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Can scrubbing avchd (h.264) footage be better?
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Interesting thread. Thanks Trevor, and the PP experts who have answered his post. I’m still editing on FCP7, but am preparing to move to PP.
My personal bias, as far as rendering time and editing, is:
Pre-edit: I don’t mind taking the time to render to the best format for a smooth edit.
Edit: Make it as fluid and smooth a process as possible. (I like to be able to stack layers of video and still have real-time playback.)
Post-edit: render as quickly as possible. (meet the deadline!)What is the best file format for PP, given those preferences? Does the answer to that question differ, depending on whether you are editing on a PC or a Mac?
Bob C
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The best format really depends on your machine. I cut on a MPB with 16Mb of RAM with scratch media on a thunderbolt drive and I can cut about 2 layers with gfx and effects with H.264/Mp4 material in real time using fractional resolution.
I have seen blazing speeds coming off a MPB with a the new Smalltree box. faster than I could ever hope to get and the folks who are using towers that benefit from more RAM are doing even better. Your question is subjective and really depends on your machine.
“Think of everything in terms of building capacity.”
Kris Merkel
twitter: @kris_merkel
Product Manager, Flanders Scientific Inc.
http://www.shopfsi.com
Co-Founder, Atlanta Cutters Post Production User Group
http://www.atlantacutters.com2.2Ghz MBP core i7
16Gb RAM
CS6/FCP7
AJA T-Tap
AJA IO XT
FSI LM-2461W/CM-170W
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16Mbs of RAM? That’s pretty little. 😛
PPro is much faster when it comes to RT performance and rendering of effects, especially if you have multiple processors (which we all do), and a compatible graphics card for Freddie Mercury playback engine to sing.
However, FCP 7 is still faster at exporting a same as source QT from a fully rendered down sequence.
But there are other benefits in PPro, like you can mostly work without rendering and the waveforms are instant because it’s generated on import. Also, PPro is more responsive and crashes less due to it being able to utilize more RAM. So yea, even if I have to transcode to ProRes, I generally prefer PPro to FCP7.
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The keywords there are “Render” and “Exporting.” You are comparing apples to oranges as “rendering in PrPro is only for the video preview files and has nothing to do with exporting the file.
In FCP7 you have to render the footage before you export (or not). if you do not you will not see a preview and exporting will render the footage on output, even if it is ProRes. In PrPro there is no “Export same as source” as all export and final rendering is done vie Adobe Media Encoder either direct from PrPro or from the queue through the AME application.
Because of the Mercury engin it is not necessary to pre render footage just to see it in your timeline and the MPE is actually much faster at encoding than direct export or Compresser could ever dream of, unless you need a native ProRes file. Then your best bet would be to stick with FCP7 because if your are working with a ProRes file in PrPro, Adobe Media Encoder will actually re-compress and encode the ProRes file into a ProRes file. You may not notice any perceptible visual difference in the file but you are wasting time by re encoding.
“Think of everything in terms of building capacity.”
Kris Merkel
twitter: @kris_merkel
Product Manager, Flanders Scientific Inc.
http://www.shopfsi.com
Co-Founder, Atlanta Cutters Post Production User Group
http://www.atlantacutters.com2.2Ghz MBP core i7
16Gb RAM
CS6/FCP7
AJA T-Tap
AJA IO XT
FSI LM-2461W/CM-170W
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>The keywords there are “Render” and “Exporting.”
There are some similarities between the two. For “render”, there is also real time playback, which is what the software does to display the image with effects. For this process, the software does a decode and renders the effect so we can see the image on a monitor. FCP7 calls it the RT Extreme engine, Premiere Pro calls it the Mercury Playback engine. MPE is more sophisticated and is able to offload the processing of certain effects to the GPU.
Then there is render to preview format, which is what the user can choose to do if the machine is unable to keep up with the real time processing of effects. This means that the original footage is decoded, and the effects rendered and then the video stream is then compressed to whatever the preview file format is. It can be Quicktime ProRes files, or Mpeg I frame, and processed at whatever bit depth accuracy the user has set.
On exporting, Premiere Pro can use preview files if you tick that checkbox. FCP is able to copy frames off the source QT files if no effects are added, without re-compression, on a same as source export. and for frames with effects added, it will copy frames from the render files if that frame has been rendered. Premiere does the latter, but unfortunately, when “use preview files” is checked, the speed bump is not the same as in FCP.
[Kris Merkel] “unless you need a native ProRes file. Then your best bet would be to stick with FCP7 because if your are working with a ProRes file in PrPro, Adobe Media Encoder will actually re-compress and encode the ProRes file into a ProRes file.”
