no conforming to be done on an NTSC or 60i timeline. That was done by the camera when it was recorded to tape.
 
bigox said:
OKAY! I finally got it! I've been editing everything in 24fps from the DVX for so long that years ago I defaulted my project properties to the 24p timeline. I forgot all about that option even existing since I always shoot in the same mode.

So, trying the timeline in the HDV 720 23.976 mode e & putting the preview window at Best. Honestly, it still doesn't seem to make much of a difference. if they were side by side, maybe I could tell, but it's certainly nothing like some of the HVX HD Screen Grabs or test video footage I see on here. And those are rendered. I'm still right on the timeline. Pre Render, which should be the best version there is.

Is there something else I'm supposed to be doing with settings? Like Pixel format etc? Are there other things I'm supposed to change to get the HD to show?
Click to expand...

What's the size of your preview window? It should tell you underneath it. If it's small, like 720x480 or smaller, and if your monitor isn't all that big, you might not be able to see as big of a difference as there actually is. If you view it full screen on a monitor that's 1280x720 or bigger, and you have the preview quality set to Best, then you should definitely see a big difference.
 
So, trying the timeline in the HDV 720 23.976
Click to expand...
youre also NOT shooting HDV. youre shooting DVCproHD

have you read ANY of the manuals that came with your software or camera?
 
Doesn't matter. The timeline isn't looking for HDV; it's just the frame size and the frame rate which are relevant. There's no difference at all if he uses that or creates a 960x720 1.333 PAR timeline.
 
I've experimented with the preview window as large as I can get it to as small as I can get it. Usually, I see a bigger difference in quality of picture in general, the smaller my preview window is. But regardless, I still can't see much difference between my HVX footage and DVX footage.


I shot the footage in 720/24pn - So I'm assuming that was the timeline I should pick. THe closest I could find was HDV 720-24p - The closest HD option I have is 1080 24p. I just assumed since I shot it in 720, I needed to go with the closest setting to that.

I've been using DVX with Vegas Software for many years, so yes, I've manualed the hell out of Vegas. But as I mentioned, I always shoot in the same mode. TO the point where I forgot all about the project properties, since I defaulted them to what I needed years ago.

My problem is figuring out the HVX footage in post. Yes, I have read the manual and have watched HVX Bootcamp many times. But I'm obviously having a hard time figuring out the transition from DVX to HVX in post. The issues I'm having are not anything I've ever seen come up in all the research I did before getting the HVX.

So yes, I'm trying like hell to understand this in all phases, I just can't seem to get it to work.
 
I'm not sure you're actually having any problems. Can you post a full-size frame grab of both HVX and DVX footage? Set the preview to Best (Full) and use the floppy disc icon.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top