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mbrazis
mbrazis
Known Participant
April 3, 2017
Question

Codec and Export difficulty for old TV movie

  • April 3, 2017
  • 2 replies
  • 1240 views

Hi, I have various .VOB files of an old movie I have been editing together and trying to export as one file on my PC.

Source:

720x480 (0.9091), 29.97 fps, Upper, 02:17:07:26,

48000 Hz, Stereo

I'm wondering which codec and settings I should use. When I tried using H.264 the image quality was very poor. The colors were washed out. Also, movement looked pixelated, and caused eye strain compared to the original. I don't know if that makes sense or not, but it's there.

Obviously, the source is not HD and I'm not expecting to end up with HD output. However, the original file still has nice colors and is easy to watch. I tried Lagarith lossless codec next but the dimensions of the output image felt a little distorted, and the file size was almost 100 GB which seems ridiculous (I'm going to have to delete that one and start over).

Thank you!

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    2 replies

    Ann Bens
    Community Expert
    Ann BensCommunity Expert
    Community Expert
    April 3, 2017

    How do you want to watch this old movie after it has been edited.

    As a dvd on a standalone, usb flash drive, PC or ....

    S
    SAFEHARBOR11
    Participating Frequently
    April 3, 2017

    Lagarith is good for mastering or intermediate use, not for delivery.

    Funny thing - NTSC DV is LFF (Lower Field First) yet .vob files like to come in as UFF (Upper), which I just ran into yesterday when playing with some old wedding DVD footage of mine in Premiere. Didn't spend much time with it, but wondering if the .vob is being misread and I should be interpreting as LFF instead? Not having an interlaced display connected (via Matrox or Black Magic card for instance) hard to judge in Premiere preview if fields are being displayed correctly!

    My idea is that maybe the fields are getting flipped and that would affect output quality? And it watching on a computer, then you don't want interlaced at all and should probably export using No Fields (Progressive).

    Will check it out tonight if I have time. But what Ann asked - how you want to watch/distribute will dictate the output format used to a large degree.

    Thanks


    Jeff

    mbrazis
    mbrazisAuthor
    Known Participant
    April 3, 2017

    Thanks Jeff, yeah the source was UFF, so I stuck with that on output, but may give Progressive a try and see what happens.

    John T Smith
    Community Expert
    John T SmithCommunity Expert
    Community Expert
    April 3, 2017

    VOB from a DVD is Standard Definition, as you noted

    A VOB file is already HIGHLY compressed (about 13Gig per hour of video reduced to less than 4Gig) and there is no good way to RE-compress when exporting and end up with very much quality

    Link to DVD Demystified FAQ http://forums.adobe.com/thread/544206 may provide some more information

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