Premiere encoding

[Robert Brown]

I’m all for hearing other people’s workflows. The quickview I’m talking about is in osx. Just click on a file in finder and then hit the space bar. It loads extremely fast and then just hit the up or down arrow to see the next file. I was working with a client the other day and it’s very fast at seeing what each file is. Then you can drag it into fcp or premier or avid and it’s in. I haven’t used avc intra yet and don’t know much about it. And yes premiere and avid are much better about other codecs. fcp is terrible for that.

[John Pale]

[Daniel McClintock] “Premiere Pro plays a good majority of the codecs used out there natively so you don’t have to transcode — just import the file, drop it in the time timeline and just edit — this is especially true for DSLRs and RED.
“

This is the same thinking that got apple in trouble with a lot of people. Tape still exists, and will for a long time to come. If you are working with tape (HDCAM, HDCAM SR, D5, etc) what codec can you capture with that is high quality but doesn’t require massive amounts of high speed storage? Do I have to factor in buying a codec like Cineform to the cost of switching?

Relying on codecs from Apple or Avid to get the job done doesn’t really sound like a good plan. They aren’t really optimized for Premiere, so they don’t work as efficiently…and you are at their mercy when it comes to support.

[Joe Moya]

You do not need to rely on Cineform to be able to work effectively with ADOBE or AVID. I prefer to use Cineform because it keeps things simple for me (specially if I am having to edit with multiple file formats).

DNxHD will work fine between the two – ADOBE or AVID… and, is similar to ProRes that FCP prefers to use. But… you can also work natively with either Adobe or AVID (i.e., …not use DNxHD or Cineform)…but, I don’t typically recommend this if the editing project is the least bit complex, HD video or long. Whether or not working in a native HD codec is feasable depends upon your hardware capabilities and less about software.

In a perfect world, if you are editing HD material…you will prefer to work off-line and/or proxy format that is lower rez… note: the term off-line and proxy are terms that are used differently between Adobe and AVID…so, when you decide to establish a proxy/off-line process in your workflow…you might want to post at either ADOBE or AVID’s forums and get some insight and details.

No matter what video format you will decide to use… there will be a certain degree of learning as to how to apply it to your current workflow. But…neither ADOBE or AVID will likely give the kind of grief FCPX will likely cause. And… I am not picking on FCPX… I would say this about ANY ver. 1.0 editing application.

[Matthew Keane]

[John Pale] “I have read that MP4s that are encoded by AME do not support progressive download (meaning they don’t play until fully downloaded from the web)”

I found that to be the case with AME CS4 (I haven’t checked in CS5.5 yet), but I found a small utility ‘QTIndexSwapper’ which adds the necessary header data to the MP4 file so that browsers can load the fie progressively. It does add an extra step to the compression process, but seems to work.

Matthew

[Dennis Radeke]

DNxHD is an Avid proprietary format. Adobe Premiere Pro can decode it if it’s using the Avid Quicktime LE codec pack that they put out for free. Premiere Pro however does NOT decode native DNxHD .mxf files. This is a licensing issue. Ditto for ProRes.

The lag that you describe is due to (I believe) invoking the QT player which is as you know 32-bit. Whenever possible, we work around the QT Player so to avoid it’s performance issues for a 64-bit application. We do that for Canon/H264 for example. FCP X I believe does the same thing through AV Foundation.

Hope this helps,
Dennis – Adobe guy

[Brian Cooney]

in FCP I have always had the option to play the gambit of codecs and edit them within the timeline. Prorez is great because it bumps up quality and also cuts HD rendering time in half… or more.

[David Cherniack]

[John Pale] “This is the same thinking that got apple in trouble with a lot of people. Tape still exists, and will for a long time to come. If you are working with tape (HDCAM, HDCAM SR, D5, etc) what codec can you capture with that is high quality but doesn’t require massive amounts of high speed storage? Do I have to factor in buying a codec like Cineform to the cost of switching?”

Hey John,

If you’re ingesting from HD tape the Matrox iFrame codecs are excellent, free, and will suffice for most uses. For effects bound source material, where greater than 8 bits is needed, the uncompressed 10 bit codecs will not degenerate any tape source, even HDcamSR, while capturing to both Prores and Dnx will. Premiere does all video processing at 32 bit float so only at that point will the quality of the intermediate codec come into play, not on ingesting from tape. And as effect’s work is not greatly storage intensive, I, for one, prefer uncompressed 10 bit to any compressed codec. If space is a concern then yes, the prores 4×4 would be a great choice.

David
AllinOneFilms.com

[Hector Berrebi]

[David Cherniack] “If you’re ingesting from HD tape the Matrox iFrame codecs are excellent, free, and will suffice for most uses. For effects bound source material, where greater than 8 bits is needed, the uncompressed 10 bit codecs will not degenerate any tape source, even HDcamSR, while capturing to both Prores and Dnx will. Premiere does all video processing at 32 bit float so only at that point will the quality of the intermediate codec come into play, not on ingesting from tape. And as effect’s work is not greatly storage intensive, I, for one, prefer uncompressed 10 bit to any compressed codec. If space is a concern then yes, the prores 4×4 would be a great choice.”

Hey David.

I tend to agree with john here. Adobe users tend to overlook too quickly how the lack of a propitery codec line hurts the product. Working native all the way is good in certain codecs maybe, but in many cases it is a weak solution, which ignores issues like unifying standards in multiple res multiple codec projects, offline/online workflows, affordable high end mastering both in broadcast and cinema ( no DNX there yet…) and yes, capture from HD tape source.

Uncompressed 10bits HD codecs are in most cases a complete overkill. And if you work in 4:4:4 then it’s even a bigger pain in the A@&. The HDD space and performance requirements on a broadcast/network scale make no sense. That’s true in other markets too.

It makes little difference that premiere reads DNX or ProRes. FCP reads DNX and AVID reads ProRes too… but they aren’t optimized for it so it works poorly. Premier’s stregth in reading Native is good for stuff that’s either very short or simple, or stuff with lower standards and less rigorous examination…
It’s also cool in presentations.

But if someone cuts their feature film in R3D native in premiere, then in my opinion, they’re either noobs, or they just don’t know better.

ProRes is genius and brilliant, DNX is solid and has potential to better up,
I believe and I hope, that soon Adobe will have their solution too.

Hector

Hector Berrebi
prePost Consulting

[Hector Berrebi]

[Brian Cooney] “in FCP I have always had the option to play the gambit of codecs and edit them within the timeline. Prorez is great because it bumps up quality and also cuts HD rendering time in half… or more.
“

Hmmm… Nothing just bumps up quality. ProRes allows more optimal use of some files in the FCP environment.
It doesn’t lose quality (in most cases) its great for capture, and it is proving to be an excellent acquisition codec too.

But any appearent bumping up of quality involving ProRes can be probably explained in better terms

FCP had funky native codec support, involving too much QT rewrapping.

Hector Berrebi
prePost Consulting

[David Cherniack]

Hey Hector,

I was responding to John’s comment about a capturing in Premiere. I duly recognize that there’s a lack of an Adobe intermediate and mastering codec and I hope that will be rectified soon. But for effects work I would still prefer to capture and render in 10 bit uncompressed. I’ve never been sorry that I have and if on those times it’s been overkill it’s because of poor decision making on my part.

David
AllinOneFilms.com