FCE4 720p in and out! Workaround?

[videoguy34]

I have HDV 720p30 footage captured into FCE4 from a GYHD200U JVC Camera. In the capture window while going in ... it looks fine! Playback on the Cinema Desktop is not as crisp. Unedited Quicktime Export out on iDVD project is same. Is there an export setting, conversion, encoding process, anything!! that might work to maintain the visual quality. I understand that "Progressive" footage will have a 'jumpy' effect on an interlaced montior/tv ... Is there any way to solve that in the capturing / converting / encoding process(es).

HD is QUITE NEW to me. Learning fast that it "all HD is not created equal". Any one with a few minutes to put it in plain English will be forever in my debt. I am happy if I can shoot raw HDV, capture it, edit it and export it to iDVD as a quicktime. That is All I need to do so FCP is not a necessity!

Keep it simple, works best for me! Thanks!

 

[ChemiosMurphy]

30p stuff (and all progressive) is going to look a bit more "jumpy" on any monitor. You gain spatial resolution (crispness due to no interlacing) at the cost of temporal resolution (framerate). 30p is the same bandwidth as 60i (2 fields a frame).

What kind of shooting will you be doing with the HD200? Be careful, ProHD is not compatible with Sony/Canon HDV.

 

[videoguy34]

I'm learning quickly about the compatibility issues We shoot mainly weddings, high school grads, dance productions that sort of thing. The 720p30 so I am led to believe, should be effective for this. I would be quite happy to only have to change settings once!

When you say ProHD (again excuse my newness) is not compatible with Sony/Canon? How do you mean. ProHD is a 'brand name'? We do have their DR-HD100 Portable DTE Recorder but apparently the drag-n-drop feature we were originally so excited about, is not a reality in FCE so we are back to capturing from HDV tape! That is do-able IF we can get the quality in and out that we want!

Appreciate the help!

 

[jettoblack]

Decoding HDV takes a lot of CPU time especially if you have any effects or transitions in use. If you have Dynamic RT turned on, then in some cases FCP may be showing you a lower quality "preview" version of the video in order to prevent dropped frames.

When you export for DVD, you have to scale the 720p down to 480p MPEG-2 so you will lose some quality there, but (unless you are trying to squeeze more than 2 hours of video on a single layer) it should look almost as good as the original video. If not, then you might have other problems with your workflow.

 

[ChemiosMurphy]

Alright.

The portable firewire recorder you are using should work. It doesn't matter if you are using FCE or whatever. As long as you are recording quicktime MOV files and not M2TS files. Just plug the firewire drive into your mac, copy the files to your scratch disk. That should be it. I'd highly encourage re-reading the manual in this case in order to obtain max compatibility.

Do you guys give your clients blu-ray HD copies of the material? If you don't, just shoot SD. Here's why..

-Less compressed than HDV
-HDV dropouts last much longer
-you avoid the whole downconversion process.
-less light needed for DV
-WAY EASIER TO FOCUS DV

I work in a studio and we have 4 of the HD200s and we DO NOT shoot in HD with them. IF your output is going to be SD, just stick with it.

I've never worked with FCE before, but here's a down-converting process. I color correct my stuff and export an 853*480 ProRes422 file since its graded. This alleviates the scaling issues. I use that file as my SD MASTER and send that file to compressor to convert to M2V and AC3 for DVDs in DVDSP.

But seriously. DV requires MUCH LESS light, and if you are doing parties your stuff will look better, and the focusing issues associated with HDV. JVC's focus assist feature is nice, but isn't perfect.

Also, with a 60i framerate/shutter, pans and handheld stuff will look a bit better. Sure it's interlaced, but you can get away better with quick pans since there is more temporal resolution.

I also HIGHLY recommend purchasing Final Cut Studio 2. You have much greater conversion control with Compressor, gain color correction capability with color, you can sweeten your audio with a visual EQ in soundtrack, and distribute with DVDSP. If you bought a $6,000 camera, take the plunge.

Oh and playback on the Cinema Display Preview is not accurate with fields or chroma/luma. I recommend purchasing a Matrox MXO and Dell 2408 (or ACD) for monitoring. This way you get a color accurate monitor that will give you a better idea of contrast. The RGB monitors that are running FCE come off a bit darker and will lie to you.

ProHD is JVC's HDV flavor. Sony/Canon's flavor is 1080i and 24f with the hv20. ProHD allows for native 24p.

So, I'd just re read the manual on how to get the footage off of the DTE recorder, I really think the quicktime based codecs will work, just not M2TS!!

-Chip