Reducing Export Time and relationship to Preview Renders

[Tony Sarafoski]

Keith,

I just want to go over your workflow to make sure I totally understand it.

1. You capture or convert all your rushes to Apple ProRes 422 (LT).
2. In PPro you create a sequence that matches ProRes 422 LT

Do you do this by selecting the HDV/HDV 1080i25 (50i) preset

or do you drag a clip to the ‘NEW ITEM” icon instead?

3. I’m guessing the most important thing is that your VIDEO PREVIEW CODEC is set to Apple ProRes 422 (LT).

Am I right to say after you’ve finished your edit, added filters (like colour correction or brightness/contras), you then render you timeline by selecting SEQUENCE/RENDER ENTIRE WORK AREA?

Do you then select FILE/EXPORT/MEDIA and export it to Apple ProRes 422 (LT) with “use preview” ticked? or do you instead drop the sequence in Adobe Media Encoder & encode it to ProRes LT that way?

[Keith Moreau]

Tony

No need to transcode anything before importing the Premiere Pro. Pretty much every type of file works without transcoding. Just ‘import’ your footage into Premiere Pro. This is the primary reason I’m switching to Premiere Pro.

The sequence settings is kind of confusing, but basically you just need to pick a resolution and framerate that matches what you want to output and the majority of the source footage. It’s almost for just for convenience.

I set the ‘preview files’ to Prores, but I’m on a system where preview files aren’t really necessary, I can play back almost everything in real time.

When you export, don’t use preview files, have that unchecked. If I have the preview files set to Prores, then on the Export window I check the “Match Sequence Settings” and this makes the export match my preview files setting. Again confusing but that’s how I think it works.

For fastest output I uncheck the “Use Maximum Render Quality.” I haven’t scrutinized with it on or off, but when I’m downrezzing a lot I don’t think it matters. Checking it will double your encoding time.

Then I queue it, it produces a Prores file.

That is then my master file, I use whatever app works with Quicktime to encode it to the final delivery format.

It’s all kind of confusing, I know, but once you get used to it it’s ok.

The main thing is:

Don’t transcode anything before bringing it into Premiere, unnecessary, time wasting, quality reducing step.

[Sean ian Macgowan]

I have the solution. I hope it makes you as happy as it does me.

1. Get Premiere Pro CC
2. Select the sequence preset for DNX220X
2a. Make sure the preview file format is set to DNX220X, but you shouldn’t have to do that manually as the preset is already configured
2b. Go to the radio button for “use maximum render quality” for preview files and turn that on
3. Edit using this sequence…using any format of source material
4. Render as you go, overnight, etc. during the course of the project – this creates “preview files” in the DNX220X MXF format…which WILL facilitate your final output, whereas creating “preview files” in some other formats WILL NOT facilitate the final output
5. Your “preview files” will be created in mastering quality and will serve in the same capacity as your full-quality “render files” used to within FCP7, helping you for a faster export when the time comes, and without any quality loss, because when you export the master output, it will not re-transcode the render files…instead, it will do like FCP7 used to…if your sequence was already rendered, it would just essentially “copy” the data, rather than recalculating everything
5a. Assuming you’re locked and everything has been rendered and you’re ready to output with nothing but a green bar atop the timeline….
6. Choose export media
7. select “match sequence settings”
8. select “use maximum render quality”
9. select “use previews”
10. jump around because you’re so happy…as you watch the progress bar move about 80% faster than the last time you exported a sequence

The output will occur in approximately 20% of the duration of your sequence’s total time. This output will be of the DNXHD220X codec and MXF file type. It looks excellent and solves a huge problem.

Now, all of you FCP7 folks can carry on as though you were using FCP7…in that you can render overnight as you go, and have those render files help save you time when exporting the master.

Thank you Adobe for a fantastic Premiere Pro upgrade in Premiere Pro CC. You knocked it out of the park with this one.

[Ty Frey]

Great info. Thanks!

http://www.tyfrey.com
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