True and not true. If the point is to get a single ProRes Quicktime file out of the NLE, then yes, FCP7 or even Avid is better because they have “same as source” export options to Quicktime.
But if the workflow is to get the cut over to the Resolve or Smoke, you could export an XML/AAF/EDL. Basically, this does nothing to the source media and all PPro does is export an interchange format for another software to read. But of course, with PPro’s wide native support for formats, you may just be working with files that are incompatible with other workstations especially if you do not plan your workflow in advance. Hence, the request for a consolidate/transcode option.
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[Gerard Tay] “On exporting, Premiere Pro can use preview files if you tick that checkbox. FCP is able to copy frames off the source QT files if no effects are added, without re-compression, on a same as source export. and for frames with effects added, it will copy frames from the render files if that frame has been rendered. Premiere does the latter, but unfortunately, when “use preview files” is checked, the speed bump is not the same as in FCP.”
Almost, but not quite. There’s a big diference between “Use Previews” in Premiere and outputting a fully rendered timeline in FCP.
FCP uses the encoded frames as is, a straight data copy from point A to point B. This is possible do to the Quicktime architecture and ProRes.
When you check “Use Previews” in Premiere it doesn’t re-render the previously rendered affects, but it still decodes each frame of video and re-encodes it in the output format, even if it’s exactly the same.
This is why why FCP is still faster in this situation. It’s not actually rendering anything, just copying data around. In Adobe lingo this is called Smart Rendering, and it’s currently only available when rendering XDCAM HD in an MXF OP1a wrapper.
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Ok folks. I upgraded my RAM to 16GB (~$85). I do notice a bit of improvement in scrubbing the AVCHD footage from the Panasonic AF100. I can hit “L” twice which I think is 2x scrubbing and the system keeps up. At three hits of “L”, it can’t keep up. It IS better than previous, though still not what I was getting with ProRes files in FCP.
SO, it’s just one of those things. There ARE downsides to “edit anything.” Downside being spending more money on a FAST machine. Or, not having responsive JKL. It’s all about pros and cons. FCP does things better and PP does things better. There will always be trade offs. I suppose I could transcode everything. But after 4 years of that, I’d ready to “edit anything” because that seems intuitive to me with an All-Digital workflow.
Remember when P2 came out? The hype was “no more digitizing tapes.” However, it took just as much time to load the cards, archive them, and transcode the footage. Seemed to me to be marketing thing. Yes, I’m saving time/money by NOT having to digitize the tapes. But, I’m spending nearly the same amount of time data wrangling and transcoding.
Trade offs.
-Trevor Ward
Red Eye Film Co.
http://www.redeyefilmco.com
Orlando, FL -
It could be due to some arcane issue specific to your computer. I know that mine on occasion have acted weirdly, or simply been “slow,” for reasons that took quite some work to ferret out. Perhaps you might try the same footage on someone else’s comparable computer, to see whether the performance differs. If you want to send me a small file I’d be happy to give you a basis for comparison.
Bob C
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I extend the same offer as Bob.
If its a computer power issue my system will cut that AVCHD like butter 😀
Tom Daigon
PrP / After Effects Editor
http://www.hdshotsandcuts.com
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DxPrG3WUyz8
(Best viewed at 1080P and full screen)
HP Z820 Dual 2687
64GB ram
Dulce DQg2 16TB raid -
[John-Michael Seng-Wheeler] “When you check “Use Previews” in Premiere it doesn’t re-render the previously rendered affects, but it still decodes each frame of video and re-encodes it in the output format, even if it’s exactly the same.
“Thanks for the reply. Not to side track the topic, but anyway, I think the idea is that PPro decodes the preview files and re-encodes it in the output format. However, it seems that if the export setting is the same, the decode and encode does not happen.
I did a test on this the other day with a difference matte and gamma adjustment in AE. So I had 1 ProRes clip with a color correction filter on it, and I exported it. Then I rendered it and exported another file telling it to use previews. I also brought in one of the exported clips and exported it with same as source settings (this will re-compress the clip). Maximum render quality is checked for both export and creation of preview files.
The first 2 clips in AE showed a pure black difference matte when put against each other. This shows that there is no difference when “use preview files” is checked. The 3rd clip showed differences due to the re-compression when put against either of the first two exported files.
What the test shows is that if PPro is indeed using preview files on a same as source export, it does not decode and encode the preview file to the final format, otherwise the additional generation loss will show up in the test against the clip that was exported without using preview files. The 3rd clip is a control, and also serves to highlight that exporting even same as source is generationally lossy in PPro. This generation loss is not necessarily the worst of evils as ProRes holds up fairly well through multiple generations.
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