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What would be the best codec for playback? Please read body for quick explanation.
I own a Canon 60D and I used to believe that it was the high bitrate (around 40,000 kbps) that caused my footage to lag when played on my computer. But I have heard, and noticed that better codecs, such as prores seem to play better.
So my question is this. I know some “flavors” of Prores are about 28000kbps….so is it the bit rate? Or if I wanted to encode the footage from the processor intensive h264 out of camera, would it make sense to encode to a different codec? If so, which? (obviously I dont want to degrade the footage. Its not a matter of getting it smaller – just more efficient but with a smaller size as a possible “side-effect”)
I apologize if this shouldnt be posted in the Premiere forum. It’s where I do most of my editing and I was just curious (and yes, I know there are option to play a 1/4 res – but I dont think the resolution is the issue.
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3 Replies
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Bit rate and decode complexity are not the same thing; there are a variety of factors that can make H.264 harder to decompress than ProRes, but the main factor is the fact that ProRes is an intraframe codec (meaning every frame stores complete frame data), while H.264 is by default an interframe codec (meaning that some frames are keyframes, storing complete frame data, but others are only partial frames which require the system to also decode other neighboring frames).
If you’re going to transcode to an intermediate format for Premiere and you are using CC or CC 2014, consider DNxHD in MXF as well as ProRes in MOV.
Walter Soyka
Designer & Mad Scientist at Keen Live [link]
Motion Graphics, Widescreen Events, Presentation Design, and Consulting
@keenlive | RenderBreak [blog] | Profile [LinkedIn] -
Thanks so much Walter. Makes sense.
I have a Windows machine and without downloading additional software/codecs, I can’t encode to Prores, but mxf worked just fine for me. -
[Dave Andrade] “I have a Windows machine and without downloading additional software/codecs, I can’t encode to Prores, but mxf worked just fine for me.”
DNxHD in MXF enjoys a significant performance boost over ProRes in MOV on Windows for decode, too.
Walter Soyka
Designer & Mad Scientist at Keen Live [link]
Motion Graphics, Widescreen Events, Presentation Design, and Consulting
@keenlive | RenderBreak [blog] | Profile [LinkedIn]
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