I'm making a video that may be as long as 30 minutes. If I make multiple videos, render them all separately, then combine them all and render them as one big video, will there be much generational loss? Basically, the final video will be a second generation file. Thanks.
@charles-mcguyer I have used video joiner software in the past to upload multipart videos to YT, and it worked fine. Could depend on where your file is going to end up as to how well it will play, unsure about that. Shutter encoder has a joining feature. Run a simulation, encode 3x 1 minute videos instead of a 3minute video, join them, upload to where ever they were going or play them on the hardware they are intended for, and see if the joins are seemless.
Joiners avoid the generational loss you were speaking about. I don't actually do this so get an opinion from someone that does this routinely.l
Todd-AO, thanks for the information. Will look into your suggestions. Not familiar with video joiner software.
Render to an intermediate lossless codec, and you will have no problem.
Personally, I render my masters to either cineform (my preference) or uncompressed AVI -- do my post-work, i.e., cuts, grading, some titling, etc., then reimport the pieces into a new project, make some final tweaks and render out to a delivery format.
As far as I can tell, there is virtually no visual loss. However it does eat disk space like chocolates.
BTW, if it's for YT, it injests Cineform no problem.
@charles-mcguyer There would be generational loss yes in what you described, but, it would be a bit unnoticeable to the naked eye..... If your final output is not geared towards Broadcast, Film or a Television Studio, then you are good to go with that kind of workflow.
I'm making a video that may be as long as 30 minutes. If I make multiple videos, render them all separately, then combine them all and render them as one big video, will there be much generational loss? Basically, the final video will be a second generation file. Thanks.
Take a look at the must-have Swiss Tool for video editors: https://www.shutterencoder.com/en/
The merge function does exactly what you want but WITHOUT re-encoding. Means NO generation loss and NO waste of time, because combining videos take just a few seconds instead of rendering (probably a few hours).
3Point, just finished using Shutter Encoder, and it is great. Thanks a lot.
3Point, just finished using Shutter Encoder, and it is great. Thanks a lot.
👍
If you use Nested Projects, you won't have to render each segment separately, just one final render from the conjoined projects.
@john_dennis It's probably very dependable on the complexity of a project: In my example I measure a 50% slower rendering!
"Slower" as compared to rendering out each segment individually plus a final encode? Only the OP could answer that for himself.
I agree that it is useful for contributors to offer more than one alternative and let @charles-mcguyer test and choose what works best for his project and comfort level.
@mark-y According the post of @charles-mcguyer, he was looking for a method for combining rendered subprojects to a final project and afraid of generation loss by rendering again, which is not necessary when using the Shutterencoder merging option. Shutterencoder merges the already rendered subprojects lossless and in a few seconds. Ofcourse nesting the several subprojects in a final project is an alternative solution, but setting up a final project with nested projects takes also extra time (besides the extra import rendering and much slower output render).
One other big advantage of rendering and merging subprojects is, that you easily can just re-render a subproject (in case of an editing mistake) without needing to re-render the whole final project again. I always work that way, just small subprojects which I render and cast to my 4kTV in my living room for doublechecking, before I finally merge them lossless together.
Ofcourse each user has his own comfort level/workflow and indeed it's useful to know alternative ways which all their pro's and con's.