HDV to SD Questions

gallois wrote on 3/5/2005, 2:48 PM
I'm converting footage from an HDR-FX1 via HD link to CFHD/Avi format (1080i). The settings work well for importing into Vegas5; a bit jumpy at times due to the cpu load I expect. Right now my goal is to pan & scan and output as ntsc SD for broadcast. I've done this several times and have noticed that the footage has

a.) tended to appear very contrasty, and

b.) the frame rate seems odd; it doesn't seem to have the clear resolution of 30fps video as if it was being processed through a soft filter or something. It just doesn't have the crispness I expect from video.

I've read elsewhere on this forum about fast pans tending to break up a bit, which I've also encountered.

Am I missing a step here or something? I just get this feeling that the playback rate seems off somehow, and by the time the HD is converted to SD there shouldn't be any playback problems right? (Note I'm checking to make sure my fields are correct; HDV=upper, DV=lower.)

Comments

farss wrote on 3/5/2005, 3:02 PM
What are you converting to SD?
Are you going from the CF DI avi or the original m2t camera file.
Can I suggest you also check the CF DI, several of us have had problems with duplicated frames which sure makes things jerky!
Also are you using the CF utility from here or the full blown one direct from the CF web site, they are NOT the same.
PeterWright wrote on 3/5/2005, 5:16 PM
If you're definitely going out SD, you could try rendering in Vegas from the m2t straight to normal DV, widescreen if required, then edit using that.
When I do this I can preview at full frame rate instead of about 7.5 fps with the Cineform avi.
I'm not sure if this will help the contrast problem you mentioned though.

OR, you can try downconverting straight from the camera. (I haven't had any successs yet doing this, Vegas capture starts and stops immediately, but I must have a camera setting wrong somewhere.)
farss wrote on 3/5/2005, 5:56 PM
I've had no problems using the HDV deck to do the downconvert, results look pretty good although I'm told Vegas can pull off a better downconvert.
Problem in this case is gallois wants to zoom in on the image so for best results he should do this at original res and then downconvert.
gallois wrote on 3/6/2005, 1:53 AM
"Are you going from the CF DI avi or the original m2t camera file."

I've actually tried both, converting the m2t file to CFHD with the HDlink program (from the CineForm website), as well as just using the convert on the fly mode straight out of the camera. I figured downconverting from the CFHD file would give me the best resolution, with the exception of the forementioned artifacts. I'm currently testing the Sony camera for possible use in the field, but since it would have to provide both HD and SD footage the results aren't looking very useful right now. The cpu's I'm using are all 3GHz so that shouldn't be a problem.

From reading other posts it seems that people are getting useable results but I haven't been happy with what I've gotten and I'm not sure if it's the result of faulty decoding or something else.
farss wrote on 3/6/2005, 3:40 AM
Coming from the CF DI you might get better results turning on Reduce Interlace Flicker on the clips on the T/L.
I've managed to get some pretty good stuff downconverted to SD DVD however it really does depend on many factors, the total amount of motion in the frame is perhaps the most important.
mdopp wrote on 3/6/2005, 4:46 AM
Please use the ColorCorrector-filter with ComputerRGBtoStudioRGB setting. That will make your high contrast problem disappear.
gallois wrote on 3/7/2005, 12:35 PM
Wow, I turned on the "rgb computer to rgb studio" preference in the timeline and the quality of the output looks amazing!! Also I found out that somebody had reconfigured the preset mode in the camera to include all the "film-like" functions which was causing some weird render artifacts, most notably in problems with the apparent frame rate as it emulated 24fps.

Thanks for the tip.