since the PR is slightly different with HD & WS DV you will get slight black bars when converting it to WS DV, but it shouldn't look funny.

I was having issues with my TV & then found it it seems to remember the WS setting for each source/channel. Could it be that your TV is set to "full" vs "cinema" or whatever?

John, I can't understand why you're having trouble getting "decent looking SD video." I've never found that to be a challenge. It has to be a workflow issue.

Insofar as the format thing goes, I'm guessing it's a probelm with the way you have the TV set, from what you've described. (Or another workflfow issue.)

Too, I've not noticed any "color fringing" when shooting under theartical lighting. I'm not saying it doesn't happen. I'm just saying the few times I've shot under such conditions, I haven't seen the problem.

Best of luck with your project!

OK, I found the problem. The standard DVD player had to be set to widescreen. It was set to 4:3 from when I used it with the 4:3 CRT set I had. Discovered that when I tried the same DVD with my Toshiba HD-A1 player that I use with my HT Projector setup and it looked fine with that setup.

So it was the only the DVD player setting that was the problem. Plasma setup is only a week old so I am learning.

Thanks,
John

John, I can't understand why you're having trouble getting "decent looking SD video." I've never found that to be a challenge. It has to be a workflow issue.
==================================
As I posted, it was the standard DVD player setting that needed changing.

In terms of the color fringing, I am not really sure there isn't something wrong with my camera. Once before I had someone shoot with the EX1 a musical I was shooting with my VX2000 for pay. She was doing that so I could test it. I sert it up on fuill auto for her with ATW and all and I saw the color fringing. Bob (farss) looked at it after I sent him a still. I thought maybe the auto everything was the problem. This time I use manual controls for this paid gig and I saw the same thing. Colored coronas on the sides of faces, etc. Still not sure if it is a defect in my particular camera or normal for this camera. As you say, you aren't seeing this with your EX3. Maybe it is a color registration problem with my camera.

Now I did use this in daylight and got perfect results creating an HD disc, but of course that was daylight without harsh side lighting, etc.

John

Jay,

Are you using the same project template I am? How are you rendering? Any filters on the timeline?

Thanks,

John

It looks like we're in the same camp, with different results. I've parked my VX2000 (followed by a Panasonic 100B), in favour of the EX1.

I can only imagine that it's a problem with pixel ratio. What's probably happening is that when you're playing your SD video on the HDTV, it's stretching everything out. HD TVs usually have several options for the type of "zoom" it uses for SD video (which most people watch most of the time).

Like ANY SD video, if you want to watch SD on an HD TV, it's going to stretch out the image. Everyone looks like they put on 40 pounds and shorter by 6".

In short, there is no SD widescreen format per se. It's just a letterbox version of SD. If you put a 4:3 image on a 16:9 screen, it's going to stretch out. If you're going to put a wide-screen image on a wide-screen TV, make it HD. It's the only way to actually fill the screen with correct proportions.

I love the EX1, and the results I get stepping down from HD to SD are excellent, and Vegas, happily, makes it very easy for me to do (and considering most of my timelines, that's a very good thing).

Purple Fringing: Lots of the little super-zoom digital cameras exhibit the same behaviour (really good glass corrects for this problem). I haven't seen it yet on the EX1. Try to avoid shooting with wide iris in scenes with high contrast. Also try to with a UV-cut filter. I use a 1A, but 2A would work better if it's a consistent problem for you. I generally light quite bright because I prefer to Iris down a little (it reduces depth of field, but since I'm shooting green screen most of the time, I can just defocus whatever my BG is going to be for the same general result).

John, here is my template for 16:9 SD for DVD. I render out directly from the TL.



Hope this helps.

Thanks Jay.............I really appreciate that. So you use a "single pass" VBR instead of a 2-pass VBR? Is that to keep the file size smaller? And what are your project properties set to?

I wanted to paste a post on Creative Cow that I saw ion the subject of chromatic aberration and the EX1.

chromatic aberrations (color fringing) EX1
-------------
What do you think?

