Best Quality Exporting From HDV to DVD

[DNA_Imagery]

I've searched on the web & gotten a few answers, but nothing seems to solve the situation.

What I've tried.

1920x1080p MPEG2, Quality 5, Min, Target, Max All Set To 60.  Came out looking like crap when it was put on a dvd.  Noisy, over contrasted (could be the tv), over colored (could be the tv).

720x480 MPEG2-DVD, Quality 5, Min, Target, Max All Set To 9.  Came out looking worse then my previous attempt.

Anyone have a secret formula for HDV to DVD conversion?

[Jeff Bellune]

Promter wrote:

The one where I exported my HD finished timeline directly to AME selecting MPEG2-DVD and letting the AME do the conversion to SD and

I also burned the one where I created and SD timeline, nested my HD sequence, scaled it properly and exported to AME just like Jeff said.

It appears that they both came out the same. I really didn't see a difference from one to the other.
I did notice a little noise in both of them. I don't remember seeing that noise when the edit was finished in Premiere.

I've just finished some extensive new tests on converting HD to SD using Dan's hd2sd script and Pr CS4.1 with different kinds of footage, and I've reached some new conclusions.  Promter is basically correct.

1. hd2sd produces superior output in significantly less time than any Maximum Render Quality method in CS4.  Sometimes the increase in quality is worthy of "Wow!", and at other times it is barely noticeable.  I think the greatest quality improvement is seen on footage with a lot of contrast and a wide color gamut.  In other words, real-world footage.
2. The quality difference between using MRQ with a nested sequence and letting the AME handle the scaling using MRQ is highly codec and footage dependent.  The codec that shows the most variation, unfortunately, is MPEG2 DVD.  MPEG2 I-frame and Lagarith show almost no quality difference on any footage.  MPEG2 DVD encoding in CS4 does introduce noise into the footage, but at similar bit rates using HC Encoder and Sorenson Squeeze 5, similar noise was also introduced.  For the record, I prefer Squeeze's MPEG2 DVD encoding to either HCEnc or CS4.
3. Frame size of the original HD footage plays a role, too.  1920x1080 footage is affected more by any quality difference in the methods than is 1280x720 footage.
4. Based on these new tests, I can't recommend nesting/scaling the HD sequence any more.  The possible, and often small, quality improvement just isn't worth the twofold or threefold increase in render time, especially if you are using 2-pass VBR.
   

I have to modify my upcoming tutorial to reflect these new results.

-Jeff

[Promter]

So basically, leaving the Premiere timeline as HD (without nesting to an SD timeline) (and mine happens to be 720p/24fps)  and sending that to AME using MRQ, 2 pass VBR gave me the same results as the one where I nested my HD timeline into an SD timeline first, scaled it, and then sent it to AME.

I guess that would make sence since in "nesting" there is actually no conversion happening there. The scaling is more a visual edit.

The recompression happens in AME from the original HD anyway, right?

I would like to add that ever since I went from my mac with FCP, which on that program I used to export directly to COMPRESSOR and by selecting the preset for standard DVD, I never had any complaints. The quality was always great.

Now I went to Adobe with PC for more options and better workflows and I have to say.....
♫♪baby come back ♪♪♪♪you can blame it all on me♫♫ lol...

naaa... but seriously I'm going to run a test now.

Since I can't get Dan's method to work for some strange reason,
I'm going to export a quicktime file from Premiere as HD,
Take it to my mac,
put it on DVD with COMPRESSOR and be happy. (I hope!)

Maybe that will have to be my new workflow!

My client is ansious to see his DVD and I really would hate to give him the one that I already burned.

Which is not that bad but I know it can be better.

and the topic continues.............

-Promter-

[Jeff Bellune]

Promter wrote:

So basically, leaving the Premiere timeline as HD (without nesting to an SD timeline) (and mine happens to be 720p/24fps)  and sending that to AME using MRQ, 2 pass VBR gave me the same results as the one where I nested my HD timeline into an SD timeline first, scaled it, and then sent it to AME.

I guess that would make sence since in "nesting" there is actually no conversion happening there. The scaling is more a visual edit.

The recompression happens in AME from the original HD anyway, right?

I would like to add that ever since I went from my mac with FCP, which on that program I used to export directly to COMPRESSOR and by selecting the preset for standard DVD, I never had any complaints. The quality was always great.

Actually, there is additional processing when the nested sequence is rendered or exported.  This is indicated by the increased render times and visually noticeable quality difference in some footage.

Given your tests, and mine, I'd say that exporting the HD sequence to directly to the AME and selecting an MPEG2 DVD preset (and Maximum Render Quality, of course) will produce the best (or almost the best) results out of CS4.  That's the same workflow you're describing on the Mac.  Please let us know how the AME output compares with the Compressor output.

