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prores 422 hq vs prores 422 vs prores 444
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To further explain Native Editing
1. In FCP… can import H.264 straight and do a cut down to determine which soundbites you need, b-Roll, etc. Assembly sequences. You can then use media manager on this.
2. In Premiere Pro, Avid MC5, Sony Vegas – You can import and edit material WITHOUT transcoding. You can work with the material in a more robust color space, add effects, etc.
Personally, I do #2… working in Premiere Pro for DSPr material. I then send out an FCP sequence with media (via XML export) and go to Apple Color at 422 if needed. Sometimes we just Color Correct with Premiere Pro or Color Finesse in AE.
As of this writing… the ability to record out the HDMI port is not really there, so writing 4:2:0 then trying to bump it up to a beefier format is really not going to go very far.
If you were shooting a photo as a JPEG, then you converted to a Photoshop or DNG, you just wouldn’t get the same flexibility as shooting in a camera raw format. I’m not saying to master back to H.264 (which would be like opening a JPEG and saving a JPEGH out – more compression than wanted).
I hope this gives clarity… Lance feel free to start insulting me again.
Richard M. Harrington, PMP
Author: From Still to Motion, Video Made on a Mac, Photoshop for Video, Understanding Adobe Photoshop, Final Cut Studio On the Spot and Motion Graphics with Adobe Creative Suite 5 Studio Techniques
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You’re right Richard! Who needs quality anyways? MP3’s are fine for music, Avatar probably should have been shot with a DVX100, and what do we even need these crazy big chips for – 1/3″ chips are fine!
You’re a prime example of that old adage- those that can do, those that can’t teach. Rewriting manuals isn’t exactly gonna win you any Pulitzer’s pal. I was cutting a million dollar feature on Final Cut 1 in June of 99… just weeks after it was introduced at NAB at the Sands if you were there.
I looked for you on IMDB… you know that industry standard thing we use in motioon picture and television industry? Didn’t see anything for you? My last TV series had 4 to 5 million viewers every week and won an Emmy… my latest feature was shot shot with DSLR’s, what’d you shot your last feature or national TV series on?
I’ve done more testing transcoding footage than you could ever dream of over the past decade – but I’m doing it for TV shows and movies with multi-million dollar budgets. Broadcasters here in LA demand everything – QC is a bitch! Drives are cheap! So I use HQ when I use ProRES! I use Filmscan 2 when I use Cineform. I use DNxHD 175 or better when I deliver on Avid. I use HDCAM SR over HDCAM… I use Dual Link SR when I can…
Don’t be a moron…
Lance Bachelder
Southern California -
Look at the original question that started thus thread. Do you think your suggested workflow us right for him?
Not saying HQ irrelevant. Just not an issue for DSLR originated.
Richard M. Harrington, PMP
Author: From Still to Motion, Video Made on a Mac, Photoshop for Video, Understanding Adobe Photoshop, Final Cut Studio On the Spot and Motion Graphics with Adobe Creative Suite 5 Studio Techniques
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Let me regurgitate then (https://images.apple.com/finalcutstudio/docs/Apple_ProRes_White_Paper_July_2009.pdf)
“Apple ProRes 422 (HQ): Boasting widespread adoption across the video postproduction
industry, Apple ProRes 422 (HQ) offers visually lossless preservation of the
highest-quality professional HD video that a (single-link) HD-SDI signal can carry. This
codec supports full-width, 4:2:2 video sources at 10-bit pixel depths, while retaining its
visually lossless characteristic through many generations of decoding and re-encoding.
Apple ProRes 422 (HQ) can be used both as an intermediate codec to accelerate
workflows for complex, compressed video sources and as an affordable, highperformance
alternative to uncompressed 4:2:2 video.”“Apple ProRes 422: Apple ProRes 422 offers nearly all the benefits of its big brother,
Apple ProRes 422 (HQ), but at a significantly lower data rate. It provides visually
lossless coding performance for the same full-width, 10-bit, 4:2:2 sequences as
Apple ProRes 422 (HQ) with even better multistream RT editing performance.”https://images.apple.com/finalcutstudio/docs/Apple_ProRes_White_Paper_July_2009.pdf
also see
https://images.apple.com/finalcutstudio/resources/white_papers/L342568A_ProRes_WP.pdf
As far as the rest… Lance. I choose not to work in Hollywood. I have no interest in it. The world of video is much bigger than IMDB. I’ve had the joy of working on PSAs for many top tier folks. I also get to work on other projects folks in the advocacy, health, and education space (that get watched much more than 5 million views). With all of that said… this is NOT about you or me. I am Not attacking your professional credibility…. this is about helping people… Not “toss yours on the table.” Find it odd that you feel the need to attack another leaders credibility.
But I’m done trolling….
Omar… do what you feel is best for you. Personally, I stick to native editing as long as possible until I’ve narrowed down which clips are going to be used. Use any of the methods I suggested to do this.
When that’s done, go ahead and transcode if working in Final Cut Studio. Go right to the source and read the white paper from Apple I mentioned above.
The simplest way I can say it is that Robust codecs are great if you capture to them to begin with or are at lest using the same bit depth and
Follow this advice from Apple
Apple ProRes Codec Visible differences (1st gen.) Quality headroom
ProRes 4444 Virtually never Very high, excellent for multi-gen. finishing
ProRes 422 (HQ) Virtually never Very high, excellent for multi-gen. finishing
ProRes 422 Very rare High, very good for most multi-gen. workflowsSo if you plan to swap your shots around between multiple workstations and users because you are doing heavy VFX or Color Grading work outside of color…. or you’re going to be doing things like output for digital cinema go for it.
of course if you were doing those things, I’d encourage you to use a Alexa or a Red.