Thanks,

John

John, here are my project properties...



Insofar as the chromatic aberrations are concerned, I have seen some, what I would call minimal. It seems to be there, to one degree or another, with both the EX cameras.

Regarding Stephan's thesis, I'm in no position to comment. When it comes to the highly technical aspects of all this, I'm the last person one wants to ask.

Ah,

You are editing with an HD template instead of one of the templates like the one I posted above (Nick Hope's Project Settings Template). I did that for the HD DVD I did that came out so good (daytime shooting though).

Let me try that and let Procoder 3 or Main Concept do the rescaling to SD.

Thanks Jay,

John


NOTE: I cannot capture the chromatic aberration (color fringing) on a screenshot to post here in either .png or .jpg, yet it is clearly visible on my external CRT preview monitor. They were using sidelights and the light on their bodies from the sidelights causes the colors to stand away from their bodies outlining them on the zoomed out shots. Zoomed in, you dont see it. Capture a screenshot and displayt it on a computer monitor (which is progressive by nature) and you don't see it. Export it to a firewire connected CRT monitor and it is clearly visible.

I used the Even Pan/Crop tool to zoom in on this screenshot On the CRT monitor the girls have a red color fringe around them

Chromatic Aberation is a function of a lens. Different wavelengths of light are bent by a different amount. An extreme example is a prism. More expensive optics reduce this, it can also be corrected by processing in the camera or in post.
The three sensors in the EX or any 3 sensor camera do not occupy the same space, how in the world could they! You can have a problem if they're not perfectly aligned. The RGB is offset spatially. Lens focal length will not affect this and it'll be consistant across the frame unless one was out in the Z axis. Easy enough to see if you have this problem, a res chart or such and a full raster monitor would show this up immediately. If you can sometimes get perfect images from the camera you are unlikely to have this problem.

If you're seeing perfect images on a LCD / plasma monitor and seeing problems on a SD TV via firewire it is not the camera at fault. Chroma shift / offset is a problem with composite video, the chroma bandwidth is very low. In rough numbers on composite video Luma = 5.5Mhz, Chroma = 0.5Mhz bandwidth. If you have say a red-blue transition in part of the image with the same luma value the edge will bleed something horrible. You can see this with bars.

Shooting HD to deliver SD can make this look worse. The image is going to have more luma resolution and more chroma resolution than what you'd get from a SD camera. The errors in the composite connection will look worse. On a HDTV things can really fall apart VERY badly depending on what the upscaler is doing. We have an early Sony Bravia HDTV and SD fed into that can look like cr*p or not. Too much edge enhancement in the SD signal causes the edge enhancemant in the TV to ring giving multiple fringes around sharp edges, YUCK!

Probably also worth considering that the EX cameras produce more red than most other camera, hence the 'far red' problem that's still a hot topic.

I should also mention I have a project, shot on a very good SD camera with serious red fringing problems on a SD TV. The talent wore orange dayglow safety vests over blues shirts. Even on the LCD preview monitor in Vegas the chroma subsampling makes the red/blue edges look bad. On a SD TV from a TV it looks just woefull, not so bad played back on a PC though


Bob..

Thanks for the response Bob.

The fringing is not just red, it is all colors depending upon the stage light - ie: blue fringing with blue light, red fringing with red light, etc.

If I shot 1080/60i, I don't know what the best workflow is to SD DVD in terms of project properties and render settings. I have tried a lot of things and none seem satisfactory. Jay uses Progressive, others say UFF (which matches the footage), others say LFF. I don't know whether an intermediate file would be best or not and what about the color conversion factor? Surely everyone that shoots stage productions can't be getting results this bad for SD. Right now I am in the process of messing with Canopus HQ intermediates and next I'll try Cineform intermediates.

John

Red or blue will both give problems, even from a SD camera (1/2" 16:9 PAL ) I've had some horrible results with deep blue or red gels.

