Export Issue

[julians25237867]

I am having problems exporting a video at 4K in Adobe Premiere Elements 2020

I am trying to combine clips from 2 separate GoPro Hero 7 cameras, but unfortunately, they were not set up identically.

The .prel file shows the video is about 1 hr and 15 min

I did once get an error message, but otherwise, the video will play until a certain area, then stop.  Sometimes it simply crashes while exporting

Exporting a .prel made entirely from Camera 2 worked without an error and played well.  Output size about 33 GB, runs about 45 min.

Windows 10 64 bit

Intel Core I-7 6700k

EVGA Nvidia Geforce RTX 2070

RAM:  32 GB

Both cameras were set to 2.7k resolution so I could turn on the hypersmoothing feature (not available at 4k resolution)

Editor:  Adobe Premiere Elements 2020

HERO 7 Camera Settings	Camera 1 Initially	Camera 1 Finally	Camera 2
Image size	2704 x 2028	2705 x 1520	2704 x 1520
Aspect Ratio	4:3	16:9	16:9
Frame Rate	29.97	29.97	59.94

Other parameters are all identical.

The CPU has 6 cores, and all 12 threads hovered around 100% while exporting, and may have maxed out. 

Graphics card runs at about 30%

Am I fighting a losing battle because of the clip differences?  Is upscaling the problem?

Is there any solution?

[Bill Sprague · Accepted solution]

The obvious future solution is to have both cameras set the same.   

To rescue this project, one solution might be to use the highly regarded and free program Handbrake to convert the files to a common H.264 codec and matching frame rates.  You might also use Premiere Elements, one clip at a time, to produce intermediate clips with matching characteristics. 

[Ann Bens]

The issue here is you are trying to export to 4K which is 3840x2160 while your footage is 2.7K which is much smaller in resolution. Your computer is having a hell of a time upscaling.

BTW Elements does not use the nvidia card.

Make sure your cpu is not overclocked: might get stuck due to overheating?

The advantage of shooting 2.7K is that you have the ability to reframe in a 1920x1080 setting.

I would set up a 1920x1080 project, drop everything on the timeline as is and reframe. Export to 1080p.

[julians25237867]

Thanks for the quick and helpful replies.  I agree with whsprague that the first item is to synchronize both cameras.  I have already done this.  This should avoid problems in the future.

Thanks to whsprague for the suggestion to use Handbrake to create a video in which all clips are the same.  However, in practice, I was not able to match the clips exactly due to limitations in Handbrake.  I have decided that the effort required to convert dozens of clips and then export to my preferred format is greater than I am willing to expend, since it may not necessarily solve the CPU problems.  I am simply going to bite the bullet on this particular issue, upscale the from 1080p this time only, and try not to have this issue in the future.

Thanks to Ann Bens for the suggestion to downgrade the 2.7 video clips to 1080p.  I discovered that I can already export the mixed-clip video directly to 1080p without having to import clips into a new project set to 1920x1080.

Getting a little off-topic, I also researched methods for upscaling.  I noticed that a clip upscaled  from 2.7k (either within Premiere Elements or by playing via a 4k Blu-Ray player) looks better than if it is downscaled initially to 1080p and then upscaled via Blu-Ray.  I can't tell if Elements does better than Blu-Ray, but I prefer not to downscale and thus lose resolution.  Others have reported that they may or may not be able to see the difference between an upscaled video compared to a higher resolution video.  In my case, it may perhaps be due to the original videos being taken underwater in a GoPro.  I haven't made any comparison between upscaling or higher original resolution video recorded in air.