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How to use/convert HD footage?
I have been trying to figure this out for some time now but dont get very good results.
I have a Canon Vixia HFR10 HD camcorder and have it set to record at the highest settings; 1920×1080 at 60i. On the raw and converted clips, the interlacing is very apparent and the image is not very clear. When I offload the raw video clips, they are in a .mts file format. My version of AE and Premiere dont seem to accept that format so the only way Ive been able to work with it is to convert it using Total Video Converter. Currently Im converting them to .mov with h264 encoding, or exporting them to a jpg/png/etc image sequence.
I dont have much experience dealing with HD footage so Im a bit of a newbie when it comes to converting and such.
How should I handle a .mts video clip that is 1920×1080 and 60i?
I do a lot of vfx and editing so the better the picture quality, the better. Especially with interlacing, tracking footage with apparent interlacing gives me messy results.
Should I deinterlace the video and reduce the video scale by half?
Im a bit lost so if anyone can answer my question, itd be greatly appreciated! 🙂
-Aaron-
“Wherever you go, there you are” -
8 Replies
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h264 is a delivery codec for playback, not really the best choice if you want to do post work on your footage. Any uncompressed format will do better, although you should expect large files.
Always de-interlace footage, or shoot 30p (29.97)Tudor “Ted” Jelescu
Senior VFX Artist -
Thanks for the reply and advice, this is kind of a grey area for me.
Is my thinking correct that filming 60i will utilize the most of my camcorder and give me the best results that I can then de-interlace to 29.97? Or is it just easier to film 24/29 fps? I have two other frame rate options on my Canon; PF30 and PF24.
File size aside, I want to get the clearest smoothest video I can from my camcorder for editing later.
-Aaron-
“Wherever you go, there you are” -
Thanks for the reply and advice, this is kind of a grey area for me.
Is my thinking correct that filming 60i will utilize the most of my camcorder and give me the best results that I can then de-interlace to 29.97? Or is it just easier to film 24/29 fps? I have two other frame rate options on my Canon; PF30 and PF24.
File size aside, I want to get the clearest smoothest video I can from my camcorder for editing later.
-Aaron-
“Wherever you go, there you are” -
Would it make sense to take the 60i footage, convert it to an image sequence (as 60 fps), and interpret that footage as 29.97 fps with upper field first?
Im trying to understand the conversion on this. I plan to matchmove and when its converted wrong, the tracking jumps all over the place.
-Aaron-
“Wherever you go, there you are” -
Get some basics from here:
https://help.adobe.com/en_US/premierepro/cs/using/WSD69D6B9C-1F89-4c85-BCB3-2C946E26246D.htmlThis is for SD, but the same principles apply:
https://library.creativecow.net/articles/onneweer_barend/deinterlacing.phpAnd some more useful info:
https://www.digitalphotographywriter.com/2010/08/hd-1080p-vs-1080i-videos-progressive.htmlTudor “Ted” Jelescu
Senior VFX Artist -
Thank you for the links, the more info the less confusing this gets.
I guess what I’m after is to take my 60i footage and convert it to 30p at its best quality for tracking and 3D elements. I would use the 60i original footage as an image sequence, but I do not know how to interpret it and it would take twice as long to render 60 fps of 3D elements rather than 24/30 fps.
I finally upgraded from my 640×480 mini-DV camcorder so I’m just trying to get all I can out of it 🙂
-Aaron-
“Wherever you go, there you are” -
Ok, I think Ive finally got this figured out and understand it.
I took my 60i image sequence, brought it into AE, interpreted the footage as 60fps with lower field first. I made the composition 29.97fps and exported the clip at 29.97fps and no interlacing. If I understand and did this correctly, it is now converted to 30p, which is better for my end of working on it since its deinterlaced.
Now then, wheres the aspirin? 😛-Aaron-
“Wherever you go, there you are” -
The thing is, once the head aches are gone, this will stick with you 😉
Tudor “Ted” Jelescu
Senior VFX Artist
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