Bob

Thanks for your input. Sony YUV is exactly what I used but I had to change the frame size to 720x528 with PAR of 1.0 in order to get 4:3 which means I loose some horizontal resolution, not ideal as DV doesn't have much resolution to begin with.

Here is what I got from MediaInfo on the rendered Sony YUV file:

General

Complete name                            : F:\Japamala_2006.avi

Format                                   : AVI

Format/Info                              : Audio Video Interleave

Format profile                           : OpenDML

File size                                : 17.9 GiB

Duration                                 : 8mn 21s

Overall bit rate                         : 306 Mbps

TCOD                                     : 0

TCDO                                     : 5017600000



Video

ID                                       : 0

Format                                   : YUV

Codec ID                                 : UYVY

Codec ID/Info                            : Uncompressed 16bpp. YUV 4:2:2 (Y sample at every pixel, U and V sampled at every second pixel horizontally on each line). A macropixel contains 2 pixels in 1 u_int32.

Duration                                 : 8mn 21s

Bit rate                                 : 304 Mbps

Width                                    : 720 pixels

Height                                   : 528 pixels

Display aspect ratio                     : 4:3

Frame rate                               : 50.000 fps

Color space                              : YUV

Chroma subsampling                       : 4:2:2

Compression mode                         : Lossless

Bits/(Pixel*Frame)                       : 16.000

Stream size                              : 17.8 GiB (99%)

I put that through Handbrake and got this:

General

Complete name                            : V:\Family\Japamala_2006hb.mp4

Format                                   : MPEG-4

Format profile                           : Base Media / Version 2

Codec ID                                 : mp42

File size                                : 193 MiB

Duration                                 : 8mn 21s

Overall bit rate mode                    : Variable

Overall bit rate                         : 3 234 Kbps

Encoded date                             : UTC 2014-04-15 19:07:45

Tagged date                              : UTC 2014-04-15 19:14:13

Writing application                      : HandBrake 0.9.9 2013052900



Video

ID                                       : 1

Format                                   : AVC

Format/Info                              : Advanced Video Codec

Format profile                           : Main@L3.1

Format settings, CABAC                   : Yes

Format settings, ReFrames                : 2 frames

Codec ID                                 : avc1

Codec ID/Info                            : Advanced Video Coding

Duration                                 : 8mn 21s

Bit rate                                 : 3 035 Kbps

Width                                    : 720 pixels

Height                                   : 528 pixels

Display aspect ratio                     : 4:3

Frame rate mode                          : Constant

Frame rate                               : 50.000 fps

Color space                              : YUV

Chroma subsampling                       : 4:2:0

Bit depth                                : 8 bits

Scan type                                : Progressive

Bits/(Pixel*Frame)                       : 0.160

Stream size                              : 182 MiB (94%)

Writing library                          : x264 core 130 r2273 b3065e6

Encoding settings                        : cabac=1 / ref=2 / deblock=1:-2:-1 / analyse=0x1:0x111 / me=umh / subme=6 / psy=1 / psy_rd=1.00:0.00 / mixed_ref=1 / me_range=16 / chroma_me=1 / trellis=0 / 8x8dct=0 / cqm=0 / deadzone=21,11 / fast_pskip=1 / chroma_qp_offset=-2 / threads=18 / lookahead_threads=3 / sliced_threads=0 / nr=0 / decimate=1 / interlaced=0 / bluray_compat=0 / constrained_intra=0 / bframes=2 / b_pyramid=0 / b_adapt=1 / b_bias=0 / direct=1 / weightb=1 / open_gop=0 / weightp=0 / keyint=500 / keyint_min=50 / scenecut=40 / intra_refresh=0 / rc_lookahead=10 / rc=crf / mbtree=1 / crf=18.0 / qcomp=0.60 / qpmin=0 / qpmax=69 / qpstep=4 / ip_ratio=1.40 / aq=1:1.00

Encoded date                             : UTC 2014-04-15 19:07:45

Tagged date                              : UTC 2014-04-15 19:11:59

Color primaries                          : BT.601 NTSC

Transfer characteristics                 : BT.709

Matrix coefficients                      : BT.601

Note: the Color primaries are BT.601 NTSC ??

I just tried in V10 and I can render to Sony YUV as 720x576 PAR = 1.0926 no problem. I bought the rendered file back into Vegas it matched the source.

Sorry but I'm at a loss to understand why you're having a problem doing this.

Bob.

Bob

Did you look at the rendered file with MediaInfo? Does it say 4:3 or 5:4? Did you render 50i or 50p

Nope and I rendered it as 50i.
Why do you want 50p, I see nothing to be gained doing that?

Bob.

As I said in my initial post, I want 50p not 50i. There is plenty to gain from 50p and Vegas does an excellent job in converting interlaced 50i/60i to 50p/60p. 50p also converts much better down to 30p then 50i.

So it seems I was right, Sony YUV doesn't allow PAL DV @50p with PAR 1.0926 4:3?

I just rendered some 50i SD DV as MPEG2 DVD/PAL using Vegas 9 and Mediainfo reported it incorrectly as 5:4. The source AVI is also reported as 5:4. The MPEG2 loads and displays correctly in DVDA (4:3, 720x576).

So don't expect Mediainfo to be infallable.

Peter

I know that MediaInfo could have gotten it wrong but it didn't, the final render does look distorted, people and objects do look visibly stretched/taller. My source avi is actually reported correctly in MediaInfo as 4:3.

