Mercalli SA 3.0 - Well: 9.3 outta 10!

Grazie wrote on 4/17/2013, 1:00 PM

OK:

PROS

1] Much cleaner and workmanlike GUI. It has truly grown-up.

2] The Timeline is now very similar to an NLE Timeline. Much finer and pro graphics.

3] I can type in a T/C window to have the Cursor jump position. Using my Mouse Wheel I can micro adjust through frames. I don't see any of this in 2.1.

4] The Trim-down sliders are now silky smooth. Not so in 2.1 .

5] Batch Processing is a doddle.

6] Workspace adjustment has, again, become more adult.

7] The T/C is now correctly placed WITH the Timeline

CONS

1] I don't see any option other than MP4 as an output. Discuss? Merc 2.1 gives me several output options

2] No hint of this as a Plug for Vegas.

Conclusion: For me, very much worth the Upgrade "offer" having skilled myself up through Merc. If the NAB discount can be used for the actual product, as a new user, it would be near the mark too.

OK, I'm starting to think about never having to stabilize within Vegas. This has advantages and disadvantages. It might just make me better organised and more constructive and logical in the auditioning of my clips. Only time will tell. Maybe, just maybe, stabilizing in VP12 and onwards, could be asking to much.

Woah!. . . . NOW . . If there was a "port-out-from-Vegas" option into Merc 3 SA.... pphorrr! A bit like we do with Audio out to "an audio editor", but here for Video?

Cheers

Grazie

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Comments

Grazie wrote on 4/18/2013, 6:04 AM

Needing to update you guys, I have reported this to Customer Services in Germany and posted my comments to the US on the proDAD Facebook channel.

I'm sure proDAD will come through for us.

MOV media is fairly ubiquitous. Canon uses this format and it is also being an iUbi media of choice, I'm guessing the proDAD-iers are on the case for a resolution as we speak/write . . . . .

Otherwise, I was using Merc 3 again today and it is so much a walk in the park!

Cheers

Grazie

Laurence wrote on 4/18/2013, 7:06 AM

Mercalli is one of those products like Neat Video or iZotope RX that absolutely fills a need and is essential to my workflow.

I have a directory full of family vacation footage of a trip to Sicily that I shot last summer. Since it was just a vacation and not work, I didn't bring a tripod and it is all completely handheld. It's all very pretty, but also very shaky. Yes I could put all the clips on a Vegas timeline and stabilize them one by one, but that would be time consuming and I don't any particular project that I want them to go in. Batch stabilizing them is so much more practical. As I look at the corrected clips, aside from the desaturation issue, they look simply wonderful. There is just the slightest amount of zoom and the resolution loss that accompanies it, far less than say the downrez to 720p that you would do to put something on Vimeo or Youtube.

The Mercalli 3 SAL batch stabilize has taken me from "Duh, why didn't I bring a tripod with me on that vacation? Idiot!" To "Wow this looks great! I should shoot handheld more often!"

Grazie wrote on 4/18/2013, 8:23 AM

Exactly L. Exactly . . . . .

G

Byron K wrote on 4/18/2013, 6:45 PM

>Reply by: Laurence
>Date: 4/18/2013 2:06:06 AM

>Mercalli is one of those products like Neat Video or iZotope RX that absolutely fills a need and is essential to my workflow.

+1
Since at least 50-60% of the footage I deal w/ is from friends and family these tools are essential to me as well. Another tool that's getting more and more use is NB ColorFast.

The best request yet was my dad shot himself and my uncle (his brother) on the couch talking about old times. His camera was on a tripod but set too low and cut off half their heads. He asked me if I could work my "magic" and fix this, I had to smile and say I can do a lot of things, but can't perform miracles! ((;

I also want to confirm that there is a Computer to Studio RGB Level shift in the output. Placing the stabilized footage on the VPro timeline and applying the Studio to Computer RGB Levels FX bring the colors back. I've inquired w/ ProDad re: this and requested that there be a switch to turn off this "feature".

BTW, Has anyone figured out how to change the output format other than mp4? It seems to be working fine but I was just curious.

Laurence wrote on 4/18/2013, 8:24 PM

The trouble with putting a sRGB to cRGB color correction filter in to bring the saturation back is that this double conversion is done in 8 bits and is bound to add subtle banding to any gradients. It's definitely a case of ProDAD misreading the output levels that the Apple supplied Quicktime routines that all programs that access Quicktime formats use.

Can anyone else confirm the 30p wrapped as 60i AVCHD bug? I'm quite certain of this, but it always helps having someone else corroborate.

Grazie wrote on 4/19/2013, 1:37 AM

"The trouble with putting a sRGB to cRGB color correction filter in to bring the saturation back is that this double conversion is done in 8 bits and is bound to add subtle banding to any gradients. "

I'm sure you are correct with the double wammy, that would result from this. However, the REAL trouble is that proDAD needs to recognise, communicate that this is serious and put QUICKLY put it right.

Here are my points:

1] The Merc Plug within Vegas 12 WORKS with MOV. There is NO clamping of the saturation.

2] MOV is everywhere - surely proDAD need to Q&A the stuff that's now being processed everywhere.

Is it at all possible that the MP4 rendering template (I really don't know what else to call it?) that has been chosen by proDAD for us to use, is not the most appropriate for us to use on this MOV > MP4 output? And that proDAD hadn't had the opportunity to observe this through development through to completion?

Cheers

Grazie

Grazie wrote on 4/19/2013, 3:53 AM

UPDATE:

All of the evidential material, screengrabs, videos and scope outputs, have been logged by proDAD Worldwide, AND, I've been told, has been forwarded by that department to proDAD's engineering department.

