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Settings – output very poor for mp4, mov, etc
I’m new to Final Cut Pro, and my first post here. I started using FCP ~4 months ago because I was having trouble with output from Blender’s video sequence editor. But my experience with FCP is similar, in that my final output is simply awful.
What I’m doing with FCP seems very simple, and although I understand that issues quickly arise with re-compression, resizing, etc, I’d expect this to be a cakewalk for any application of this type. The real mystery is why the output file looks so bad when the preview inside FCP looks fine.
I’m starting with a bunch of jpg stills and some MPEG-4 720×480 & 720×544 clips (compiled using ffmpeg from a large series of programmatically saved aerial images — this results in beautiful streams of hi-res aerial animations). I’m assembling a short 5-minute documentary, and the stills and clips are scaled into smaller areas with zoom-in/out & pan using Motion, cross-fades, etc.
In other FCP projects I’ve started with MPEG-4 clips outputted from Blender and other solids modeling applications, and had similar poor results in the final outputted video.
At first I was using FCP 5.0, and I imagined that newer codecs may be needed so I upgraded to FCP Suite 7, but see no improvement.
My sequence settings are Frame size: 1280×960, Pixel Aspect Ratio: NTSC CCIR 601/DV (720×480), Compressor: DVCPRO HD 720p60, Quality: 100%, and Render Control: Apple ProRes 422. (Should this be set to “same as Sequence Codec”? Could this be the problem?)
I’m attempting to output a large format video for the sake of keeping good/high resolution (and accepting that this produces large file sizes). Though I admit that I’ve done a lot of stumbling around FCP settings because this or that setting causes squat aspect ratios of either individual clips or the whole canvas.
So, even though my preview render inside of FCP looks great, my final video files mostly look horrible. I’ve tried dozens of output settings in both FCP-Export-QT-Converter and Compressor 3. I’ve tried exporting MPEG-4, AVI, WMV, various sizes, codecs, etc. I’m at my wit’s end.
Example of my quality issues are:
1 – Scaled animations (videos) seem low resolution, like they have low vertical-line count
2 – Text label fonts also have low resolution
3 – My opening title fades in, then suddenly gets squashed to ~60% height, then corrects itself… I have no idea why this would occur and this seems completely random since there are no motion settings applied to that object.I have no preference of the final video size but since I’ve invested a lot in precise positioning and scaling via motion I’m hoping that I can keep my size/ratio settings and that the problem is in the codecs I’ve chosen.
Any advise is greatly appreciated!
Justin -
7 Replies
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what are the specs for your computer?
I have had the jumping and correcting issue with a computer. But it was mostly because the computer was old.
Have you tried trashing your preferences?
Josh
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[Justin Zakowski] “My sequence settings are Frame size: 1280×960, Pixel Aspect Ratio: NTSC CCIR 601/DV (720×480), Compressor: DVCPRO HD 720p60, Quality: 100%, and Render Control: Apple ProRes 422. (Should this be set to “same as Sequence Codec”? Could this be the problem?)”
Where and why did you come up with that? You have different resolutions, different codecs, no way this will work well.FIrst like we have posted a hundred times, you cannot edit mpeg4 video in FCP, it needs to be transcoded to something like ProRes and all you video should be converted to the same spec. If all your video is SD you need to edit in SD, there is no reason to edit as HD.
Convert everything to 720×480 ProRes, make the sequence match and do from there.
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Transcode to ProRes to make FCP happy, easiest to work with.
Files grow a bit, but makes things easier faster.You can also work in DV/DVCPRO, although DV is highly compressed.
As Michael said If you have SD footage work in an SD(720×480) timeline.*Production*Post-Production*
Apple Certified Instructor (Final Cut Pro 7)
“Semper Fi USMC” -
After QT conversion, Double check the options>movie setting>size>make sure you have 720×480 and not some crazy size like 468×268.
*Production*Post-Production*
Apple Certified Instructor (Final Cut Pro 7)
“Semper Fi USMC” -
Thank you, I upgraded to FCP Suite 7 knowing that Apple ProRes 422 is going to be what saves me. I guess I assumed that this conversion of the clips to intermediary files would be automatic, but I guess that’s not the case.
So, is it necessary to have everything the same size? Seems using media manager, all the clips, stills, and canvas gets resized. Plus, I’ve already done lots of Motion layout. (Also, my source clips are of varying sizes – 1920×1200, 720×544, and 720×480 – and I assume that FCP can deal with this as the finished video will not have all clips displayed full size. I’ve tried to record source material in larger formats than they’ll be shown at, so as not to zoom in on a low-res clips… Really, what I’m trying to do seems so basic, but being a newbie I’m certainly making too many assumptions).
For example, say I have a 1280×960 canvas, and two 320×480 clips in small boxes will move about the canvas. The imported clips are MPEG-4 so I want to convert them to ProRes 422. Can I do that without forcing everything — canvas, stills, clips — to the same format (size)? If I need to convert them outside FCP then can someone suggest a tool that knows ProRes 422?
Sorry if this topic has been discussed, but I’ve done a lot of searching in the past months and haven’t found my answers.
Many thanks!
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Work with the best res possible, so:
Keep all of your clips closest to their native size, round up or down if they are a few pixels off like 1920×1200 turn into 1920×1080. are these timelapses, or Still sequences?
DONT TURN SD CLIPS INTO HD (720×480 into 1280×720)Just change your codec to ProRes. YOu should be fine.
enjoy.*Production*Post-Production*
Apple Certified Instructor (Final Cut Pro 7)
“Semper Fi USMC” -
Ahh thanks — I’m beginning to see the light 🙂
I just discovered Streamclip, so I’m on the right track to getting everything into ProRes 422.
I also realized that I had lower-quality-than-previously-thought sources. (I had been working with mov/MPEG-4 files that I had converted to MOV using Quicktime Pro, So I’m now going to rework all of my video sources using Streamclip.)
Although not all matching frame rates (maybe fine on this one, but my next project will be vastly better) I think I’m able to replace clip content to minimize the Motion rework.
Thanks all!!
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