• Apple Final Cut Pro Legacy

  MPEG2 using compressor – image shake/artifacting

  Posted by Martha Henson on March 10, 2009 at 4:29 pm

  Have been hunting through this and other forums to find a solution, but no joy, so I’m hoping someone here can help. I’ve been having a problem I’ve not seen before when converting sequences in Compressor to MPEG2 files in order to put them on DVD, a slight but noticeable rhythmic shaking of the image in several places and a similarly rythmic sudden pixelation in one place. This is not visible on the original footage, or on a quicktime exported from the same timeline.

  I’ve tried as many different things as possible; exporting using compressor from the timeline, exporting a SC quicktime first and converting that, changing GOP settings, quality settings, bit rates, changing between VBR and CBR, and it doesn’t seem to make much difference, although I can get rid of most of the pixelation/artifacting by lowering the bit rate, but definitely not the shake.

  This is a workflow I’ve used several times before and not experienced a problem previously, can anyone help? Would be very grateful for any suggestions as it’s driving me spare.

  Thanks in advance,

  Martha
  (Most stuff shot on an EX1 1080i 25fps, using native settings for edit though some material is HDV. Exported quicktime for conversion using same settings).

  Martha Henson replied 17 years, 6 months ago 2 Members · 4 Replies
• 4 Replies

• 

  Eric Pautsch

  March 10, 2009 at 5:36 pm

  Have you tried inserting a marker from your FCP timeline? This will insert I frames at that location and might help. BTW….Compressor is a fairly poor encoder IMO so it won’t preform miracles for you. You might want to look at other third party tools which will almost surely help in this situation. Hard to say though without looking at the source footage.
• 

  Martha Henson

  March 11, 2009 at 9:53 am

  Hi Eric,

  Thanks! I haven’t tried that, no, I’m not even sure I know how but I’ll look into it and give it a go. The shake continues for a long time though, so I wonder whether adding in more I frames would make a difference? Unless I’ve misunderstood. However, the fact that it’s quite rhythmic does make me think it’s something to do with the GOP structure, so I will try it.

  I guess overall maybe am asking too much of Compressor, though I’m surprised it’s quite *this* bad. Any recommendations for better 3rd party software?

  Thanks, Martha
• 

  Eric Pautsch

  March 11, 2009 at 5:08 pm

  Also – make sure your source’s field order match the settings in Compressor. I think this “shaking” might be a field order issue for you. Do a ggogle on encoders for DVD – there are tons. Bitvice is a good one on the mac
• 

  Martha Henson

  March 12, 2009 at 1:44 pm

  Hi Eric,

  Thanks for the tip, they definitely do match, though. Is a left to right shake, does that help with the diagnosis? Looking into alternative software as well, including Bitvice, thanks.

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