m2ts – which format to render to to keep resolution in Vegas 9.0?

[Scott Francis]

DVD’s are not HD quality…if you are burning to Blu-Ray there are templates under the Sony AVC dropdown.
Good luck

Scott Francis
Mind’s Eye Audio/Video Productions

[John Rofrano]

Yea as Scott said use Sony AVC with the Blu-ray 1920×1080-60i, 16 Mbps video stream template for your video and Dolby Digital AC-3 Pro for your audio.

~jr

http://www.johnrofrano.com
http://www.vasst.com

[Davd Keator]

This really all depends on your level of Edititing…

Simple cuts – use the blu-ray codec…

If however you are using transitions, fades, green screen etc..

Then you must, absolutely must transcode to a good Wavelet interframe codec first before you start editing. Otherwise you will see codec errors left and right. Most people don’t notice these but editors and other film critics do…

Cineform = rockin solid
Morgan Jpeg = great in 32bit world
Lagarith 32 bit world good too…

[Larry Cole]

This is an area I’d really like to know more about.

Where do codec issues show up (I’m not sure I’ve ever seen an error when I render)?

What type of things do the editors and critics notice?

Are the Cinform and other codecs you mentioned just third party rendering engines that are better than those provided by Sony in the out of box product? Do you use them inside of Vegas?

I recently discovered the joys of working with a third party chroma key effect and realized how much things can be improved if you move from the default tools and into the more advanced ones.

Thanks

[Davd Keator]

Oy Vey – This is a big can….

Lets see: Codec: A program and algorithm that is used to encode and compress media data. Certain codecs are fast and dirty. Such as Mpeg1. Mpeg2, M2ts, etc…

Throughout the years, processors have gotten faster and along with innovation we have benefited from faster more efficient codecs to compress our video. As time went on we have evolved to what is known as wavelet codecs such as Cineform.

Quick brief:

Long Group of Pictures is a format that bunches individual pictures of the video and massively compresses the areas of the image that don’t move very much, and a little compression on the parts that do move. This is processor intensive and when you as an editor cuts in the middle of the group of pictures, your computer and editing software needs to recalculate the new stream and then re-compress a new group of pictures. When this occurs you get compression errors and blocking artifacts, not to mention just a bit muddier image.

This type of compression falls apart right after the second generation of rendering. That is if you were to make a few cuts render it out then go back add some effects and cuts then render it again.

You will see blocks, lines, off colors and graduations in the colors as well

This is simplistic as Vegas does have no-re-compress on their H264, however overall, it still falls apart.

GOP is known as lossy compression

Longer part of the brief:

Bit-rate: this is how many bits of data are used to save the information for the computer to reconstruct the image. The less data, the more compression, the more the computer gets to guess what the image looks like. The higher the bit rate – the better. However, there is a point of diminishing returns.

Too much bit-rate and you are wasting processing power trying to keep information and you see stuttering and other playback issues. Simply your computer can’t keep up with the data stream.

Also, the codec in general only allows for so much information to pass through at a tine.

Look at wikipedia: H264 codec specs. There you can see the data rate & resolution specifications. If you exceed the bit-rate, you simply waste power, not to mention a possible break of the codec and you can no longer play it back or edit it properly.

Sony gives you great defaults per codec of choice. If you lower the bit-rate you get more rendering errors / compression artifacts etc…

M2ts is a glorified codec like MP4. Looks good as a blu-ray, not good as an editing codec.

What do we do?

We get a codec that is the most modern and as lossless as possible that my computer can edit.

Enter Cineform, Mjpeg2000, Huffy, etc…

I have played with many codecs and struggled and prodded my way through to just realize. Just get the best and pay for it.

Therefore I use cineform.

This is a wavelet codec, it compresses each frame individually and uses advanced mathematics to keep the frequencies of light and color space more accurate each and every time you re-render the video.

The bit-rate is extremely high as well, however, the math behind the codec is great and most computers can handle it with ease. Even Apple and it’s touted “Prores” is getting replaced with this form of codec for their next Final cut release.

This digital intermediate is pricey yet well worth the cost if you do composting and other complicated effects.

Thats about it:

For further reading look up:

Bit-rate
Codec: H264, Mpeg2, Lossy & Lossless
Wapper: AVI, MP4, MOV
Bit depth – 8, 10, 12, 16 & 32float
Wavelet
de-blocking
Transcode

Simple point of view:

Take captured footage, transcode into Cineform ‘filmscan1’, edit, render out to codec needed, blue-ray, Mpeg2 for DVD, or MP4 for internet upload & or sharing. Be happy, this is the best you can get, now you just need practice making your footage look better and hone your editing skills.

Don’t forget, learn how to edit audio as well. Sound Forge or Adobe Audition / Sound booth.

Good luck.

[Larry Cole]

That was a great response. Thanks for taking the time to fully answer my questions. I’ll definately try to work towards your suggestions.

[Larry Cole]

I currently have a sony hdr-sr11 video camera. At some point I want to upgrade but I’m finding other tools in need of upgrading first (lighting, green screens, mikes and audio recording equipment). Are the cinform codecs something that would benefit this low end model or is this something to invest in once I get a better camera?

Also, what is the workflow? Convert native format to cineform, edit and rerender to cineform until all effects have been incorporated and then render to the DVD architect formats? I’m assuming cineform is for the intermediate editing and rednering but you still have to convert to a format that DVD architect can handle. Do I have this correct?

One last question, is cineform a standalone application or do you still use vegas to create the new files?

Again, thanks so much for the great information.

[John Rofrano]

[Larry Cole] “I currently have a sony hdr-sr11 video camera. At some point I want to upgrade but I’m finding other tools in need of upgrading first (lighting, green screens, mikes and audio recording equipment). Are the cinform codecs something that would benefit this low end model or is this something to invest in once I get a better camera?”

Yes, using CineForm would be beneficial for your camera. Especially if you are doing green screen work.

[Larry Cole] “Also, what is the workflow? Convert native format to cineform, edit and rerender to cineform until all effects have been incorporated and then render to the DVD architect formats? I’m assuming cineform is for the intermediate editing and rednering but you still have to convert to a format that DVD architect can handle. Do I have this correct?”

You got it! CineForm is the digital intermediary that you do all of your edit with and then you render to your delivery formats from that.

[Larry Cole] “One last question, is cineform a standalone application or do you still use vegas to create the new files?”

Both. CineForm NeoScene is a batch conversion and capture application that includes the CineForm codec for Vegas. So you can convert your files stand-alone in batch or generate CineForm files from with Vegas. This comes in handy when going out to other applications like After Effects.

~jr

http://www.johnrofrano.com
http://www.vasst.com