-Jeff

[medi-ochre]

I think what Dan is doing is really great but why on earth is Premiere Pro not good at downconverting HD footage. It is an extreamly professional video editor with a hefty price tag, the least i would expect it to do is to give me an output which is the best acheivable. If better can be done freeware, then someones not doing their job properly. I haven't tested Dan's route as for me theres just not enough time avaliable to do it, most of my projects have a very small timeframe and once i've finished editing, i usually just render as fast as i can.

[Jim_Simon]

If better can be done freeware, then someones not doing their job properly.

Can't argue with that.  Premeire really should do a much better job of both scaling and trasnscoding.  Add native 64 bit and those three features alone are enough to make CS5 worth buying.

[Promter]

Hello all,

Just wanted to let you all know what I ended up doing.

With all the work I had this week,
trying to take my semi-large file over to my mac to put it on DVD with compressor was going to become a heavy task in the middle of everything else, so.....

In order to deal with what was bothering me the most which was the horrible noise, I dropped a gamma corrector to my entire 23 minute timeline, set that on 14 and used AME @ MRQ selecting the MPEG2-DVD preset, and after building the DVD and playing it on my 60"HDTV I have to say that if it wasn't for that gamma adjustment I was not going to be able to turn this project in.

It gave it an enriched warm look, and it took care of the noise (for the most part) (enough to make me happy)

Quality wise I have seen a lot better, but I'm just glad I was able to pull this off.

(I still have a compressor test pending)

There's a little corner in my brain that won't leave me alone until I try that out! ...

-Promter-

[Guest]

I Downconvert in Adobe After Effects with Matrox HD AVI files.

Steps:

1. Open a new untitled AE project

2. Bring in the Exported Matrox HD AVI file.

3. Go to the Interpret the footage Menu: Ctrl-Alt-G on CS4

4. On the Fields and Pull Down Box, enable the Preserve edges (best quality)

5. Create a new sequence and change the length to match your clip lenght.

6. Drag your clip into the sequence and press "S" to scale the clip to the sequence size.

7. Add to render que and select MPEG-2 DVD and choose appropriate Bitrate settings.

8. Render out to MPEG 2 and bring into Encore for burning.

[Promter]

Thanks for the additional option Laura,

With Dan's intructions I just selected MPEG2 and the preset took.

I was selecting MPEG2-DVD before and that's why it wasn't working.

Hopefully the rest of the process goes smooth. I shall return.

thanks again!

[Dan Isaacs]

I Downconvert in Adobe After Effects with Matrox HD AVI files.

Why? AFAIK, you'll get exactly the same results by using "Maximum Render Quality" in AME from Premiere (actually, you'll avoid some compression and colorspace conversions)

[Promter]

I'm at the step where I try to open the file in VirtualDub and it doesn't open, Virtual Dub keeps crashing over and over and over.

Maybe the script is not correct?

Would you mind taking a look to see if the script is correct?

thanks.

[Promter]

it did not let me attach the notepad as a file attachment but here is what I have:

video = "Sequence 05.m2v"

audio = "Sequence 05.wav"

FFMpegSource(video)

(audio == "") ? last : AudioDub(WavSource(audio))

hd2sd(OutputColorSpace="YUY2", OutputBFF=true)

[Dan Isaacs]

Please tell me exactly how Virtual crashes. Do you get an error message? Please let me know what it is.

[Promter]

it just turns seethru white and at the top it says "not responding"

[Promter]

I just tried modifying the script as a test to see what it would do and it gave me an error message when trying to open it that said something like "bad script error" or something among those lines.

then I put the script back like it was and tried opening it again and got the same white pale looking with the (Not Responding) at the top

[Dan Isaacs]

NEW VERSION of hd2sd() package for AviSynth:

Changes include:

1. Automatically handling of MPEG-2 I-frame .m2v + .wav exports from Premiere Pro. You can now simply use:
   
   hd2sd("myfilename.m2v", OutputColorSpace="YUY2", OutputBFF=true)
   
   
2. Added new deinterlacers, now uses Yadif (DeintMethod=3) by default. Also added a high-quality deinterlacer (using NNEDI2 + Yadifmod) that can be used by specifying DeintMethod=0
3. Better optimization for AviSynth MT
4. Added new WidescreenType options. There's no more need to set OutputWidescreen=false … just use WidescreenType=-1 [crop] or  WidescreenType=-2 [letterbox]
5. Conforming input framerates to exact broadcast specs (such as 24000/1001, 30000/1001, 60000/1001 for NTSC and exactly 25 or 50 fps for PAL) to avoid audio sync loss or dropped frames on long encodes. This is done by slightly slowing down or speeding up the audio as needed. Audio is resampled back to the original rate, but you can override this using OutputAudioRate=44100, for example to force 44.1kHz.
   
