[Ken Vaughn]

I tried to embed that screen shot you did earlier, not working for some reason. Anyway, any refinements to the burn to disk settings?

Ken

[Ken Vaughn]

I have no problem with downloadable content, storage space is getting to the point price-wise that cost isn’t an issue (this is a boon to digital pack rats like me). What I’m not interested in is paying for CBT type content that is accessible only online. I ran across this recently, a rather pricey training program that is online only. No thanks.

Now that I’m up to speed with Vegas I want to revisit rendering with DVD creation in mind. Earlier in this thread you said;

“Render your video using Sony AVC using one of the “Internet..” templates. You can modify the bitrate to get the filesize you are after. This codec gives really good quality at low bit-rates and can be played by both PC and Mac users. It’s also a good format to distribute on a data DVD to be watched on their computer. If you want the DVD to be watched on a DVD player then you need to author a DVD using MPEG2 video.”

Thanks again,

Ken

[Ken Vaughn]

Pardon the dupe, not sure how I pulled it off…

Ken

Another unscheduled off-world activation…

[Ken Vaughn]

Sorry John, I didn’t mean to get you. After all, you’ve forgotten more about all of this than I’ll ever know most likely…

I should have mentioned it earlier but I did try the Sony AVC format. Here are the results;

Frame Width: 800
Frame Height: 600
Date Rate: 820kbps
Total Bitrate: 949kbps
File Size: 17.7MB

The interesting thing about the Sony AVC file on playback is that while the gradient background held up well with a minimum of banding (a problem with gradients in any digital file from my experience) and few artifacts as the object revolves, the object itself seems blurry and much less sharp than other options. I’m going to keep experimenting to see what yields the best results.

What will life be like when all the pipes are fat and available bandwidth is never a consideration?

Ken

PS Is VASST planning to roll out a new version of “Absolute Training for Vegas + DVD Pro Bundle”? I notice some of the individual disks are discontinued.

[Ken Vaughn]

I too wonder about this. I tried converting to AVI but Vegas wouldn’t allow it to be added to the timeline. Might have been the conversion program.

Ken

[Ken Vaughn]

Sorry John, I didn’t mean to get you. After all, you’ve forgotten more about all of this than I’ll ever know most likely…

I should have mentioned it earlier but I did try the Sony AVC format. Here are the results;

Frame Width: 800
Frame Height: 600
Date Rate: 820kbps
Total Bitrate: 949kbps
File Size: 17.7MB

The interesting thing about the Sony AVC file on playback is that while the gradient background held up well with a minimum of banding (a problem with gradients in any digital file from my experience) and few artifacts as the object revolves, the object itself seems blurry and much less sharp than other options. I’m going to keep experimenting to see what yields the best results.

What will life be like when all the pipes are fat and available bandwidth is never a consideration?

Ken

PS Is VASST planning to roll out a new version of “Absolute Training for Vegas + DVD Pro Bundle”? I notice some of the individual disks are discontinued.

[Ken Vaughn]

I’m on the verge of understanding this and I want to better illustrate my thinking that video differs from a still digital graphic image in certain respects regarding dimensional changes. So here’s what I did, I rendered my project file with two different custom sizes. All other settings/parameters were the same (the “all other things being equal” part). I used VBR so the actual bit rates in the two files were slightly different as a result of the VBR setting.

Frame Width: 800
Frame Height: 600
Date Rate: 916kbps
Total Bitrate: 1045kbps
File Size: 19.5MB

Frame Width: 640
Frame Height: 480
Date Rate: 894kbps
Total Bitrate: 1023kbps
File Size: 19.1MB

Graphic Image;

Dimensions
Width: 800
Height: 600
DPI: 300
No Compression “12” Setting in Photoshop
File Size: 70.8kb

Same file opened and resized;

Dimensions
Width: 640
Height: 480
DPI: 300
No Compression “12” Setting in Photoshop
File Size: 52.3kb

So this means that reducing the video file dimensionally with all other settings remaining constant only resulted in a roughly 2% difference in file size. Doing the same with a graphic image resulted in a roughly 25% reduction in file size.

I don’t wish to put forth an argument about this as I’m a right brain kindof guy and it’s often difficult for me to wrap my brain around concepts of a numerical nature. I only wish to illustrate why I reached the conclusions I did above. And admittedly the video world includes some basic concepts I must become comfortable with as understanding the concepts are as important as understanding the mechanics. And as it always is with such things (for me) there is a good chance there is a huge flaw unseen in my thinking.

You’ve been very helpful all through this thread John and I appreciate it very much. I’m glad you pointed out the error in my concluding the source file sizes were critical as I was on the verge of requesting smaller renderings from the designer. That saved me a lot of time.

Thanks again,

Ken

[Ken Vaughn]

Well a day’s worth of working with V11 has taught me some things. One thing I have learned is that to make a video smaller than the dimensions at which it was created actually adds to the file size. This is a revelation as with my extensive experience working with digital images I’m use to the opposite being true. Making an image smaller dimensionally will always make for a smaller file all other things being equal. This is why going from 800 x 600 to 640 x 480 didn’t reduce the file size by an appreciable amount.

One thing I noticed also is the fact that the original animation files were rendered at 24fps so I tried rendering from Vegas at that rate but the result was not impressive.

If I wish to have smaller files when bandwidth is an issue, I must have smaller originals. One thing I really do like about V11 is progressive download. It seems to work well. For my small project it’s not as big of a deal but I can also see that GPU acceleration is would be good for large projects.

Now I need to nail down the right settings for burning to optical disk. As John said one setting will work best for playing on a computer, another for playing on a television set.

I’m looking forward to the next project. I’d like to know what should be considered when obtaining stock footage.

Ken

[Ken Vaughn]

Ok, so far some interesting results. The v11 render is smaller dimensionally, higher bit rate and the file is 4MB bigger but the quality is noticeably not as good. Here is a comparison of the two;

Existing: (file at the MP4 link above)

800 x 600
17.6MB size
Bit Rate: 918kbps

New: (Vegas v11)

640 x 480
21.5MB
Bit Rate: 995kbps

Main Concept: Internet 480p 4:3

Unfortunately I don’t have the custom settings from v8.1 that created the “Existing” file but I tried to use the same ones for v11 as best I could remember. I guess I’ll have to do some T&E.

It seems that “Enable progressive download” might be an advantage.

Ken

[Ken Vaughn]

Woo Hoo, I am officially in a state of upgradedness…. Version 11.0 (Build 511) 64 bit. The down side is I’m going to have to PM Santa and tell him to forget about that cowboy outfit I’d asked for…

It’s dark, and scary….

So never mind all my 8.0 questions and prepare for upgraded queries.

Ken