Best option for deinterlacing HDV in Vegas 5?

mdopp wrote on 10/25/2005, 11:45 AM

If you are really interested in high quality deinterlacing then forget about Vegas' built in deinterlacers. What you need are programms like DVFilm (www.dvfilm.com) or smooth deinterlacer (http://www.guthspot.se/video/AVSPorts/SmoothDeinterlacer/). See also www.100fps.com.
Since Smooth Deinterlacer is free I am using it frequently. Here's a short "How-to":

1) Do all your magic in Vegas. Once you are completely finished with everything render the project to "Video for Windows (AVI)" in "HDV 1080-50i" format
(filename xyz.avi).

2) Now create a small script for AviSynth - that's just a textfile with the filename "xyz.avs" and the following three lines:
AVISource("xyz.avi")
ComplementParity
SeparateFields

3) Start the freeware program VirtualDub and open the script under "File ->
Open Video File..."
Note: You need to install the freeware AviSynth before VirtualDub can open this script.

4) Set "Video-Compression" to "CineForm HD Codec"
Note: You will need the standealone version of CineForm HDLink in order to be able to do this. Otherwise select a different compression method. But you will most likely loose quality and/or need much more disk space since the Cineform encoder is really perfectly suited for HD material.

5) Select "Video -> Filters... -> Add... -> Smooth Deinterlacer" (the default settings will do).

6) Render the file "File -> Save As AVI...".
After a long while you will have your perfectly deinterlaced file in 1080p50 format.

Now you can go back to Vegas and render to any format you like (MPEG2, WMV, MPEG4, ...).
Please remember to set the framerate to "50 (Double PAL)" , Field-Order to "None" and Deinterlace-Method to "None" in the project properties when opening the file in Vegas.
If you intend to render to a target format in 25p it's best to set the "Undersample Rate" to 0,5 in the file's properties. That will discard every second image rather than interpolating between two frames (which would introduce new smearing artifacts).

Sounds complicated ? It is!

When will Sony finally include a decent deinterlacer with Vegas ?
This has been on my whishlist for a long time.

Good luck
Martin

Avene wrote on 10/27/2005, 12:39 AM

Hello Martin, many thanks for detailed explaination of how to achieve this. I'd probably want to do all the deinterlacing before editing though, incase I enlarge or reduce the size of any sections using the pan and crop tools.

Now, I've never really used VirtualDub much in the past. Maybe just once or twice to convert movies to DivX a number of years back. I'm wondering if there's any kind of automated batch scripting for deinterlacing clips using the method you described? So a whole tape's worth of clips could be deinterlaced overnight, and then be ready for editing in either 24P or 25P the next day.

Thanks again for the info. I've downloaded all 3 components necessary and will give it a try.

Glenn

farss wrote on 10/27/2005, 3:00 AM

Have you done any tests on just what's happening to your resolution in this process?
If you discard every second frame I suspect you've thrown away half the vertical resolution.
In fact even going out as 50p you're converting fields to frames which is certainly a useful trick for some things but again I suspect you've halved your vertical resolution. Of course if your intent is to downscale to SD then indeed this is a good trick but if you start zooming in on the frame, I think things might get ugly.
The only real way to test this is to shoot a resolution chart and check the results at each step through the process.
Bob.

JohnnyRoy wrote on 10/27/2005, 5:53 AM

> I'm about to buy a Sony HC1 along with the Connect HD capture app from Cineform

Glenn, Since you are buying CineForm Connect HD why don’t you just capture progressive? (it’s one of the CineForm Encoder Options) That would seem to be the fastest solution.

Connect HD does an outstanding job at converting my Z1 CineFrame24 to 24p. (better than Vegas does and no more stutter because it removes the pulldown!) I’ve never tried the capture progressive option for PAL but you should see if you like the results before you do a lot of time-consuming deinterlacing after the fact.

> So a whole tape's worth of clips could be deinterlaced overnight, and then be ready for editing in either 24P or 25P the next day.

Connect HD also has the option to capture CF25 as 24p adding the 4% slowdown during the capture process. So you can start editing immediately. You should download the trial and check it out to see what’s available to you before you worry about this any more.

~jr

Jessariah67 wrote on 10/27/2005, 5:57 AM

One problem I've noticed when deinterlacing a cut project (as opposed to working on a "progressive" time line) is that the pulldown sometimes makes hard cuts quick fades. Is there any way around this?

JohnnyRoy wrote on 10/27/2005, 6:00 AM

> Is there any way around this?