I've shot stage shows at SP 50i with the EX1 and no problems with the SD DVDs. Edited on 50i HD T/L in Vegas and encoded directly to 16:9 PAL mpeg-2 for DVD straight out of Vegas. De-interlace Method set to Blend, encoded at Best. Stage full of red, blue and gold (real gold thread) saris. Looked damn fine if not a bit over the top 'Bollywood". Almost no gells on the lights though.

Forget about field order, that's not your problem. A field order problem yields problems with motion.

Have you simply tried looking at the outcome on a different TV?
Also try using a S-Video connection. Better yet try a component connection if possible. You can spend a lot of time chasing ghosts in this game.

One way to narrow down your search is to take the camera out of the equation. Try simply sending test patterns through the same system, try something as basic as blue and red text on a black background.

Bob.

I've shot stage shows at SP 50i with the EX1 and no problems with the SD DVDs. Edited on 50i HD T/L in Vegas and encoded directly to 16:9 PAL mpeg-2 for DVD straight out of Vegas. De-interlace Method set to Blend, encoded at Best. Stage full of red, blue and gold (real gold thread) saris. Looked damn fine if not a bit over the top 'Bollywood". Almost no gells on the lights though.

I shot this using HQ 1080 /60i
Plenty of gels frin the top and the side.

Forget about field order, that's not your problem. A field order problem yields problems with motion.

Are you saying I should render progressive instead of Upper or Lower field first? Or that it doesn't matter Upper or Lower field first, the problem I am describing has nothing to do with field order?

Many of my customers have CRT TVs.

Have you simply tried looking at the outcome on a different TV?

I have tried them all. Don't liike the way it looks on any of them. I must admit I used Unsharp Mask set at Medium because I didn't have enough detail on their faces. That worked, but I am sure it didn't help the fringing problem. I guess ghosts" would be another description of what I am getting....colored ghosting around the figures. The new plasma TV, two CRT tvs, JVC CRT editing monitor - same problem on all of them.

John

"Are you saying I should render progressive instead of Upper or Lower field first?"

What I'm saying is this is not a field order problem. Vegas and DVD players seem to sort this out anyway. I'm just trying to reduce the number of variables for you to consider. About the only way you can create a field order problem is if you change media's properties.

If you render as upper or lower and bring that back into Vegas it'll simply handle it. DVD players seem to do the same thing.

"I must admit I used Unsharp Mask set at Medium because I didn't have enough detail on their faces."


OH!
Where did that get applied??
To the HD before downscaling or to the SD after downscaling. Where you do this might make a huge difference to the outcome.

General advice if shooting with the EXs for SD is to turn Detail down or Off. I've kind of gone with Serena's recipe, Detail -20, coring +30. That helps stop enhancing noise when shooting in low light.

Now sure, sometimes I've added just a smidge of edge enhancement in post but only AFTER I've downscaled to SD. Adding it before might induce a number of problems, aliasing and line twitter being two of them. You should be able to nest your HD project into a SD project and add whatever edge enhancement you want there using the Unsharpen Mask. Then from that encode to SD.

Bob.

About the only way you can create a field order problem is if you change media's properties.
======================
Well I guess that means that one should edit by clicking on Match Media Settings on the Project Properties window for best results.
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"I must admit I used Unsharp Mask set at Medium because I didn't have enough detail on their faces."


OH!
===============
For each Event's FX right after Color Correction filter on the HD timeline.

But, actually, I just stopped the playback on a frame where the blue corona was sticking far out the side of a dancer's head and then unchecked Unsharp Mask from the event FX and all that happened was a blurring of the dancer's features, but not any reduction in the blue corona sticking out from the side of her head.
This while watching it on my JVC CRT external monitor. It would seem that this is not a noise problem.

So in that case, would there be any benefit from a nested project?

John

"Well I guess that means that one should edit by clicking on Match Media Settings on the Project Properties window for best results."