6. Better automatic handling of input PAR. hd2sd() now correctly detects the PAR all major HD formats.
   
7. Added InputPAR and OutputPAR parameters to override automatic assumptions
8. hd2sd now works well (when interlaced_out=false and OutputFieldRate is set as needed) for internet output (such as 640x360 @ 30p)
9. Moved dependent plugins to subfolders (such as C:\Program Files\AviSynth 2.5\plugins\ConditionalSmoothBob ) ; most plugins are loaded on demand instead of AviSYnth startup.

And more, of course… but these are the big changes that come to mind now.

-- Dan

[spreeni]

thank you Dan, I'm very curious about these new deinterlace modes. I will test and report.

[RainbowUnicorn13]

I cheat when I convert anything to DVD.

I bought 'ConvertX to DVD'. I set the encoding to highest quality 2 pass fit to 1 4.35GB dvd. I then add the (anyvideo includng HDV). I hit the Convert button and I have the highest quality DVD I can get in less than an hour. I can add HDV clip, .mov clip, .avi clips and convert them all to 1 DVD if I want very quickly. For higher quality or long (over 2 hr videos) you can also set it to create a dual layer DVD if needed but a single L dvd usually is more than sufficient.

You can select whether to crop or use letterbox or not lose any video, there are many settings.

I do have Adobe MC installed but Adobe IS NOT the best conversion software by a long shot.

You can save the DVD to your HD or burn as many DVD's as you wish.

ConvertX to DVD is a conversion program only and is the easiest and fastest method for conversion that I have found. I also installed a few codec packs (like all codecs I could find) as needed when required.  

[medi-ochre]

With you there, but Cs5 won't have this, you can bet your moneys on that. Whatsmore, maximum render quality is a joke. I have just rendered a 3 minute video, 32 bit colour with max quality and it took 1 hour 30. Im sure if i had a render farm, it wouldnt matter but I don't and my computers far from slow, overclocked E6400, 3gb memory. That said, AVCHD is the satan of rendering, if they compress video anymore we might start making tiny 'black holes' in our computers.

[Jeff Bellune]

You can spend your time rendering in Premiere using MRQ, or you can spend your time putting together a free, fast, high-quality solution.  You decide.

-Jeff

[Curt Wrigley]

Jeff,

Next time you do your test; throw in some progressive source.

Unscientifically; Ive reached the same conclusions as you (dissapointed in Adobe's on board solution still).

But i recently shot a gig in HDV progressive and found the scaling down of progressive footage much better than interlaced footage.   Not sure if this is really very helpful to a lot of folk; but its an indicator that the scaling of interlaced footage is much more diffcult to do right.

Curt

[Jeff Bellune]

Curt,

I've been working with both - interlaced and progressive - and you are

correct. Pr does a lot better with progressive. I expect folks will be

shooting in 1080p24/30 and 720p24/60 anyway (720p30 seems pretty

useless). To get good results from high-motion subjects, you either

need 1080i60 or 720p60. For almost everything else, I'm leaning toward

1080p24. Plus, 1080p24 plays back in its native frame rate on my BD

player/HDTV setup.

-Jeff

[Dan Isaacs]

But i recently shot a gig in HDV progressive and found the scaling down of progressive footage much better than interlaced footage.

Yes. Scaling of progressive footage is passable, but hardly breathtaking. "Maximum Render Quality" makes things intolerably slow but slightly sharper – at the expense of some ringing artifacts. The deinterlacing is still quite poor, even at 'maximum'.

As you and Jeff know, I have tried to bring these issues to Adobe's attention but they just don't seem to think it is important or, rather, they feel that the status quo is "good enough." Instead of trying a new approach to improving quality, the simply borrowed the already-inadequate scaling and deinterlacing from After Effects. A little sad, but hardly surprising.

I will, as always, do my best to end-run these issues for folks who continue to be dissatisfied with Premiere's "maximum" quality.

[Curt Wrigley]

I agree with you Dan.  Your efforts are not missed.

Lets keep this issue visable and hope for improvements in the future.   It is rediculous that there is not a way to scale footage with good quality with native adobe products; Especially in this transitional time when many folks are shooting in HD and delivering in both HD and SD.  Its mandatory functionality.

[medi-ochre]

out of curiosity, are there any encoders that will work within Adobe Premiere Pro that do the scaling within the encoder itself rather than with the software. Personally, I've never used a third party encoder so I wouldn't know.

[jimbell]

I am posting here because Dan Isaacs appears to frequent this posting. I am still using Premiere CS3 and would like to try out the debugmode frameserver along with hd2sd. I have seen many references to that workflow, but I have not been able to find the workflow document. Can someone point me to it?

Thanks