MP4 vs AVCHD

[David Roth weiss]

Transcoding is time intensive, but not labor intensive – i.e. It can be done while you’re sleeping or eating lunch. Editing, rendering, and latency are all time and labor intensive. So, would you prefer to do the heavy lifting, or would rather let your computer do it while you’re sleeping? You get to choose. I know which I prefer. 🙂

David Roth Weiss
Director/Editor/Colorist & Workflow Consultant
David Weiss Productions
Los Angeles

David is a Creative COW contributing editor and a forum host of the Apple Final Cut Pro forum.

[Bryce Douglass]

Still not clear what I should do lol

Bryce

[Jeff Pulera]

Hi Bryce,

If I read between the lines of David’s comments, I think he might be saying to transcode 😉

Thanks

Jeff

[Chris Borjis]

Bryce, one of my contractors has that same camera and showed
once that one of those two has a higher recording bit rate.

I would shoot on that one whatever it is.

[Bryce Douglass]

yes. my xa25 has a mp4 35MBPS. Question is this. If I record in MP4 35MBPS and transcode to Pro Res do I lose the 35MBPS or does it keep it?

Bryce

[David Roth weiss]

Transcoding to another codec is analogous to pouring water from one container into another of different size.

If you pour a small glass of water into a larger one, you lose no water. Right? So, transcoding from MP4 to a ProRes keeps virtually all of the information that was in the MP4 container. Right?

Meanwhile, if you pour water from a large glass into a smaller one, you lose some water. Right? So, if you transcode from ProRes to MP4 (at a lower bitrate of course), some of the information won’t make it into the new container, and you’ll lose some information. Make sense?

So, transcoding to a better codec doesn’t make the original video look any better, but it does preserve the original information, and it does give you some of the added advantages the newer codec offers, such as an increase in color space when grading, and it can also hold up better as you go thru generations.

Does all this make sense to you now Bryce?

David Roth Weiss
Director/Editor/Colorist & Workflow Consultant
David Weiss Productions
Los Angeles

David is a Creative COW contributing editor and a forum host of the Apple Final Cut Pro forum.

[Tero Ahlfors]

[David Roth Weiss] “such as an increase in color space when grading”

Well to continue the water analogy… Pouring the water into a bigger container doesn’t turn it into wine. If you transcode your 8 bit 4:2:0 whatever to 32 bit 4:4:4 float it doesn’t gain any information that wasn’t there in the first place.

[David Roth weiss]

[Tero Ahlfors] “Pouring the water into a bigger container doesn’t turn it into wine. If you transcode your 8 bit 4:2:0 whatever to 32 bit 4:4:4 float it doesn’t gain any information that wasn’t there in the first place.”

I agree mostly Tero…

As I said, it doesn’t make the video look any better… However, it does give you additional color space to work in, meaning there will be less interpolation in the 4:2:2 color space of ProRes, and thus less color information lost (i.e. fewer discarded pixels) when processing.

David Roth Weiss
Director/Editor/Colorist & Workflow Consultant
David Weiss Productions
Los Angeles

David is a Creative COW contributing editor and a forum host of the Apple Final Cut Pro forum.

[Bryce Douglass]

How many MBPS is Pro Res 422?

Bryce

[Bryce Douglass]

Never mind I just found this. https://documentation.apple.com/en/finalcutpro/professionalformatsandworkflows/index.html#chapter=10%26section=4%26tasks=true

It says 1920 x 1080 at 29.97 fps is 147 Mbps at Apple ProRes 422. Does that mean if I shoot in MP4 at 35MBPS and Transcode to 422 I will still be at 35MBS since I can’t gain anything else?

Quick Question.

Lets say you compare MP4 35MBPS to AVCHD 25MBPS. Is there really significant video quality difference that everyone is going to notice or are they only going to notice if they had a side by side comparison?

Bryce