Cineform quality

Laurence wrote on 9/26/2005, 2:37 PM
I've just checked the quality using media player classic of some mts footage against the same footage rerendered using the Cineform codec. I'm really surprised at how much color contrast the Cineform codec seems to show. I see the same thing from the Vegas timeline as well by the way. A render from .mts to hdv mpeg looked much better, but in my test rerender there were a couple of errors (another reason why smartrender is so important). Does smartrender loose a lot of image quality or am I possibly doing something wrong?

Comments

Marco. wrote on 9/26/2005, 3:28 PM
Smart Rendering means copying digital datas. Just like a copy and paste process in Windows. So if there is really a Smart Rendering done there cannot be any quality loss at all. If there is a quality loss or any change visible than it cannot have been Smart Rendering.
Of course except of the parts where filters/fx were used.

Marco
Laurence wrote on 9/26/2005, 5:42 PM
when I first render the .mts into a Cineform codec file it is a full render. That is where I get the quality loss. As I edit the Cineform codec file, it rerenders only what I need to and there is no further quality loss (unless of course effects, filters or picture adjustments are used).
Laurence wrote on 9/26/2005, 5:56 PM
A further clarification about the damage converting to the Cineform codec: The detail looks just as crisp, it's the color that suffers.
Laurence wrote on 9/26/2005, 6:09 PM
You know, I just ran a Cineform conversion again and this time it looked just fine. I must have been doing something wrong the first time.
Wolfgang S. wrote on 9/27/2005, 12:48 AM
There are at least two things:

- every intermediate codec will show at least some quality drop, when you render m2t--> the intermediate. That cannot be avoided at all. To my opinion, this quality drop should not be larger, compared with a render process m2t-->m2t.

- the other question is, what happens, if you render more then one generation of the intermediate. So, if you see a significant drop in (Intermediate 1st generation) --> (Intermedate 2nd generation)..., then the codec has an issue.

Testing intermediates, that is the approach that you have to follow, to my opinion. With Vegas 6c, you have a new version of the Cineform codec incoporated. There are still tests pending with the new codec.

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Laurence wrote on 9/27/2005, 6:02 AM
I know what I did wrong now. The first time I rendered to the Cineform codec, I saw "1.33" as an aspect ratio and assumed it ws a mistake. I changed it to "1" and checked the "do not letterbox" tab as I rendered. Thus the colorspace ended up screwed up. Now I realize that the aspect ratio of 1.33 is not a mistake, but rather a better approximation of how much a HDV camera is actually sampling.

The more I mess with comparing the Cineform codec to merely using proxie files and continuing to work with mpeg, the more I appreciate how much the Cineform codec improves the workflow. Not to take away from "Gearshift" which really is brilliant, but the Cineform codec has some real advantages.

I've also noticed that Cineform video looks about as good as SD with the preview quality set all the way down to "Preview - auto". This setting keeps my aging PC humming along quite nicely even with the large files.
David Newman wrote on 9/27/2005, 9:00 AM
Wolfgang,

Your statement doesn't reflect our aims, and hopefully not the user experience : "every intermediate codec will show at least some quality drop, when you render m2t--> the intermediate. That cannot be avoided at all."

The first point is the the difference should not "show", it can only be statistically measured, but under normal working conditions the intermediate should be practically identical. Having as much loss as m2t->m2t render is too much as that can show, this is what we are trying to avoid. An intermediate workflow is working to approach that for uncompressed, i.e. no loss, mathematical or visual. In fact "every intermediate codec will show at least some quality drop" is not true for lossless compression such as HUFFYUV. CineForm is constantly upgrading our codec, a real-time codec than is completely lossless is the ultimate goal. Vegas 6.0c has the release of the v2.1 CineForm codec, and v2.2 is about to follow with a new release of Connect HD. With every codec upgrade we get closer to our goal.

David Newman
CTO, CineForm
David Newman wrote on 9/27/2005, 9:02 AM
"The more I mess with comparing the Cineform codec to merely using proxie files and continuing to work with mpeg, the more I appreciate how much the Cineform codec improves the workflow. Not to take away from "Gearshift" which really is brilliant, but the Cineform codec has some real advantages."

Thanks Laurence. I hope you have added Connect HD to your workflow, which I believe simplifies HDV workflow even further.

David Newman
CTO, CineForm
mark-woollard wrote on 9/27/2005, 10:06 AM
Dan, can you be more specific on timing of the next release of Connect HD?

"About to follow" sounds imminent to me--that is in hours or a day or two. Or is "ATF" really just a synonym for "RSN"? ;>)

Mark
David Newman wrote on 9/27/2005, 10:33 AM
It is in beta and is looking good. It could be only a day or so away.

David Newman