Film Transfer to HD

Skratch wrote on 2/25/2012, 4:59 PM

I'm getting a reel of film transferred to HD by Lightpress in Seattle. They can deliver the footage onto a hard drive in any file type. I use Vegas 10. What would be the best HD file codec to have transferred to? I don't want a compressed file, Looking for the most user friendly and least compressed codec.

Comments

xberk wrote on 2/26/2012, 12:45 PM

I'm not expert in this area. Someone else can explain codec vs containers.

I know for editing in Vegas 10, converting to Sony MXF files in resolutions like 1920 x 1080 or 720P works fine on my machine (i5-750 CPU) for playback, editing, and rendering . Generally I'm converting AVCHD HD files that are 1920 x 1080i in MTS format .. but what's the spec on your editing system?

It might help, for the experts here, to know what your ultimate output will be .. is this for Blu-Ray or upload to the internet?

What type of film is being transfered? .. What's the aspect ratio? Is it 4 x 3?
How much is being transferred -- 10,000 feet? 100 feet? Color? B&W?
What does Lightpress recommend for the highest quality on this particular job?

Former user wrote on 2/26/2012, 12:51 PM

"I don't want a compressed file" "least compressed".

Kind of two different things. You can get an uncompressed AVI that will work great on a PC, or an umcompressed QT for a Mac. The file sizes will be large, but they will be your best quality.

Or you can get compressed, and these can vary greatly in file size and quality. In the Mac World ProRes HQ has become the standard for best quality vs. compression. But in PC land, there does not seem to be any accepted best vs. quality. MXF seems to be good, Cineform is liked by many, but there are several others to choose from. I would talk to the facility transferring the film, tell them your goals with the film and the type of system (computer) that you will be using to finish and see what they recommend.

Dave T2

Skratch wrote on 2/26/2012, 4:12 PM

I'm also using an i5 750 with 1.5TB. I will be rendering it for Bluray and another render for Vimeo. I'm not all that familiar with full HD codecs yet, so i'm basically looking for a 1920x1080 version of an AVI (my older AVI SD transfers were about 4 gigs for 3 minutes). There are so many codec options for HD on my list, i'm not sure where to start. I have about 20 minutes of footage that will be scanned, and enough hard drive space to store it.

john_dennis wrote on 2/26/2012, 6:10 PM

As suggested, ask your transfer vendor what they are able an willing to provide.

Here is a discussion of various codecs and characteristics.

I have used MXF for work where I made four passes and it held up respectably, but I wouldn't discourage you from using an uncompressed codec if this is a "once in a lifetime" transfer.

fldave wrote on 2/26/2012, 8:41 PM

MXF is slightly compressed, and plays great even on my lowly Pentium 4 still.

Lossless, I would use a Lagarith or even the old HuffYUV, ~5x less file size. Create your own intermediate to work with.

larry-peter wrote on 2/27/2012, 9:43 AM

The last time I worked with an HD film transfer I was using 8.0, so there may be better workflow choices than mine in recent versions that I haven't discovered (or needed to yet). I had the transfer house give me uncompressed AVIs. I figured with the expense involved I wanted to be able to work with and archive the best quality possible. I used the ProxyStream script to make MXF proxies for editing in Vegas then rendered the final product using the original footage. Then made a copy of the original drive from the transfer house so I had a dual backup of the original footage. That drive is in my queue now to be backed up once again to BluRay datadiscs. (I am a backup fanatic)
Larry

Skratch wrote on 2/27/2012, 4:36 PM

I talked to the lab today and they recommended ProRez 10 bit. Can Vegas 10 handle that? Do I need to download Quiktime first?

videoITguy wrote on 2/27/2012, 5:16 PM

To Skratch:
From the voice of a lot of experience -if you do not have a lot of transfer to accomplish - follow "atom12...."'s advice above. His statement is what I have found works best. Stay out of the ProRes quandry if you want this process to go smoothly.
Uncompressed .avis are easy to work with and you go quickly to good intermediates for compressed storage - I use Cineform backed up on Blu-ray disc.