No, the only way is to work in 24p from the start. That’s why we created Celluloid to convert all of your footage FIRST, then change your project to 24p, then bring that footage back in and work at 24p from the beginning of your project. It’s the only way to preserve cuts. Anytime you translate to another format, things get lost in the translation. ;-)

~jr

MH_Stevens wrote on 10/27/2005, 8:56 AM

Also, if you are shooting interlaced video that you plan to convert to 24p, your camera's shutter speed will determine the quality of frame rate conversion in Vegas. If you're shooting PAL or HDV 50i video, set your shutter speed to 1/50 second.

If you have a camera capable of shooting 24P, the Vegas manual says this:

" Create a project in 24p from start to finish
If you have Vegas+DVD software and a 24p camcorder (such as the Panasonic AG-DVX100), you can create, edit, and deliver your project completely in 24p.

With the Panasonic AG-DVX100, shoot in 24p Advanced mode. The 2-3-3-2 pulldown method used in Advanced mode is more efficient than the 2-3 pulldown used in the 24p Standard mode.

Set your project properties:

a. From the File menu, choose Properties. The Project Properties dialog is displayed.

b. From the Template drop-down list, choose NTSC DV 24p.

c. Click OK to close the Project Properties dialog and apply your changes.

Select the Allow pulldown removal when opening 24p DV check box on the General tab of the Preferences dialog.

Add the video to the timeline.

Render or prerender your file using the following settings:

Use the NTSC DV 24p (inserting 2-3-3-2 pulldown) AVI template for pretenders.

Use the NTSC DV 24p (inserting 2-3 pulldown) AVI template for print-to-tape.

Use the DVD Architect 24p NTSC video stream MPEG-2 template when rendering for DVD Architect.

Print your project to tape or burn to DVD using DVD Architect"

mdopp wrote on 10/27/2005, 11:31 AM

I think we are talking deinterlacing from 25i to 50p (or 25p) here. 24p would be another story.
What SmoothDeinterlacer does is to interpolate every field (50 of them are recorded with 540 lines each by Sony's HDV camcorders) to the full number of lines (1080) by means of an adaptive deinterlacer. See www.100fps.com for more detail.
The result of this process is naturally a 50fps film at full resolution. Therefore no information of the original material is lost - just interpolated lines are added.
The best output format would hence be 1440x1080/50p - but very few computers can playback this smoothly today.
Therefore a good alternative is to reduce frame rate to 25p. However that will remove some of the original information (going from 25i to 25p always does - with any interpolation process).
Alternatively you could render to 1280x720/50p (which is a standard format). The resolution will suffer visibly but many displays can't resolve a higher pixel count anyhow.
I've tried this SmoothDeinterlacer several times and believe me - the results are outstanding.
And no - there is no batch file that will simplify the process. But once you've done it you get acustomed to it pretty quick...
However the conversion is very very time consuming. Also the resulting file has twice the size of the original material - about 70 to 80GB per hour (using the Cineform codec) !
I don't think you will want to use this on your original material before cutting...

Martin

mdopp wrote on 10/27/2005, 11:36 AM

P.s.: I advise very much AGAINST using Cineframe 25 (or 24) modes on Sony's HDV cams. Both modes reduce vertical resolution dramatically. See http://www.dvfilm.com and http://www.adamwilt.com/HDV/FX1-60i.jpg for a detailed comparison.
You may want to use these modes for a quick fake of "film mode" if resolution is of no concern for you - but that's about it.

MH_Stevens wrote on 10/27/2005, 1:43 PM

This may be tangential but as I seemed to miss the original point (sorry) will someone explain in what situations would one want to go from 50i to 50p.

JohnnyRoy wrote on 10/27/2005, 8:38 PM

> P.s.: I advise very much AGAINST using Cineframe 25 (or 24) modes on Sony's HDV cams. Both modes reduce vertical resolution dramatically.

I’m not understanding your point here. There is no camera that can capture HD 1080p so whether I shoot CF25 or I shoot 50i and deinterlace in post I’m still loosing resolution so what’s the difference? There is no other option.

In the article you sited, Adam Wilt said of CF24, “...it cannot be reverse-telecined to get smooth 24fps imagery”. Well… someone should tell CineForm ConnectHD to stop doing that because it does an excellent job and removing pulldown from CF24 to get a nice smooth 24p.

~jr

Avene wrote on 11/3/2005, 7:27 PM

Thanks for all the replies here. Sorry about the slow reply too.

