Episode help for DG Fast Channel encoding

[Craig Seeman]

Hi Curt,
I passed DG Fastchannel certification using Episode 4.1.x and have succesfully distriputed broadcast spots through them. Episode is now up to 4.2.2 and some setting options have changed slightly but if you give me a bit I can post back some details to help you.

Can you post details such as version of Episode and any information DG Fastchannel gave you for the failures.

I do have a preset I used under Episode 4.1.x that passed their certification.

[Dakotacurt]

I’m using version 4.2.2 on MacBook Pro 2.16 GHz w/ 2 GB RAM on OS 10.4.8. DG emailed me a settings file from a client who has had success encoding, uploading and delivering files, but when I use these preferred settings to encode one of my files (uncompressed 8-bit from Final Cut w/Kona LHe), the result ends up with severe compression tiles/pixilation. The preferred file includes settings of: Bitrate-based, CBR, Average rate of 25,000 kbits/s, closed gop, gop format of IBBPBB, interlaced, 2-Pass, and I crop the bottom 6 lines. I’ve not uploaded one of these files because the quality is so poor. I have noticed if I change the gop format to I-frames only, the result looks very good, but the uploaded file prompts an email message from DG that the file, “contains a file format not supported by DG Systems or the file is corrupt”. Any ideas that might work?

Thanks,

Curt Friesen
Dakota Video & Post Productions, LLC
curtis@dakotavideo.com

[Craig Seeman]

Curt,

Any word on why DGFastchannel says your failing certification?

Some important details are that they want Field Order – Top First (even for standard def).
Pixel aspect ratio should be 1:1 to keep the .9 pixel size rather than make square.
GOP format should be IBBPBB
I do 2 Pass CBR encode at 25000kbps for max quality (which is their peak spec) but will accept as low as 10000kbps. If you do VBR encode your peaks may be too high.
In your NLE you should conservatively hold the luma to 100ire or equivalent. I don’t remember the chorma spec but it also is very conservative. Think PBS standards. If you’ve ever done broadcast work for PBS you’ll know what that means (very conservative).
Also think analog audio instead of digital. It seems that if you let peaks go above 0 on your digital scale they’ll reject it. Normally when I do spot work I push to as close to +6 digital can compress/limit to keep things hot. That’s not acceptible to DGFastchannel.

[Craig Seeman]

My experience is that Quicktime will show the artifacts you mention but they will actually be fine. Follow their recommended GOP structure. The settings you’re using look similar to mine. Send them the file and have them look at it. I wouldn’t be surprised if the settings they’ve sent to you is the one I sent to them.

[Joe Murray]

Hi Craig-

Are you using Final Cut Pro? If so, what settings do you use in Episode to reverse the field order? FCP is lower field first and DG wants upper field first. Inside Episode there are two places you can change the field order…in the Profile tab and by adding a Field Order filter. I’ve tried a couple of different combinations with these settings and my files are still getting rejected by DG, and the techs tell me it’s a field order problem.

Any pointers are greatly appreciated.

Joe Murray

[Craig Seeman]

In the Profile tab – Field Order: Top First.
Alsmo make sure you have Frame Type set to Interlaced.

My settings which they may be distributing as a preset since I sent it to DGFastchannel.
Code type Bitrate-Based
Bitrate control CBR
Average rate 25000kbit/s
Pixel aspect ratio 1:1
Frame Type Interlaced
Field Order Top First
GOP type Closed Gop
GOP format IBBPBB
Encoder Settings 2-Pass

I did first use these settings with Episode 4.1.2 when I passed their certification.
I haven’t retested with Episode 4.2.2

You should ask them what they’re seeing. They may not give you a technical description but I may be able to translate colloquial English to “Techenese”

Make sure they’re ok with Luma and Chroma peaks as well as Black level (set-up) and audio peaks. These are other non Episode reasons for DGFastchannel rejection.

Make sure you send them very clean material for the tests. Avoid slow mos, black and white video fx and other color fx.

[Joe Murray]

Does your material start out as lower field first or upper?

This material is very clean, it originated on 35mm film and has been color corrected on a Philips Spirit telecine, and there are no effects. It’s one of the nicest looking spots I’ve done and all the levels are in spec. At this point I’m not even getting past the automated “Ingest Failure” message, the rejection has something to do with the file format or fields. I’m sure we’ll move on to audio and video levels if I can get a file to ingest into their system properly.

Here is the description they gave of the error message when I asked for more detail:

“This file showed 2 errors:
eof on input file (Typically no SEQUENCE_END_CODE found)
File does not contain interlaced frames.”

Thanks for your help-

Joe Murray

[Dakotacurt]

Joe and Craig,

I’ve uploaded a variety of Episode encoded spots to my drop box, only to have them rejected. When the DG Tech guys look at the spots they say the spots look fine and don’t understand why they’re getting rejected. Yesterday one of the Techs suggested I try the demo version of the Main Concepts encoder. I did and it worked. I’m mostly concerned about finding a method that works. I don’t know what this means for Episode, but I’m planning to talk with the rep who initially helped me buy Episode.

I’m using Episode 4.2.2 on uncompressed Final Cut generated QuickTimes. If you’re interested, here’s a link to Main Concepts: https://www.mainconcept.com/site/?id=761

Thanks for your ongoing help,

Curt Friesen
Dakota Video & Post

[Joe Murray]

I’ve tried Mainconcept before, and the mpegs were good quality but the gamma levels were incorrect, and last time I checked there was no way to adjust levels in Mainconcept. This is key because DG does not require bars and tone at the head of each clip, so the levels need to be dead on from the start. Has Mainconcept added handles to adjust gamma/contrast/saturation/brightness? Their support group once emailed me and said they had plans to do so, so if they have that’s great.

Joe Murray

[Craig Seeman]

[Joe Murray] “Does your material start out as lower field first or upper?”

My material was SD lower Field First. Episode converted it to upper field without issue for my DGFastchannel Tests.

[Joe Murray] “This material is very clean, it originated on 35mm film”

But what was it converted to and how? Was it 23.98p or embedded in 29.97 or . . .?

I can email you my preset that passed DGFastchannel but if you’re getting an “interlaced frames” issue It have have something to do with your source vs. your settings.

If you can put your spot on an FTP site I can do some conversions and get them back to you to send to DG for testing. Basically I’d try different ways to get an interlaced result but it may involved some experimentation.