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Best Codec for 2.8 anamorphic screener
HI,
We’re cutting a feature in Premier that was shot 2.8 anamorphic. It’s time to upload a screener to the producer for notes. What is the best Codec to use to export this 2 hour file? We will either upload using We Transfer or post to Vimeo, depending on the producer’s preference.
The editor wants to maintain as much of the quality as possible but also stay under 20GB in size.
Is this possible? What Codec should we use?
Thanks!
Rachel
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3 Replies
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In terms of quality vs compression, you best bet is with modern compression algorithms.
Without considering your playback computer, one of the best quality compression available today is within H.265 (HEVC). You did not specify your frame size, but I believe in 4K you should be able to compress your movie for less than 20GB file size.
An other common option is H.264 but compared to H.265, with similar parameters, it will double the size of your file.
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Thanks! The frame size is 2.8K anamorphic – not sure that was clear. I will test both codecs out.
Thanks again!
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I’m not sure what 2.8K anamorphic means. I presume you mean an Alexa at full sensor size with an anamorphic lens, so that the actual de-squeezed frame size of the dailies would be 2.8 x 2. Correct?
Normally your timeline would be a standard video or DCI frame size. So a feature file that is 2.39:1 aspect would generally have a timeline size of 2048 x 858 or a 4K variant. So your camera footage would be de-squeezed and then scaled to fit into this timeline size, usually with some cropping on the edges. At that point you could export any way you like.
If you are creating lightweight screening copies, then H.264 at around 8Mbps should be fine. You might want to look at a 1/2-sized version of that sequence size to lower the files size even more, if required.
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