[Travis Roesler]

Holy crap! This worked! Amazing!

Thank you so much man… I really appreciate it! Thank goodness you caught this.

What a bizarre setting… seems to be universally reviled. Anyhow, I’m glad that I don’t need to go through the exchange process to get this thing working with my gimbal. I send you positive vibes and good karma, sir!

[Travis Roesler]

I’m dragging from list view and it still doesn’t work for me.

[Travis Roesler]

YES! Thank you!

Uniform scale… so simple!

[Travis Roesler]

Ok… fair enough… and trust me, I have no idea what I’m doing anyhow, but I just don’t understand how h264 is supposed to differ from the entropy mode which is used to encode the h264.

The bottom line is that I’m angry and unreasonable.

So what is his final verdict here? Export in h264 with the entropy mode being CABAC? Where does prores come in? Was he originally editing in prores?

[Travis Roesler]

Also… all of the CABAC and CALCV options are available for h264… so why are they being COMPARED to h264.

Does this guy even know what he’s doing?

[Travis Roesler]

This article doesn’t factor in the source media. If you are editing in ProRes, perhaps this would apply. If you don’t edit in ProRes, you have to attempt to reencode in prores using Adobe media encoder which is simply not to be taken for granted… I’ve tried every possible setting, and the output is never good.

As you try to run through optional outputs in AMS for ProRes, you’ll see in the preview pane that it just doesn’t quite add up… somehow “fit to window” yields a “2010 x 1080” frame… how the hell does that happen?

You end up with a subpar conversion to ProRes, which yields a lengthy and subpar conversion to h264 mp4… in addition to taking up massive amounts of data.

Additionally, that guy is changing his key frames to something bizarre and running his tests. Then he claims that Adobe’s h264 encoding is inferior… where the hell is THAT picture in the article? The only clear quality difference was between h264 and apple prores, with apple clearly sucking.

I sure as hell didn’t see any picture comparing adobe’s h264 encoding with compressors 264 encoding… and I would be HIGHLY surprised to find it any different.

Also, what the hell is this:

“Unfortunately, you can’t use the x264Encoder with MP4 or M4V output, since it’s a QuickTime plug-in which doesn’t work with the other outputs.”

What?!

If I still used final cut, compressor would be the way to go. Since premiere is by FAR a superior editing platform (after 7 years on FCP), compressor just doens’t make sense any more.

[Travis Roesler]

I ended up solving the issue…

Yes, I have upgraded to 4.1.1
Workflow was to export the highest quality h264 file possble and send it to compressor.

I was forced to export the files as quicktime… basically converting the file to ProRes before putting it into compressor.

This was retarded, as the increase in file size from the source media and subseqent compression caused a reduction in quality.

I simply learned adobe media encoder, chose the appropriate h264/mp4 setting right off the bat, and exported a file that is not only a much HIGHER QUALITY, but also significantly smaller than the file resulting from compressor exports.

The bottom line is this… despite having spent a long time building a network to distribute processing, and upgrading operating systems on “non-upgradeable” machines to do so… I’m DONE WITH COMPRESSOR.

Compression shouldn’t take hours and hours anyhow… the only reason it’s necessary to distribute processing with compressor is Apple ProRes.

No more taking up piles of memory with this god-aweful codec. No more stupid-long exports. Adobe handled everythign beautifully, and quickly at the absolute highest setting.

I feel like I’ve wasted a lot of time… but that’s all over now!!!!!!

[Travis Roesler]

Here are my settings… sorry:

https://www.dropbox.com/s/kj7uyi6d229ydlw/Screenshot%202014-02-17%2003.41.46%283%29.png

[Travis Roesler]

Boom! Sweet!

[Travis Roesler]

Good advice fellas… thank you.

Todd, I was thinking about something that would look more like a traditional curtain (to keep the wife happy) but I think I might be able to design a shade of some sort which would still look good.

Either way, I will keep that material bookmarked.

Rick, I don’t know what the hell Lahmajoun is, but it looks delicious.

Bill, the type of filming that I’ll be doing with this window qualifies as “it’s good enough” type footage.

As long as I’m not crazy overexposed and the light catches approximately half of my face, we’re fine. I’m filming myself making customer support phone calls from my desk…. doesn’t have to be perfect, I just don’t want it to be distractingly bad.

Anyhow, this is the info that I need… thanks gents! Instant solution as always.