m4v, quicktime & VLC gamma question

Yoyodyne wrote on 2/1/2010, 3:18 PM
I'm wondering if someone could help me check my work flow.

I have to deliver a m4v file to a client.

720 30p HDV project. Right now I'm rendering out as uncompressed .avi from Vegas with the studio rgb to computer rgb gamma preset added. Then rendering to a m4v web file in Quicktime pro. Everything is working fine but I'm getting different gamma/audio sync results depending on the player.

If I play the file in quicktime, which will be the default player for most I'm guessing, the gamma looks correct but the audio sync looks a little off.

If I play back in VLC the gamma looks too dark but the audio is right on.

Should I not be adding the studio rgb to computer rgb preset to my uncompressed render? In my testing this made the file look to washed out when played in the quicktime player but right on the money in VLC.

Which player should I trust here?

Any help much appreciated!

Comments

ddm wrote on 2/1/2010, 3:36 PM
Unfortunately, I think you have to trust QT because that's what it's probably going to be viewed in. You must know how fun it is to tell many mac users to use a different program than the default program. And even if you change the parameters in OS X on their machine to launch VLC as the default program for m2v's let's say, for many file types qt still launches. You could try renaming the m2v as an mkv, that would autolaunch VLC, try it on the m2v to make sure it works on the mac.
ddm wrote on 2/1/2010, 3:40 PM
I just tried changing an mp4 to an mkv and it launches VLC in OSX, don't have any m2v's on this machine right now.