Bob, where can i find a resolution chart like you mentioned here? Is there one that I could download and print out a bubble jet printer?

The camera arrived on Monday, and although I've been getting to know it pretty well since then I'm still yet to buy a copy of Cineform Connect and try that out or the Smooth Deinterlace, VirtualDub and AVSynth combination. So I've been a bit slack getting that organised. Of course my internet computer failed to start in the meantime and I've juist got it running again here with a replaced system drive.

I'll most probably want to be working in 25P as I'm in a PAL territory. Of course if I were working in 24P, would it be compatible with PAL SD or HD tvs? Or would it be possible to create a 24P DVD using DVD Architect that will play on any tv with the appropriate multi region zone?

As for capturing progressive using Cineform, I can imagine the end result would be much the same as just deinterlacing the footage in Vegas with it set to interpolate the fields. Am I right? Using 25P of course. Thankfully, living in Australia I've never had to worry about NTSC pull downs or any of that.

What would be nice is some kind of program that could just take a single field and just create the missing detail, rather trying to deinterlace by combining 2 fields together. I guess much like the Re:Vision AE plugins used for creating slow motion. And with a batch script to go with it to deinterlace a whole tape or two worth of clips in one shot, preferrably overnight.

Glenn

Laurence wrote on 11/3/2005, 7:58 PM

Well using Cineframe 24 or 25 does cut the resolution in half, but have of HDV vertical resolution is still twice that of an XL2 or DVX100 (actually more than twice a DVX100), and nobody's complaining about either of those formats ;-)

Serena wrote on 11/3/2005, 8:03 PM

Glenn, have a look at chart

and print out the PDF file (at a suitable size). The actual size is important for quantitative measurements, but provided you make it large enough for all elements to be resolved by your printer then you can use it to compare the relative performances of each workflow.

Also see lens resolution testing

Avene wrote on 11/3/2005, 8:29 PM

Hello Serena, great, thanks for that! I'll give it a try.

Glenn

Avene wrote on 11/4/2005, 3:07 AM

Alright, although I'm yet to print out the resolution chart and test that, I did try out a bit of deinterlacing. Since my only real video programs are Vegas 5 and Commotion Pro 4.1, that's all I used. Plus VirtualDub and AVSynth to test Martin's method.

Firstly, I tested an obviously interlaced clip of a car driving by in Commotion Pro using a demo of Re:Vision FX's 'Fields Kit' deinterlacer AE plugin which actually works in Commotion, unlike a lot of other AE plugins. This plugin had some decent reviews and sells for $89. What I found with this plugin was that I could get almost exactly the same results in Commotion just by interpolating the footage and applying 2 pixels of vertical blur. Unfortunately the guassian blur in Vegas isn't as precise, so could never achieve the same kind of result as the blur in Commotion. Anyway, once the footage in Commotion was stretched to 1920 x 1080, the Fields Kit and blur deinterlacing proved pointless and everything ended up looking much the same as the normal interpolated deinterlaced clip. So the Fields Kit is essentially quite useless for HDV.

Next I tried Martin's method he outlined above using VirtualDub, AVSynth and the SmoothDeinterlace plugin. This proved to be better than the Fields Kit or vertical blur, retaining more detail. Although what I found with SmoothDeinterlace was that the results were practically the same whether the original footage was interlaced or interpolated. I didn't expect to see any improvement running interpolated (1 field only) footage through Smooth Deinterlace, but it did actually smooth things out in the same way as it did with the interlaced version. So I'd imagine that running Cineframe footage through Smooth Deinterlace would yield much the same result aswell. Except at only 25fps, not 50fps.

From there I took things a step further and loaded the final Smooth Deinterlaced clips back into Commotion where I applied Bicubic filtering to them. Both the originally interlaced and interpolated versions. Now this was definitely the icing on the cake and improved the overall quality even more. Any tiny jagged pixels on 45 degree straight edges vanished once the Bicubic filtering was applied. Although very fine lines did still appear slightly pixelated in some areas. Of course other finely detailed parts in the shot such as tree leaves looked a whole lot better aswell. A huge improvement actually.

At the end of the day, it's all been quite interesting. Thankfully I'm quite happy with the end results and now have a much better understanding of what works, what doesn't, and how to achieve a decent progressive look without too much trouble. One less thing to worry about you could say. Of course I'd still be interested in trying DV Film and seeing there's any difference there.

Glenn