Interlace noninterlace

Nikola wrote on 4/20/2012, 12:09 PM
I have read questions about problems (some fixed) producing non-interlaced content.

In the Vegas 11 engine: Is it possible to input non-interlaced material (such as a series of motion frames) and output non-interlaced material without ever going through an interlaced phase?

I am looking to upgrade from Vegas 8 to Vegas 11. In Vegas 8 when I input a series of still frames - Vegas converts the frames to an interlaced format (or it seems so).

Comments

johnmeyer wrote on 4/20/2012, 1:43 PM
Yes, Vegas lets you input either progressive or interlaced footage, and after editing, you can then render to create either progressive or interlaced output. In other words, you have four possible combinations: progressive-->progressive; progressive-->interlaced; interlaced-->interlaced; and interlaced-->progressive.

The best thing to do is nothing: just match the project properties to the input video, although even that isn't really needed. The only real "trick" is to make sure you set the field order correctly when rendering (in the "Render As" dialog).

If you ever have any question as to whether your footage is progressive or interlaced, and if you want to know the field order (for interlaced video), follow these steps:

1. Set the preview quality to "Best, Full."
2. Set the media (or event) properties to "Smart Resample" (which is the default), and make sure the field properties for the video are correct. If you don't know the field properties (which, after all is why you are doing this), then guess.
3. Open the project properties and set the frame rate to exactly double the frame rate of the video (e.g., 59.940 for 29.97 fps NTSC video). Set the field order to progressive (do this even if your source video is interlaced). Set Deinterlace Method to "none."

Using this trick, you will actually be looking at one field at a time.

Then, go to the timeline and while holding down the Alt key (so as to ensure that you only advance one frame at a time), press the right arrow key and watch the video. If the video is progressive, you should see each frame repeated (i.e., two identical frames in a row). If it is interlaced, each frame should be different (i.e., you should see movement).

If the video is interlaced, and if field order shown in the Event or Media properties is incorrect, you will not see smooth movement. Instead, the movement will progress back and forth, with a "two steps forward, one step backward" pattern. If this is the case, the field order for your media has been set incorrectly by either you or by Vegas. You need to manually change it.

Hope that helps.

TheHappyFriar wrote on 4/20/2012, 1:45 PM
The only conversion happens when previewing or rendering. IF the project is set to progressive & the render is progressive then it's progressive. Technically, the project ONLY effects the preview, you can have a progressive video marked as interlaced in the media properties, the project set to interlaced & render to progressive, it shouldn't make any changes (unless you have a deinterlace method setup). Progressive/interlaced is just something for the playback device, it doesn't change the file at all.