I have been archiving many old DV tapes and was looking for the least "softening" settings. I have set the timeline properties to match source, however many render as mp4 options soften the images. DV had a certain "grain" that resembled film grain that appears lost with the mp4 render options. I would like to keep the output file size similar to the original say in a case 25g in/out.
Liquid used to have a "Fuse"output that would just consolidate the timeline.
Any thoughts?
DV is interlaced. MP4 is mostly progressive. So deinterlacing method becomes important. Vegas has several options for deinterlacing, try and see which method fits your needs.
Happy Otter Scripts solution:
https://www.vegascreativesoftware.info/us/forum/how-to-480i-to-720p--119206/#ca743883
In x264 (Voukoder), these settings will help preserve grain at the expense of compression.
Use a low CRF, 17 or 18. This may produce files slightly larger than the original.
Use the Grain Tune. It is designed to preserve fine detail and grain.
Set deblocking to [-2,-2]
Set GOP length low, around 50 or so.
Use 3 or 4 Ref frames
Here are the full details for the x264 Grain Tune:
- grain (psy tuning):--aq-strength 0.5 --no-dct-decimate--deadzone-inter 6 --deadzone-intra 6--deblock -2:-2 --ipratio 1.1--pbratio 1.1 --psy-rd <unset>:0.25--qcomp 0.8
Note that preserving grain and Long-GOP interframe compression are not the best of friends. One exists at the expense of the other.
I've settled on Timeline properties same as source (DV), render as "Video for Windows/DV". The result is an.avi,no recompression needed, the file size is 22G, large but not unmanageable by todays standards.
Thanks for the suggestions.