[Craig Newman]

I didn’t interlace. Canon’s source files are progressive, so I match those settings within the respective software project and render progressive too; you shoot progressive, you render progressive… Simple as.
That way there’s no danger of the image being impaired. Don’t even get me started on the whole’ interlace or progressive’ thing. I find the existence of interlaced and deinterlaced scanning, and when/when-not to use it, to be a stain on this world.

As for your question: “Why not use a color swatch for this or show dynamic range?”… If you let me know the simplest way of acting out such a procedure, I would be happy to make a comparison. However, I do believe the pictures alone, show all the evidence. The difference between Premiere Pro and Sony Vegas is quite staggering.

[Craig Newman]

Nah, I made sure it was set to 8 bit.

[Craig Newman]

In the bad footage is this rendering a previously rendered M-JPEG A again in M-JPEG A?

Yes… the footage used in Sony Vegas is M-JPEG A, which was previously converted in MPEG streamclip from H.264, which was then rendered to M-JPEG A in Sony Vegas, once the edit was complete.

I chose this file type as it (should) produce better results. As you can see from the pictures, the M-JPEG A is lighter than the H.264.
This makes colour-grading a lot easier and effective. Naturally, I want my film to look the best it can. So when my colourist tells me he wants the best possible quality render/image that I can make, I go to the M-JPEG A. Unfortunately I get those lines.

I’ve tried all the other file types Sony Vegas has to offer (I forget all of their official file names) but they all seem to produce a small-size file and darker image. I’m trying to make sure that the output matches the lightness and quality of the source files, as closely as as possible. The M-JPEG A seems to produce the best results… If/when it works. I’ve also tried DNxHD, which I heard was really good and basically a PC equivalent to Apple’s Pro-Res. Turns out that is not true as DNxHD is rubbish; giving the image a dark, almost green tint.