Saving storage. Archive to H.264 or ProRes 422 Proxy

[macfilm]

Hi, I don't have the means to archive finished FCPX projects at full quality ProRes 422, these are only personal home projects, so nothing serious in a sense.

Exporting at ProRes 422 the file comes in at 47GB lets say but in H.264 its on 7GB and ProRes 422 Proxy its 14GB so much more manageable sizes.

Is there any reason why I can't export my final master exports of projects in H.264 or ProRes 422 Proxy??

I can't see any particular difference in quality between the three if I'm honest and I likely won't be using the files in the future to edit with or use in any particular way, they are just a master copy for me to look back on.

Is there any advantages/disadvantages between these two formats?

Thanks!

 

[e1me5]

H264 will be the best for your situation. Or you can wait for a month or so when FCPX will be updated to export H265 with OSX 10.13.

 

[BeechFlyer]

Is there any reason why I can't export my final master exports of projects in H.264 or ProRes 422 Proxy??

Nothing wrong with saving your final export using H.264, which is a so-called delivery codec. As opposed to editing codecs, which create much larger files to preserve information that either speeds up typical editing tasks or improves the quality of edits.

 

[macfilm]

OK that's great, thank you for your answers

 

[joema2]

...Is there any reason why I can't export my final master exports of projects in H.264 or ProRes 422 Proxy??

I can't see any particular difference in quality between the three if I'm honest and I likely won't be using the files in the future to edit with or use in any particular way, they are just a master copy for me to look back on....

Never, ever save data as ProRes 422 proxy. That is 1/2 the linear resolution and 1/4 the total pixel resolution of the original material. Consider that 1080p is 1920 x 1080 or 2.07 megapixels per frame. Saving that as ProRes proxy is 960 x 540, or 518 thousand pixels per frame. It is throwing away 3/4 of the pixels. Even if you likely won't need the material, it's a major, easily visible difference if you look closely.

It would be far better to save it as H264 at the original resolution, either 1080 or 4k, whichever that is. That will be about 1/8th the size of full-resolution ProRes 422 but will be decent visual quality at the bit rate FCPX exports.

 

[macfilm]

OK thanks joema2