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imported bmps are distorted
Hi, I’m on Vegas Pro 15.0. I use a map animation program (Route Generator 1.7.1) that outputs a series of bmp images I then import into Vegas and render out as an MP4 for import into my main 1080p project. The source images and initial output file are a high resolution (3724×2095) so once in my 1080p Vegas project I can zoom in without loss of visual quality. This process has worked for me for years, but all of a sudden I am getting distortion on the bmp images once pulled into Vegas, both in the preview window and in the output file once rendered. Oddly enough if I use the Vegas screenshot feature the screenshot looks fine. By the way, the raw images look fine when viewed with an image viewer (see below for links)
I had seen some people talking about shifting the project settings to 32bit full range and disabling View Transform but that doesn’t seem to be working for me.
Kinda losing my mind here, does anyone have any advise?
Related links:
Example source BMP image (22MB, one of many for the sequence): https://kydeanderic.com/images/cow/map00011.bmp
Rendered output video result (7MB): https://kydeanderic.com/images/cow/mapoutput.mp4
Project Settings: https://kydeanderic.com/images/cow/project.png
Render Settings: https://kydeanderic.com/images/cow/render.png
Full series of BMP files (280MB) : https://kydeanderic.com/images/cow/bitmaps.zipAdditional notes:
-I have tried 8bit pixel format and had the same results, 32bit full range is just where is sits now in my confusion
-I know my render bitrate is super high, but has worked for years so I never messed with it for these tiny files. Also, I can see the image distortion in the preview window in Vegas before rendering, so I don’t think this is a problem with render settings.
-This seems like some sort of issue with these specific files and how Vegas is “reading” them. I just don’t have a clue as to what or why.Thanks everyone!
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9 Replies
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Hi Eric,
I tried to help, but I’m not seeing the difference. Either my monitors are too low of resolution to see the difference or my old eyes are failing me, or perhaps both. I think I see a very, very small difference, but that is probably because after reading your post I wanted to see the difference you do.
I would agree, stick with the 8 bit pixel format and the higher rendering bit rate you have used in the past should help a bit with quality and not hurt you.
You could check to see if there is any difference when you load up a previous project. If the difference shows up in your previous projects, then you might want to consider some change to your system, such as a GPU driver update.
Best Regards……George
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Hi Eric
Got this from the Route Generator Web Site. It might help:
I was getting reports of people, having problems with the conversion of Bmp2Avi and/or the quality of the output movie being low. From Route Generator version 1.7.1, FFmpeg is used as default generator, which is much better in encoding HD video’s. Thanks to Kyle Schwarz the builder of the Zeranoe FFmpeg Windows builds.
Tip: Always make sure that the resolution of the background map is equal to the resolution of the source movie itself.Cheers !
PC Win 10 Pro 64-bit 16gb Intel® Core™i7-2600k Quad Core 3.40GHz
Cameras: Canon XF305 + Canon XH-A1
Blackmagic HyperDeck Studio Mini
Vegas Pro 16, User since Vegas 3.0\’\’When the cutting stops, the editing begins…\’\’
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George,
Thanks for getting back to me. I jumped into an old project as I had not thought about that and I don’t see the same issue, so I’m even more baffled as from what I can tell the project settings are all identical. I feel like I’m going crazy here, haha.
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Francois,
Good research! That brings me to another issue actually, which could also lead me to a solution if I could solve it. For some reason I can’t ever import a video file output by Route Generator and compressed via RG’s ffmpeg builtin functionality into Vegas, which is one reason why I had always used the bitmaps. Route Generator can output compressed video in about a million different codecs and no matter what I use I get a “An error occurred while opening a codec.” These files always open and play fine with vlc, by the way.
Route Generator also has the ability to export an seemingly uncompressed file via bmp2avi.exe, giving me a 2GB-ish avi file I could in theory pull into Vegas and then render into something more storable, but while the file looks totally fine in Vegas’ preview window the outputted video is super duper washed out. That is, unless I change the project settings to 32bit floating point and disable view transform, then it outputs properly. However I cannot import a higher resolution file this way (“An error occurred while opening a codec.”), so I can’t zoom into the final map without distortion, which is the second reason I was working from the bitmaps.
It’s so complex I’m not even sure what to ask, it feels like there is some sort of encoding going on somewhere along the lines here that Vegas is not dancing with, somewhere a file is being created that has some flag set wrong or something so it’s not being interpreted by Vegas as it should be.
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Hi Eric,
I have another short test you may want to try. Start a new test project. Import into this project bipmaps source images from your older project that you mention in your previous post which look good in Vegas. Is the quality good as in the past or poor as in your latest problem project.
What we are trying to do is identify what has changed and caused the issue, Route Generator, Vegas, or something in your system.
If you can start a new project, and bring in old bipmaps and they look good, then that would point to a change somewhere in Route Generator.
Best Regards……George
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George,
Great idea, I wish I could do this but I have not stored old bmp files, i would always render them into a lower filesize video and work from that.
That said, I get the same distortion from files created from The Gimp, so I don’t think it’s an issue with Route Generator specifically.
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Hi Eric
I downloaded Route Generator and tried it. It worked fine in VP11, 13, 14 and 16 with no loss of detail but I had to convert the original AVI file to a MP4 file with Handbrake before I could use it. You may be having a problem with your video card or other hardware related issue. Have you tried viewing the file on another computer ? Sorry, but I couldn’t reproduce your problem.
Cheers !
PC Win 10 Pro 64-bit 16gb Intel® Core™i7-2600k Quad Core 3.40GHz
Cameras: Canon XF305 + Canon XH-A1
Blackmagic HyperDeck Studio Mini
Vegas Pro 16, User since Vegas 3.0\’\’When the cutting stops, the editing begins…\’\’
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Francois,
Oh wow, you went the distance to help me! Thank you so much. I will give that workflow a try this weekend, I had not considered pulling the AVI into handbreak first, great idea! Thank you!
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Francois!
Thank you so much, just converting the AVI in handbreak worked wonders and let me skip all the craziness with the BMPs in Vegas all together. Such a simple solution I’m embarrassed I didn’t come up with it myself. Thank you so much!!!
-Eric
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