Well, there you go. What can you rely on? Death and taxes?

[I]" So it seems I was right, Sony YUV doesn't allow PAL DV @50p with PAR 1.0926 4:3?"[/I]

Just to be sure to be sure here I just rendered to Sony YUV 50p using checkerboard Generated Media and bought that back into the same PAL DV project on an upper track so I could do an A/B comparison and it is identical. When I R-Click the media Vegas reports it as 720x576 50p with a PAR of 1.0926. All this was with Vegas 10.

Bob.

Bob

Yes, I know, Vegas does interpret it correctly as 4:3, but when you check with MediaInfo it will show 5:4 and when played back in WMP it will be distorted. Use a circular cookie cutter on the ckeckerboard, render it to Sony YUV 50p and play it back in WMP, you will see what I mean.
Bringing the rendered file back into Vegas, even interpreted correctly, still leaves me with no option to render it out as 4:3 so that it can be played correctly on other devices. Try and put the rendered checkerboard through HB and I will be distorted... Happy Easter!

I am sure it isn't more then having the aspect ratio flag set wrongly in the avi file. If I archive the avi file the way it is, down the line in years to come I may not have a player or software to interpret it correctly as 4:3.

[I]" If I archive the avi file the way it is, down the line in years to come I may not have a player or software to interpret it correctly as 4:3. "[/I]

I'd be pretty confident the tools to put it right will be available for the next few centuries. I'd recommend including a slate stating what it should be at the beginning of every file and a circle would be handy.

I think though you're approaching the archiving process incorrectly. Archival copies should always be as close to the original as possible, warts and all. Once you do something to them you're possibly denying someone in years to come the ability to use new tools to get a better outcome from the footage.

A few years ago I worked on a project to release some ancient audio that'd been recorded on acetate disks. That'd been recorded to DAT by someone and then the acetates destroyed. Problem was the wrong sized needle was used to play the acetates and without the acetate disks I had to spend a lot of time cleaning up the audio with Sound Forge. Today though a much better job could be done with iZotopes Rx. That's why I sent back the original files on archival media to our National Archives. The "fixed as best I could at the time files" were used for the commercial release.

Going from these principles if I was archiving D8 I'd leave it as 50i DV because that's exactly what is on the tapes.

Bob.

I agree about archiving the original footage and I am not touching it. I am archiving the final render at the best possible setting and that doesn't work as it should. If I loose the project file I cant go back and redo it without spending more time then doing it the first time.

To my knowledge, there is no field in an AVI header which specifically stores aspect ratio information or if it's interlaced or not, except in the case of a DV file which has a flag that says either normal and widescreen and DV is always interlaced lower field first. Mediainfo is calculating the aspect ratio of AVI file by simple dividing width in pixels by height in pixels.

MPEG2, MP4 and M2TS files do have this information in the header and Vegas can read these fields directly to set the properties correctly but since there are no fields in the header of an AVI file to determine aspect ratio or whether it's interlaced or progressive, Vegas uses a predefined set of rules, apparently, it determines an AVI files properties by looking at image dimensions, frame rate and codec. For example, if it sees a Cineform AVI file with the dimensions "720x480" and a frame rate of "29.97" frames per second, it assumes that this is likely interlaced lower field first with a pixel aspect ratio of .9091 and most of the time that will be correct unless it happens to be widescreen with a PAR of 1.2121, in which case it has no way of knowing this. In the event that it isn't correct, you can always change the clip's properties and you can also click on the disk icon next to the stream properties field and from then on, every time it sees that combination of codec, image size and frame rate it will apply your custom properties.

John

Thanks for your reply. The problem isn't getting it correctly in Vegas, the issue is getting it properly out of Vegas. I cant get SONY YUV to render it to 720x576 @50p PAR 1.0926 and 4:3, it always comes out as 5:4.
I did however manage to get Handbrake to render it properly to 4:3 by changing the anamorphic picture setting to custom: Display width=768, PAR width=128, PAR height=117.

Right, since there is no aspect ratio header in an AVI file, Mediainfo will report it as 5:4 since 720/576 = 5/4. Handbrake has no way of knowing either, it assumes a pixel aspect ratio of 1.0 unless it reads otherwise, in the case of a YUV AVI file with a non-1:1 PAR, you must set the PAR manually in Handbrake. Keep in mind that many media players don't pay any attention to pixel aspect ratio either and if you really want it to display at the original 4:3 aspect ratio you must render it out with image dimensions equivalent to 4:3 with a PAR of 1.0.

John

Thanks for your reply. Yes, rendering at 768x576 was my other option and it actually looks good too. So the only avi file that has info in it is a PAL/NTSC DV file?

Correct, no other AVI file types contain PAR or interlacing information, that's for you to keep straight. 768x576 with a PAR of 1.0 is probably your best bet anyway, it will completely future-proof the recordings and will always play back with the correct PAR on anything. Besides, when a media player does happen to read a non-1.0 PAR correctly, it's going to stretch it out to 768 pixels on playback anyway, why not just render it as 768x576 and eliminate any potential playback issues in the future? The only exception to this is if you happen to make a standard video DVD, in which case you can adjust it back to 720x576 with the correct PAR when rendering to MPEG2 for the DVD, otherwise most everything these days has a PAR of 1.0.