best output for viewing avchd files with vegas

[Danny Hays]

My camera makes mts files and I don’t see where Vegas can render back out as mts. I render hi res, high bitrate mp4 or wmv.

[John Rofrano]

[luke massoud] “What is the best format to output for highest quality viewing ?”

I would render them back out to AVCHD. Use Sony AVC with the AVCHD 1920×1080-60i template (unless you have a PAL camera in which case use the 50i template)

[luke massoud] “would it be back to mts then put it on my camera ?”

Why would you put them back on your camera? If you down’t own a Blu-ray player then you should either buy one, or invest in an HD media server. Copying video to your camera every time you want to watch it doesn’t sound like a convenient solution.

~jr

http://www.johnrofrano.com
http://www.vasst.com

[Luke Massoud]

thank you both very much for your replies .
John,
i have a ps3 but no blu-ray burner.

usually i want to view my video on the computer but the odd occasion i want to view it on my big TV.
I have hdmi out on my computer . I can use that.
but will that be as good quality as from my camera ?
also John ,what avchd player software should i use ?

what about Danny’s suggestion will the quality be not as good ?

sorry for the barrage of questions and thank you again for your time

[John Rofrano]

The PS3 will play media from your PC so I would render to AVCHD and have the PS3 play it back on your TV. In this scenario the PC is your media server. You can also buy a stand-alone media server like the one’s that Lacie makes and the PS3 can use them to display your videos.

You can also burn the Blu-ray format to DVD media and play it back on a PS3. You only get about 20 minutes of AVCHD but it does work.

Danny’s suggestion is almost the same. He recommended a high bitrate MP4 which is AVC/h.263 as well. If you get the bit rate up to 16Mbps it will be similar to AVCHD.

~jr

http://www.johnrofrano.com
http://www.vasst.com

[Luke Massoud]

thankyou!
and whats the best way to play avchd on my pc ?

[Danny Hays]

Rendering AVCHD with Vegas (M2TS) has a 1080 60i 16 mbs limit where my TM700 makes 1080 60p at 27 mps, so I render as MP4 or WMV which I can make either at 1080 60p with the same high bitrate. My i7 plays them fine. It even plays the TM700 native 1080 60p .mts files perfect with media player classic.
If your going to work with AVCHD, you really need an i7.

[Luke Massoud]

yeah i got one of those 😉 thanks for the info danny are you saying that you can get higher quality with mp4 and wmv ?

[John Rofrano]

I just play AVCHD in the Windows Media Player and it plays fine. I have an old 2.66Ghz Intel Core 2 Quad.

~jr

http://www.johnrofrano.com
http://www.vasst.com

[Danny Hays]

Luke, (yeah i got one of those 😉 thanks for the info danny are you saying that you can get higher quality with mp4 and wmv ?)
I’m saying even though the camera (TM700) makes (in 60p mode) 1080 60p .mts and .m2ts if you use the HDWriter software that came with the camera, Vegas doesn’t yet render to .mts at all and .m2ts has the limits I stated so yes I get better quality with mp4 and wmv as I can maintain the 60p and the higher bitrate, with custom project settings and render settings. I believe the HDWriter software will do basic edits and save as 1080 60p .m2ts which can be put back on the ext. memory card and played with the camera if you don’t have an i7 to play them.
The 1080 60i .m2ts 16 mbs video made with Vegas looks great, don’t get me wrong but with fast moving video on a large HDTV, I can see the interlacing and is not as smooth as the 60p. But now like I said, it’ll need an i7 to smoothly edit and playback these files so I don’t really recommend the 60p if you intend to give the video to people to play.