Blake Gibson
Forum Replies Created
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Well, the reason why I prefer DNXHD is because I found I get the best results making a h264 from Handbrake using DNXHD rather than a h264 straight from Vegas, at a smaller file size.
I followed your instructions using floating 32bit levels. Here is a comparison, password is pp for both:
Prores HQ > HDCAM SR Lite > h264 12-14mbps 2 pass:
Prores HQ > h264 12-14mbps 2 pass:
I’m sure that the files pre-upload looked noticeably different too, but I’ve done so many tests that I can’t be sure. I’ll have to recheck that when I get home.
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Not printing to film. Going to web, and a larger master on disc. It might just be me be crazy but I tested CF High and it didn’t look as good as Filmscan 2. Notice the top of the bartender’s forearm at 2 seconds till the start of 3 seconds when he’s lowering the bottle, I might be crazy but to me it goes noticeably fuzzier in the CF high test then it does in the CF Filmscan 2 test. I originally though there was more noise and macroblocking in his shirt too but that seems to be equal now. PW for both is pp
Prores HQ> CF Filmscan 2 > H264 30mbps 2 pass:
Prores HQ > CF High > H264 30mbps 2 pass:
And a H264 from the original Prores HQ for comparison:
Prores HQ > H264 30mbps 2 pass:
I’m a bit hesitant to upgrade as I always read horror stories of Vegas randomly crashing for no apparent reason, I believe mine is pretty stable at the moment apart from this crash. Pretty scary espcially since I’m already behind on this project (which is entirely my fault)
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Also, have you guys heard of “UT Video”? Apparently its a “new” codec for windows and MAC, its been around for a while but the stable version was released Feb this year I think?
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Ah ok John. I must have already had it somehow. Anyway, update:
I’ve successfully rendered all 240 prores files as Cineform filmscan 2 422 YUV using Aaron’s scripts above in lots of 75. I will purchase you script on the next job John, this job doesn’t pay enough to justify it unfortunately and I wanted to make sure that Cineform was an actual fix/workaround and worked reliably.
So, I dropped 50 cineform files onto the timeline and it was fine, the filesurrogate didn’t even flinch, was sitting happily at around 50-100mb usage in task manager. I tried it with the same 50 prores files and the filesurrogate jumped up to 800mb, so surprises here.
I then proceeded to dump all the cineform files into the timeline as a test, got to the third batch of 75 and vegas crashed, and kept crashing when I kept trying, I imported 25 at a time from then on and still got crashes, I managed to get all 240 files in (i think, is there a way to count/check the amount of files in a timeline? Can’t really find anything on google about this). about 1hr 25m footage, total size is larger due to using filmscan 2 – 147gb vs Prores 116gb. Filesurrogate is happily sitting at around 17mb with everything in the timeline, so that’s no longer the problem.
I haven’t done much at all yet in terms of editing, but vegas seems to be struggling when I hit CTR+Z to undo, it freezes and shows as not responding but eventually comes good.
I read on a forum that increasing the Dynamic Ram preview MAX (MB) in options > preferences > video, might help with crash in general. At the moment its on 200mb our of 7107 available (8gb ram installed on PC)
Any suggestions on this or anything else that might help?
Will proxies help in this case?
Here is the error code I got with one of the crashes (other times it was the generic “vegas has stopped working”)
https://i58.tinypic.com/1zw7x4.jpg
I really appreciate the help I’m getting from you guys, thank you so much
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Yep, I know that now. The Pocket cam is just too good to say no to!
That said, prores isn’t too bad on Windows it seems apart from Vegas. My friend edited a short I shot on my pocket cam in Premiere CC and it didn’t crash once he tells me, 210 files totalling 356gb (he used all the files in the project too)
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Excellent. I will do a cineform test clip tomorrow and see how it goes. I did a lot of tests with HDCAM SR last night and something wasn’t right about it.
