help with Mpeg2 export – 4:2 encoding vs 4:2:2

[Noah Kadner]

[Gregory Aimo] “Hi,

I am trying to export an 30 second spot from motion to MPEG-2 so that it will play out of a small casino’s in -house server on tvs around the casino but it doesn’t look like Compressor will allow me to specify YCbCr 4:2:0 as the color space.

These are the specs the casino provided:

1) MPEG-2
2) Use 4.2.0 Encoding, NOT 4.2.2 encoding
3) In MPEG-2, both fields should be encoded. This is the normal
default..
4) The Audio track must be MPEG Layer 2. Files with audio & video
tracks cannot be mixed with video only or audio only files on the
same channel during playback.

Can anybody tell me which project and export settings from motion or compressor would match up with these specs – as in how do I set the output to standard definition 720X480 4:2:0 mpeg 2 with audio on layer 2

Compressor does offer mpeg2 export as a choice between elemtary, program and transport stream settings. I was also thinking about using one of the dvd export settings but don’t know which ones are appropriate.”

This is the Motion forum- might want to ask over on the DVDSP forum. That said, all MPEG-2 is 4:2:0 so you don’t have to worry about that. Use the normal high quality settings, make sure field dominance is set to progressive and export as a transport stream. It might take a couple of tries to hit their exact specs. MPEG-2 is a weird format especially when you are using it for something other than DVDs.

Noah

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