Canopus DV Codec import, what to export?

[rick287]

OK, I think I understand the forums now, it is just one big forum for Premiere and the tags are just to help finding things. Clearly I'm a newbie. 🙂

So, the current Premiere won't import any of my projects created in Premiere 6.5, but to my amazement, it imports all of the avi files I captured with a Canopus DV Rx card and plays them and exports them! However, when I look at the file properties, it doesn't mention the Canopus codec, weird, yes? Here's the imported file:

So, first question is, which format should I choose to export in? I tried them all but I can't see a difference between them. I use Quick Export because I don't know any other way just yet, and the options include Adaptive High Bitrate, High Quality 1080p, and High Quality 720p. Which one is best? I am exporting to a file which I will import and put into a new project.

No matter which format I choose, the output is always a 4:3 aspect ratio. The aspect ratio in the Source and Program windows is 1.5 (720x480 or 720p). I should be able to export to 1.5, yes?

Thanks, Rick

[Steve Griffiths]

Hi rick287, a couple of terminology explanations first that may help.

The 720 in '720p' refers to the vertical resolution in 1280x720 not the 720 horizontal resolution in a 720x480 video file.

So 1920x1080 = 1080p (we'll get to the 'p' part later)

1280x720 = 720p

720x480 = 480

The 'p' refers to 'progressive' frames. If it was 'i' instead, for example 480i or 1080i - this would mean the video was interlaced. In the case of your DV files, it is likely they are interlaced. DV is an old standard definition format and I think it was interlaced by design (someone please correct me if I'm wrong).

A complication with DV standard definition files (720x480) is they can also be 4x3 OR 16x9 aspect ratio. In your properties frame grab image you'll see Pixel Aspect Ratio is 0.9091 this means your files are 4x3. if that figure was (I think) 1.2021 this would indicate your DV files were 16x9 (widescreen).

Ideally you would be editing in Premiere Pro, in a sequence that matches the size and frame rate of the footage you are working with. One way to achieve this is to choose a sequence setting that matches your video files when you create a sequence or create any sequence and then immediately drop one of your DV clips into the timeline. A pop-up menu should then appear asking if you want to have your sequence settings match the video file - choose yes.

You don't mention what you are editing these DV files for and this may have an impact on your workflow. I get to work with standard definition files regularly ... but always as part of a new HD program. So when mixing Standard Definition (SD) with HD I'm always working in an HD timeline (1920x1080) and therefore scaling the SD footage up to fill the HD sequence AND either leaving it 4x3 and having black bars either side OR scaling it up even more so the SD image fills the frame. The downside to working with SD in an HD timeline is it won't look any better just because it's in an HD sequence - it's still just SD resolution but zoomed up to fill the HD frame and if I scale it to fill the frame (no black bars) I will lose parts of the image and make it look even lower resolution.

So with all the above in mind the question to ask yourself is what 'final' video to you have in mind. Do you just want to keep everything SD and output SD (4x3) or do you want to convert to HD and output HD (16x9).

By the way there are a whole ton of things to consider if you put interlaced SD footage into an HD progressive sequence but that's a whole other story. 

You mention 1.5 as your aspect ratio in you Source and Program windows ... not sure what you mean there. Video is generally 16x9 or 4x3 aspect ratio.

Hope some of this helps.

[rick287]

Hi Steve, this is well over 1,000 clips of a movie I shot on Sony DVCAM many moons ago and now I wish to create a trailer for marketing purposes. All the live action is shot but the animation/special effects are taking decades! My goal is to post the trailer on You Tube to try and generate the funds to finish the movie. (After my wife of 30 years died, I lost interest in the movie). So I have all the clips I need for the trailer but they are in Canopus DV format. I have to combine the clips for the trailer in Premiere and I would like to use the best possible output so it doesn't look so amateurish. My Win XP PC died and none of the software loads on my Win 10 PC.

