Lousing resolution on rendered 720p DVCpro footage ?

[Shinjaro]

Ok i’ve found an interesting work around that is leaving my puzzeld to say the least.
If I creat a new composition with the HDV/HDTV 720 preset effectively creating a true 1280:720 workspace. Then I drop my DVCpro HD 720p (960:720) anamorphic clip into that comp and everything is fine, no pixelation. However surley I should be able to use the DVCpro HD 720p preset and render out without pixelation.
What gives ?

[Kevin Camp]

it’s mostlikely the pixel aspect ratio correction that ae uses… try toggling it off by clicking a button at the bottom of the preview window that looks a rectangle with an arrow pointing left and right above it (in ae7… earlier versions look a little different).

or you can set your comp to use square pixels, 1280×720… ae will then compensate for the 1.33 par of your dvprohd to a square par of the comp.

Kevin Camp
Designer – KCPQ, KMYQ & KRCW

[Kevin Camp]

well you figured out one worka around before i posted my reply….

but your not ‘losing’ resoultion in ae. dvcprohd is not full (pixel for pixel) hd resolution, it is 960×720 rather than 1280×720. the pixel is streched horizonally to fit 16×9 aspect ratio, that’s where the 1.33 par (pixel aspect ratio) comes in.

Kevin Camp
Designer – KCPQ, KMYQ & KRCW

[Shinjaro]

I had already played around with using square pixels and checking PAR but this didn’t resolve anything. untill you try working with DVCpro HD yourself I think it will be hard to understand whats going on here. I’d even go so far as to say it’s a bug with something but what I don’t know.

[Kevin Camp]

i do work with them…

it’s realy not any different than working in a d1 or dv preset where the pixel aspect ratio is 0.9. when you turn on the par correction in ae (so the frame is the correct 4:3 aspect ratio, and a circle looks like a circle, and a square like a square) you get the same jaggies. it’s just that there is a lot more par coorection going on with a 1.33 par of dvcprohd then there is with a 0.9 par of dv or d1.

but remember, this is just in the preview window. if you render your files, and take them back into fcp, they won’t have the jaggies.

Kevin Camp
Designer – KCPQ, KMYQ & KRCW

[Shinjaro]

Thats what I thought also but the jaggy’s do get rendered out using the DVCpro HD preset and correcting with PAR. I noticed them in FCP and by viewing the quicktime.

[Steve Roberts]

When I use DVCPROHD I just make a 1280×720 square pixel comp.

Maybe there’s a bug that got fixed with CS3, but if not, I’ve gotten used to workarounds and don’t lose any sleep over having to use them. 🙂

[Kevin Camp]

fcp shouldn’t be having issues with a dvcprohd render out of ae… so, lets go over your workflow and settings….

it sounds like your file is ok in ae — when you said setting the comp to 1280×720 square px, everything looked good, that sounds like what i would expect.

when you rendered, are you rendering the dvcprohd preset comp (960×720, 1.33 par) or the square pixel test comp. you’ll want to render the dvcprohd (1.33) comp to go back to an fcp timeline using the dvcprohd setup in fcp. fcp should be expecting that frame size and par.

in ae, are you rendering back to the dvcprohd codec or another codec?

Kevin Camp
Designer – KCPQ, KMYQ & KRCW

[Kevin Camp]

note: you could render out as square px from ae, but you may have to tell fcp that it is sqr px footage at import.

Kevin Camp
Designer – KCPQ, KMYQ & KRCW

[Shinjaro]

Indeed the work around is fine for me also, it just took a little while to discover :O)
Thanx for all the help