Just not 100% on why I can’t use the Cineform that’s already in Vegas. I’m not questioning you at all I’m just curious. Come to think of it I can’t be 100% certain that Cineform was in Vegas before I installed Gopro Studio but I’m assuming it was.
Apologies if I’m missing something but what I understand from what you’ve said is its the old version in Vegas, installing gopro studio is the “new” version but Vegas can’t access it unless you create a new template which effectively “links” it to the new version of cineform? (and the new version somehow might and probably does work better than the old version for some reason)
Assuming that’s correct, how will I know that it’s indeed using the new version and not the old version?
I’ll more than likely get another 8gb ram tomorrow, so I’ll have 16gb. Then if I need more I’ll get more. I just checked another video I recently edited that was relatively large, 90gb worth of footage, but only 16 files and I didn’t have an issue at all with it at all. So its definitely the amount of files first, then the size of them it seems.
EDIT:
Just did a test export from vegas to cineform, VLC couldn’t play it and handbrake didn’t read it. I’ll wait till I do your template trick first though before I start stressing.
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Sorry John, didn’t see this until now, still getting the hang of this forum layout.
Sounds like Cineform might be the way to go! Do you happen to have a tutorial on your site for this?
And how large a project have you successfully used with Cineform in Vegas? would it be able to handle my 240 clips (116gb total size)?
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Thanks John, I’ve just been doing tests with HDCAM SR all night (I’m in Australia), I’ll do the same tests with Cineform tomorrow, or Saturday. Vegas will handle LOTS of Cineform files OK do you think?
I’m trying to figure out the best quality for uploading to YT/Vimeo:
Because I can’t export from prores Vegas to DNXHD, I have to go with one of the AVI options:
Prores > HDCAM SR Lite > Lagarith > Handbrake h264
Or straight from Vegas as a H264 (mainconcept) but I find handbrake much better at a much lower file size.
What would you recommend as an export workflow whether I use cineform or hdcam sr or something else? Lagarith might not be the best option, so Cineform might be better as you said, would this be the best option:
after editing/grading etc: Cineform > handbrake h264 (that would mean I’ve gone from Prores > Cineform > Cineform > Handbrake
Phew, this is hard yakka!
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Excellent! Thank you Aaron! I will do it overnight *fingers crossed*
I’m currently doing HDCAM SR tests and by the looks of things it’s VERY close to DNXHD.
I normally export from Vegas as DNXHD 185 RGB, then run it through handbrake to get a good h264 for web. But because I can’t export the large project to DNXHD with the 32bit/fileiosurrogate issues, I will need to export to something else first that won’t kill vegas. I’m experimenting with Lagarith, then running that through handbrake and so far the quality results are equally good. Or maybe h264 straight from Vegas but handbrake is visibly better
I’m assuming any of the AVI codecs will work and won’t have the issue?
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Thanks for that Aaron, I will try HDCAM-SR for sure. I think SR-Lite will be fine, as the bitrate is pretty much the same as the prores originals I think (185 @25p)
And I will switch to 32bit FP project prior to exporting ALWAYS now. Thanks for that tip again.
So, onto the converting of my prores from Vegas, I’m still not 100% clear on this process(sorry!)
I’m assuming I’ll import say, 20 prores files just to be safe, push them all together in my timeline and export those 20 prores files as 1 HDCAM file? Or is there a way to batch process those 20 files so they come out as 20 separate HDCAM files?
Do you know of any third party programs that can batch process from prores to HDCAM-SR? I like cliptoolz converter v2 but that doesn’t have HDCAM-SR, it has:
Prores, h.264, h.265, dnxhd, OP1a MXF, MPEG Intra, MJPEG 220M, Wrap to MOV, QL RLE RGBA, OP1 ATOM MXF, TIFF 48-bit (more info down the bottom of this page: https://hdcinematics.com/ClipToolz-ConvertV2-UserGuide.html)