Just my opinions… let the personal attacks on credibility commence
Richard M. Harrington, PMP
Author: From Still to Motion, Video Made on a Mac, Photoshop for Video, Understanding Adobe Photoshop, Final Cut Studio On the Spot and Motion Graphics with Adobe Creative Suite 5 Studio Techniques
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Don’t be a moron…
Lance,
This was an EXTREMELY offensive post to another forum leader.
And frankly you do not have a clue about ProRes, there is absolutely NO reason to take a highly compressed h.264 file and balloon it by using either PR444 or PRHQ. Rich is only mirroring MY recommendations, so I am the one you should be attacking,
What, by passing to another codec you some how create additional quality? It will NEVER be more than what was a shot, by forceing the file to a higher level codec all you are doing is taxing the CPU and storage without any gain in quality.
When using ProRes standard the 8 bit materials are carried in a 10bit container and it will only convert to 10bit
when rendered or modified, however with HQ it will force the 256 levels of 8bit content to fully expand into the
1024 levels of every time you open or play the file, limiting the performance on all but the most powerful machines.I have done these tests all the way back to film with standard, HQ and 4444 and I stand by my tests, DSLR footage gains absolutely nothing from processing in anything more than ProRes (SQ)
gary adcock
Studio37Post and Production Workflow Consultant
Production and Post Stereographer
Chicago, ILhttps://blogs.creativecow.net/24640
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Last year I worked with one of the major networks as they transitioned from analog to digital. The engineering departments in both NY and LA unanimously agreed that ProRes (not HQ or 4444) is the perfect intersection of quality and file size. The shows they are archiving are are all shot on 35mm, vipercam and the like. If ProRes is good enough for one of the major networks, I can tell you it’s more that good enough for DSLR footage.
Steve Martin
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[Stephen Martin] “he engineering departments in both NY and LA unanimously agreed that ProRes (not HQ or 4444) is the perfect intersection of quality and file size. “
I second that. I grade nearly a 125-130 hours of programing a year for Discovery, Geo, PBS and without question from talking to all QC departments for DSLR or other 8-bit sources ProRes (SQ) is recommended. In fact LT is acceptable in many cases (roughly equivalent to DVCPRO HD) depending on the level of programing.
Gary’s explanation is technically accurate for sure, and I’ll go one further. Over the years I’ve found (myself guilty of this sometimes) that because a “better codec” is available people convince themselves of perceptual differences in quality when none exist.
And Lance, calling people morons now matter who they are, skill level, or question they ask or statement they make is simply unacceptable in my opinion, but especially in an environment like the COW. We all have different opinions and because someone differed from your opinion doesn’t give you carte blanche to act like a 3 year old. Success. Technical aptitude, creativity and the ability to give advice aren’t measured by an IMDB listing, a codec someone uses or a piece of equipment they own.
Robbie Carman
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Colorist and Author
Check out my new Books:
Video Made on a Mac
Apple Pro Training Series DVDSP
From Still To Motion -
ProRes is an excellent codec in all of its varieties.
For DSLRs, you can do tests on your own to confirm what I’ve found: converting the h264 from the Canon DSLR into ProRes 422 HQ will not improve the quality of your footage. The acquired footage is so lossy that I’ve actually found that ProRes LT is the sweet spot to balance size and maintain quality from a DSLR.
If you are recording an HDMI/Composite feed straight from the camera, or if you’re working with RED or an EX3, convert to ProRes 4444 to maintain as much quality in that uncompressed signal as possible. Your 7D or 5Dii is essentially shooting JPEG video frames (meaning that the image is compressed; not MJPEG format on a Canon), and converting JPEGs to TIFF doesn’t add quality that didn’t exist before. You certainly will continue to degrade your footage if you convert to AIC or ProRes Proxy, but if the final output is SD or med-size web video, the degradation won’t be significant for some producers.
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[Garrett Gibbons] ” converting the h264 from the Canon DSLR into ProRes 422 HQ will not improve the quality of your footage. The acquired footage is so lossy that I’ve actually found that ProRes LT is the sweet spot to balance size and maintain quality from a DSLR.”
Garrett,
while then PRLT variant is the sweet spot, I advise using the PRSQ to give you a little more headroom and quality, so that nothing is lost in the editing and grading process.There is Not really any advantage with converting between 2 equal codecs, however by using the next level of quality that you are gaining the benefits without over taxing your system, storage etc…
gary adcock
Studio37Post and Production Workflow Consultant
Production and Post Stereographer
Chicago, ILhttps://blogs.creativecow.net/24640
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I’m new to video production (old to still photography & graphic design) and much of the technical discussion is still over my head (but I’m a fast & avid learner!).
I’ve been informed (in several sources) that the native h.264 footage captured by my 5DII is too compressed and unsuitable to import into FCP for editing and that it must be first converted to ProRes 422 using Compressor.
Richard…I interpret your entry as indicating that it’s OK and preferable to import the original h.264 file into FCP and then transcode the edited version to final output. Is that correct?
If not, what IS the best workflow? Most of my startup projects will be instructional videos output to DVD and web downloads, so not the highest quality…yet.
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