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Proxy files problem
Hey everyone
I have 2k 24p Pro-res 4444 footage that I am trying to edit in Premiere Pro 5.5. The files are massive, and do not play smoothly either in Premiere or in Quick Time Player, so I wanted to create some proxy files to do some offline editing. Because there is going to be some image manipulation, I would like to preserve the same frame size (2048×1152) in the proxy files as in the original. That way any filters or effects can be applied to the proxy footage and the original footage equally.
I haven’t been able to find a good solution so far to create proxy tiles that will work. First, I tried using Adobe Media encoder, outputting to .mov files using the h.264 codec. Unfortunately, Media Encoder doesn’t allow me to choose 2048×1152 as N output size for h.264 Quick Time files. When I enter in 2048, it defaults back to 2000. Which makes the proxy files unusable in that they will be the wrong dimension as the originals.
For my second try, also using Media Encoder, I tried outputting to .mov files using the MPEG-4 codec. That output the files to the proper dimensions, however they are still somewhat large and are definitely unplayable in both Premiere and Quick Time.
My third option was to find a 3rd-party encoder. I downloaded Any Video Converter, and successfully created 2k (2048×1152) h.264 .mov proxy files of all of my footage. The proxy files were significantly smaller in size and quality than my original footage, and as such played just fine in Quick Time Player. However, Premiere got very moody with these files when I tried to import them. Sometimes they would import. And sometimes Premiere would crash. I tried reimporting them individually to see which ones Premiere didn’t like, but it seemed that which ones crashed the program depended on Premiere’s mood at the moment. The same file would properly import OR crash the program, with no indication why. When I was able to get some files into Premiere, I had another problem in that their timecode did not match the original files. Even though they were listed as 23.976 FPS both in Premiere (when I right-clicked on the file) and in the movie inspector in Quick Time, they would display a timecode that was in 30 FPS when I brought the files to the source window. If I dropped the proxy file onto the 24p timeline and displayed timecode over it, even when 24p display was selected, the timecode did not match the timecode of the original footage. I would think this would be a big problem when I go back and online the project because the timecode of the original files and the proxy files won’t match.
Ideally I’d like to be able to create 2k proxy files that will
a) play on my computer with no lag, and
b) properly import into Premiere without crashing or timecode issues.
Anyone have any ideas?Thanks
Paul McKinney -
3 Replies
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I’m not sure about the timecode issues…
as far as the dimensions of the file.
As long as “scale to fame size” is selected in prefs prior to first usage, and your sequences is at final output resolution, you should be able to add effects ok.
One way to determine this is to note that when you drop a small clip on to a hires timeline and it fills the frame, if you examine the effects controls, the scaling should still be displayed as 100%.
That’s because PPro does the mismatch transformation prior to the effects controls processing, leaving that metadata independent and thus allowing it to be transferred to clips of different dimensions.
If you can get the timecode and stability worked out…I’d test it to be sure…but I’m pretty sure that’s the deal…
Alex Udell
Editing, Motion Graphics, and Visual FX -
Well, that would certainly make it a lot easier. I’m going to try it, thanks.
I think the issue is between Any Video Converter and PPro. Premiere just doesn’t seem to play well with files created in AVC. I’ve also seen that sometimes, Premiere refuses to load a file created in AVC into the project bin and instead insists that the file is offline. All of the files created with Adobe Media Encoder work fine in Premiere, and the timecode displays correctly.
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a key is…
name your proxy set the SAME as you full res set….but put in a different path…this should make relinking to the full res easiest…
please TEST this…
I’m going on other things I’ve read.
Alex Udell
Editing, Motion Graphics, and Visual FX
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