[Tod Hopkins]

Import first. Select clips in Project. Right-click and select Create Proxies. You’ll get a dialog that allows you to select all parameters. I only use this method. The automatic option is useless to me.

[Tod Hopkins]

Blackmagic Multi-Studio is probably your cheapest external option. There used to be a cheaper external Intensity “Shuttle” but I don’t see it listed anymore. Maybe find it used. Just make sure that whatever you buy has the right I/O connections and you should be good to go. AJA also sells very nice boxes, but much more expensive.

[Tod Hopkins]

<div>I would recommend that you disable one track for your offline and leave the other to the later mix. Cut both only if you believe the producers will want both later in mix, but only enable one or the other as needed. Personally, I always cut the boom by default, and substitute or add the lav only when the boom is deficient unless the boom is clearly not the prime. Mixing is sometimes useful at the final mix stage, but it would never recommend as a default. It simply muddles the sound.
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[Tod Hopkins]

Oh, and you might want to learn the “replace” function. If you have a clip in the timeline and want to replace it with a clip in the browser AND keep all the attributes of the clip in the timeline, that’s “Replace” and it’s one of the great features of Premiere.

https://www.premiumbeat.com/blog/replacing-clips-in-premiere-pro/

https://www.premiumbeat.com/blog/matching-frame-and-replace-edit-in-premiere-pro/

I use Replace constantly to replace unedited photos with edited versions. Option-drag and drop, boom! No re-doing motion and effects.

You can also use Replace to change the sync point of a clip, rather than trimming. Sometimes it’s much easier to find a new start point and replace rather than trimming to a new spot.

As you see in the article, Match Frame and Find in Project are very useful with Replace.

[Tod Hopkins]

Alternatively, you can “Link” clips in the timeline so that Premiere will default to editing them together. This is the default with most clips. If you click on video, for instance, the audio is automatically selected. This behavior can be enabled and disabled in the timeline (see picture). If you have two independent clips you want to be treated as tracks in a single clip, you can link them in the timeline so they are treated as one. Select both clips, right-click and select “Link.”

Once linked, when you click on one track’s transition, the linked track
should automatically be selected (if the function is on, see picture). Apply a transition and both tracks
should get the same transition.

Yes, if you modify the clip to stereo it will become more difficult to control. What you want is not “stereo” but dual-audio meaning two synchronous tracks in one clip, that are not meant to be combined as stereo. If these came into the system together as a single clip they should already be linked and you may simply need to enable linking in the timeline.

[Tod Hopkins]

When you export, look for the “Captions” tab. When you have captions in your sequence, you must specify, on export, how you want Premiere to handle them. By default, they are off. This one confused me for a while too! You must enable an option. In your case, I presume you want to burn captions into the video to make them a permanently visible part of the image. You can also export as closed captions or as a sidecar file.

[Tod Hopkins]

If Shutter Encoder does work, try handbrake set to Production preset.

[Tod Hopkins]

Likely the deprecated QT MPEG4 codec. I’m assuming you are on a Mac. PP simply doesn’t play everything. VLC does (almost). You’ll need to convert. Since VLC can play it, you can probably convert with anything that uses FFMPEG for core conversion. You can convert with VLC but it’s a PITA. Presuming you want to convert to a pro format, like ProRes, I suggest FFWorks. In short, it’s a matter of finding an app that can read the file and convert to the format you want. Worst case, you’ll need Windows, Linux, or an old Mac (pre-deprecation) but chances are FFMPEG can handle it.

[Tod Hopkins]

Handbrake only goes to MP4. Fine for making progressive release versions. FF Works can make progressive masters, such as ProRes to ProRes, and do many, many other things that Handbrake can’t. The quality is essentially the same since both are using FFMPEG as their transcode engine.

[Tod Hopkins]

I’m sure the issue is interlacing. The reason the two cases look different is most likely because your DVDs remain interlaced (as they should) and you are playing them back using DVD players that understand interlaced video. MP4’s are always deinterlaced (the format can handle interlacing but it’s rarely implemented) hence you are likely seeing deinterlacing artifacts. There is another possibility based on what you describe, reversed field dominance (also an interlace issue). If you are editing without an interlaced output (i.e. in software
only), there’s a good chance you will not see this while editing. When you deinterlace footage with reversed field dominance, or you reverse it when you are deinterlacing, you’ll get a vicious back and forth jitter on anything with movement as it combines fields in the wrong sequence.

But if you are simply looking for a better deinterlace, the best is dedicated hardware. You will need a post house for the best equipment, but most professional output cards like AJA and Blackmagic do a good job though you’ll need to pass through SDI baseband. For software, I recommend anything that uses FFMPEG and gives you the control you want. I use Handbrake for simple stuff or FF Works for more complex tasks. I don’t have time to get too deep and it often involves experimentation but using the “Yadif” filter set to defaults gives generally good results.

Cheers,

tod