Ok, I always thought the standalone number referred to the horizontal resolution, sorry about that. However, NTSC is 640x480 = 4:3 = 1.333. DV (at least my DV) is 720x480 = 1.5. I measured on the screen as 1.4 but I think there was a setting in the old Premiere to go to 1.5. I think it had to do with the 0.9 pixel ratio. I forget if I captured progressive or interlaced. I think it was interlaced because disk space was hard to come by back then and p takes more bytes. Is there some way to find out?

Yes, I will edit in Premeire Pro. I load a Canopus DV clip (typically 30 seconds in duration) and export it in a modern format. Then I will import that new format file into a Premiere Pro project for the trailer (trim the clip, edit the sound track, etc.). When done, I will export it in a format for You Tube, duration less than 2.5 minutes. I do not know how to find or set the size and frame rate for the project. I could easily do this in 6.5, but don't have a clue for Pro. I will have to research it. Do you have a recommendation?

Yes, this helps a lot! Many thanks!!! Rick

[Steve Griffiths]

My advice is do not export to a different codec or frame size before you edit. Use what you have (Canopus DV 720x480) and edit with the clips as they are.

In my opinion there is no benefit to exporting DV to a modern codec until you have an edited program and want to export the final video. Then I would suggest you export the finished edit to Prores HQ from Premiere Pro.

In Premiere Pro, create a new sequence and choose the 'Standard 48khz' preset found in the DV-NTSC folder in the presets list. I'm going to assume you captured 'interlaced' in 4x3 aspect ratio. If you shot widescreen on your DVCam then you would choose the 'Widescreen 48khz' preset in the DV-NTSC sequence preset folder. 

Note that regardless if the footage is 4x3 OR 16x9 the actual pixels in the DV format are 720x480, only the displayed pixel aspect ratio is different ... and you need to ensure that Premiere Pro correctly interprets the Canopus clips when imported. So when you import a Canopus clip and play from your Premiere Pro bin in the 'source' window - does it look OK. i.e. not stretched or squashed. If it looks wrong then it's not being interpreted correctly. Right click the clip(s) in your bin and select > Modify>Interpret Footage and under 'Pixel Aspect Ratio' choose 'Conform to:' D1/DV NTSC (0.9091) if it looks horizontally stretched or D1/DV NTSC (Widescreen 16:9 (1.2121) if it looks squashed horizontally.

To get the best looking end product you are going to want color grade the project. Use Lumetri in Premiere Pro if you are going to do it yourself. If after completion you want to deinterlace and/or uprez the final program then I would use Topaz Video Enhance AI to potentially uprez to at least HD or maybe even 4K. Topaz Video Enhance is a paid app but it can improve SD to HD/4K conversions (sometimes amazingly so).

A lot to cover here, hope this helps.

[rick287]

Hey Steve, no they do not look squished, but something funny is going on. When I compare sizes between what's in the preview and what I export, I think they are different. I'll try to make something to post. The aspect ratio from Use File is the same as Conforms to (0.9) but Conforms has a lot of other options. I just leave it at 0.9. I think you are correct about interlace and 4x3, I wish there was a way to confirm. Some of the footage looks fuzzy but that may be because of my background green screen replacement. (I had a terrible green screen and had to put a lot of it in traveling mattes in After Effects - talk about a lot of work!!!). 🙂

Understood about not exporting until after editing, but I think I'll have to make the trailer and then do it again with the original footage. At first it was the only way to preview thie files but then I discovered VLC which actually plays the Canopus codec. Constructing the trailer has definitely been a bear. 2.5 minutes is not a lot of time so I think I have to go voice over for parts. It seems every sequence I try to make is over 30 seconds! 🙂 Today's trailers tend to be very action oriented nd I only have a few action scenes.

I don't understand parts of what you said, the sequence concept has me confused, I need to read up on it. Actually, I understand it, I just don't know how to implement it in Premiere Pro. I don't know what "color grade the project" means but I will definitely look into Topaz.