Match Media will set the project for the correct image size and frame rate, Vegas will not necessarily know whether the footage is upper or lower field first, although most MPEG2 files will have this information in the header, .AVI files will not as there is no defined parameter in an AVI header with the field order. In the case of HD footage from the EX1, it will be upper field first (as will HDV footage.) Regardless, as has already been determined, your color fringing is not a result of incorrect field order.

Do you have any filters on the front of your EX1 lens? I have noticed the fringing issue when using a plain 1A Sky (UV) filter and scenes which have high contrast. It was a reflection between the rounded front of the lens and the flat back of the filter.

OK,
lets reset all thinking.

See if I and the rest of us understand your problem correctly.

You've got footage from your EX1 in a HD project.
You have a JVC SD CRT external monitor connected to Vegas via firewire.
In Vegas's internal preview you do not see this blue corona sticking out of the guys head. You do see it in the JVC CRT?

Questions:

1) How is the firewire being converted to analog.
2) How is the analog signal from the converter connected to the monitor?
3) How is Vegas external preview monitor setup?

Bob.

Do you have any filters on the front of your EX1 lens? I have noticed the fringing issue when using a plain 1A Sky (UV) filter and scenes which have high contrast. It was a reflection between the rounded front of the lens and the flat back of the filter.

Thanks John,

In fact I do have a Hoya HMC Multicoated UV(0) filter in front of the lens for protection.

Could that be part or all of the problem?

John

You've got footage from your EX1 in a HD project.
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Yes. It is readily apparent on the external JVC CRT monitor, but not on the Vegas preview window. Also apparent on the resulting SD DVD. Not seen on the rendered m2p when viewed on either a CRT computer monitor or computer LCD monitor played via VLC media player or Windows Media Player. Both displays being natively progressive of course. Readily apparent when importing to DVDA and previewing on same JVC external monitor. So it is there in that same m2p file when viewed on the JVC monitor
---------------------------------------------
1) How is the firewire being converted to analog.
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Computer firewire to Sony WV-DR9 Digital Video deck.
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2) How is the analog signal from the converter connected to the monitor?
------------------------------------------------
DV deck S-Video output to S-Video input of JVC Monitor.
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3) How is Vegas external preview monitor setup?
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Preferences/ Preview Device:

John

OK, good.

So we can discount anything wrong with the camera including lens flares, filters causing flares etc as they's show up on the internal monitor. Just to be sure turn off Scale Video so you're seeing the video pixel to pixel. Might need to enlarge the preview window to get a good look.

Assuming you see nothing remiss with the above then logically the image is OK however there's something in it that is spinning out the analog system so next step.
Take a look at your video scopes Set them to Studio RGB, do you see anything over 100%?
If so you need to adjust your levels to legal.
Even then the chroma could be outside legal. You could try adding the Broadcast Colors, try Conservative Or try the CC and reduce saturation. Really just try anything to adjust the image so you don't see the problem on the CRT. Just to get a pointer to what is in the image causing the problem.

One last question, not by any chance got your project set to 32bit float have you?

Bob.

Just to be sure turn off Scale Video so you're seeing the video pixel to pixel. Might need to enlarge the preview window to get a good look.
============
enlarged I can see horizontal banding, but not color fringing. EDIT: Some of the bands are colored and are sticking out from the dancers a little when I enlarge it nearly full screen.
==============
Take a look at your video scopes Set them to Studio RGB, do you see anything over 100%?
Everything is between 0 and 90 or so for most numbers. Played with the levels filter. No setting with any slider could improve the problem.

No 32-bit floating point. Only 8-bit.

Also, on zoomed in shots the problem disappears. Only the wide shots from far away aimed at the stage (which are most of the shots).

Broadcast Colors plugin - I can't see any change with any setting using this filter. Never used it before, but it shows nothing in the preview when I mess with it. Color Corrector - fringing disappears when saturation is at 0 (black and white). Even the slightest color and it shows up.
I then tried every filter Sony has and nothing improves it.

John