I have an engineering job which pays the bills so most of my Premeire work is on the weekends.

Thanks, Rick

[Ann Bens]

If you do want to uprezz the footage from SD to HD I would recommend uprezzing the original footage and edit those clips and not the final export file.

[rick287]

I see Topaz has a trial so I will try it and see how it does. Uprezzing from SD to HD makes the video clearer (more pixels?) but does not change the aspect ratio, right?

[Ann Bens]

With Topaz you need to do some experimenting.

i uprezzed quite afew dv avi to 720p widescreen but left the clip itself to 4:3.

i cannot upload any examples as i am on holiday in the Caribbean.

There are some posts around from me about Topaz here on the forum.

[rick287]

Steve, no I was wrong about something funny, the aspect ratio is the same. I made an mpg for an entire scene (I was posting them at one time) and those are slightly different than the avis. It also accounts for the fuzziness. I think Ann's suggestion is the best approach, would you agree? Uprez the original clips and edit with those and figure out how to do the final export later. 🙂

Ann, is the reason you suggested this approach because if I edited with the original avi's, i would have to export the entire trailer (which could degrade it a little) before I could uprez it? Also, be careful in the water! A woman was killed by a bull shark 2 days ago in the Bahamas while snorkling. As for me, I never go in deeper than my knees. 🙂

Thanks! Rick

[Steve Griffiths]

I agree with Ann to uprez first (with Topaz) is the best approach. However I went with doing it to the final edit as Topaz is very slow to encode and if you have a lot of raw footage then it's going to take a very long time to convert all your footage and take up a lot of drive space.

One advantage to uprezzing first, and this is what I do when working with Standard definition 4x3 original footage ... is, uprez to 4K (and deinterlace), then edit in an 16x9 HD timeline. Doing it this way allows each 4x3 shot to be reframed to fit the 16x9 aspect ratio (no black bars). So you end up with a widescreen trailer from 4x3 footage that will now have a more cinematic feel to it.

[Ann Bens]

Uprezzind to udh then edit in 1080 does not give you black bars but does cuts off top and bottom of footage...

[rick287]

Steve and Ann, thank you both for your extremely useful suggestions! Fortunately, the trailer will not be more than 2.5 minutes as this is a requirement. So, my approach will be to first construct the trailer using the mp4 clips I extracted from the original footage. I suspect it will be over 8 minutes so I will have a lot of trimming to do. So once I have the final sequence of clips, use Topaz to uprez them to 4K udh (I don't know what udh is but I'll find out) and deinterlace (I discovered MediaInfo which confirmed the avis are 4x3 and interlaced). Hopefull, when I uprez, I can extract only the portion I plan to use. (If not, it will be a major pain but should still be accomplishable in my lifetime 🙂 ). I will edit the uprezzed video in a 16x9 timeline (to match the desired clip sequence) and position the video so that only the non-essential areas are not in the frame (usually the top). Audio edits will come last. From that stage, I will have several options to export the entire sequence to. I have a plan! Thanks again! Rick

[rick287]

Great news, I made a first cut of the trailer and although it came out to be over 10 minutes, I was able to trim it down to 3 minutes. Close enough for me to go to the next step. So I downloaded the trial for the Video Enhance AI and it most definitely made the video look better. The edges of people are darker, but I think that has to do with the green screen filtering (done in AE). The issue is the output is still 4.3. I am trying HD (1920x1080) now but it never gave me a chance to choose what to crop. The clip is only 3sec but downloading the AI Model is taking a very long time (I aborted at 20 minutes, it's very late). Does a new model have to be downloaded for each clip, or can I process the same model for a batch of clips? Is the output size you are recommending the 4K UHD (3840x2160)? If the 4K model takes longer, then this is not going to be a viable approach. I also set it to Artemis High Quality instead of Medium, is that ok? When it was on the 200% output, it didn't take more than 20 seconds to process the file. Rick