Cheers

Grazie

Laurence wrote on 4/19/2013, 10:16 AM

I just responded to an email from ProDAD tech support so I am optimistic about this being fixed!

On a related note, Mercalli SAL v2 does not desaturate .MOV video. Input and output colors look the same.

Also, with Mercalli SAL v2, you can specify the interlace format of a clip. It will do it automatically, but if auto gets it wrong, you can manually set that the clip is interlaced and specify the field order.

Mercalli SAL v2 also lets you specify the output codec (a feature that has been left out of the latest generation of ProDAD products). Boy do I wish they would put that back in. The mp4 format they use looks very good, but I don't believe it will hold up after multiple generations like Cineform would.

Output quality of v2 and v3 looks about the same, but v3 adds that oh so important batch stabilize feature.

Laurence wrote on 4/19/2013, 10:45 AM

Just looking at Mercalli SAL 3.0 stabilized clips in MediaInfo:

The video (at the highest quality) is AVC compressed at just under 40Mbps. Not broadcast, but not bad.

The audio is AAC compressed at 128Kbps! Ouch!

Grazie wrote on 4/19/2013, 11:02 AM

What do you read into that Laurence?

G

Laurence wrote on 4/19/2013, 11:15 AM

I just looked at a Mercalli SAL 3 processed clip with MediaInfo. For anyone who isn't using MediaInfo, it is a wonderful free program which will tell you what is going on in the format of any video clip. You can find it here:

http://mediainfo.sourceforge.net/en

Just be sure to use the custom install so that you don't install the bloatware that supports it.

Grazie wrote on 4/19/2013, 12:01 PM

Yes, Laurence, I use it. What do you read into that? Into what you found out from MediaInfo?

G

Laurence wrote on 4/19/2013, 12:25 PM

Well the video compression is actually pretty good, but it isn't designed for multiple generations. If you look at mp4 at a high bitrate as compared to Cineform, on a single generation I can't personally see any difference. Run it through 10 more generations of the same compression and the mp4 will totally fall apart whereas the Cineform will look the same after all those generations. How does that apply here? Well, you have a generation of compression in the camera, another in Defisheyer, another in Mercalli, another in your master, another in your upload conversion, another in Youtube or Vimeo's encoder and ... you get the idea. Still, practically, 40Mbps is going to do a minimal amount of damage.

The audio is another story though. I see 128Kbps as a sort of lowest acceptable quality for end point distribution. Running your raw footage audio through this low a rate of data compression is a horrible idea. You've ruined it right at the beginning! Even for b-roll audio... I really just hate this!

Grazie wrote on 4/19/2013, 12:49 PM

Laurence thanks for the comprehensive rundown. I'm assuming proDAD will be reading this so they can a truer understanding of what is needed.

Cheers

Grazie

Laurence wrote on 4/19/2013, 1:12 PM

I had never even tried SAL v2 because I just used the Vegas plugin instead. V2 SAL is actually quite nice. You can choose your codec for both audio and video, there are no desaturation issues, and you can force the interlace settings if the auto setting misreads them. Missing is the batch functions and the ability to handle above HD resolutions.

musicvid10 wrote on 4/19/2013, 3:41 PM

Getting good AAC audio is the Achilles heel of third party encoding applications.

faac is horrible, ffmpeg and its spinoffs have their own problems, Fraunhofer is expensive, and Nero comes with licensing baggage for nonpersonal use.

Trouble is, most upstream destinations and devices won't handle MP4 with AC3, only AAC.

Laurence wrote on 4/19/2013, 3:49 PM

I can get decent results out of AAC if I bump it up all the way to 320Kbps (or however high it will let me go). 128Kbps though... no way! It sounds like crap!

skeeter123 wrote on 4/20/2013, 5:23 PM

Any news from Mercalli? I'm sure some of us would be glad to beta-test whatever they need. I'm in...

Byron K wrote on 4/20/2013, 6:57 PM

Response from Prodad Cust Serverice:

Hello,
Thanks for your request.

To your questions:
1. We work on a solution, I send a message asap. <<RE: Computer to Studio RGB color shift.
2. Mercalli 3.0 SAL has MP4 export with 3 quality settings only.

Mit freundlichen Grüßen / with kind regards

Uwe Wenz
Customer Support Manager

Grazie wrote on 4/21/2013, 12:56 AM

I really hope they ain't gonna come out with a low reso solution??

Hmmm...

Why weren't they testing for this ubiquitous MOV format to begin with? The desat clamp isn't good. The worrisome piece of evidence is that the existing Vegas 12 Mercalli Plug works. Is it at all possible that one team isn't speaking with another team? Or the Plug Team, here that would be the Sony Vegas support, have now gone? As they don't appear to be supplying a Vegas12 Plug, then that team wouldn't be needed? Not boding too well here...

Grazie

dalemccl wrote on 4/21/2013, 1:17 PM

Edit - when I posted the problem described below I was using the demo version. I have since purchased the upgrade from v2 and since entering my serial number, the problem has disappeared. It must be related to the 2 second export limitation in the demo. So if anyone else experiences this unplayable 261 byte export problem with the demo, rest assured that it does not occur after you enter a serial number.
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Has anyone tried that batch mode without doing the analysis of each video before exporting? The help screens say the new batch mode can do the analysis and export in one step, but it isn't working for me. If I analyze each video within SAL 3 and then do a batch export, it works fine. If I don't do the analysis and just let SAL 3 do the analysis and export in one step, the exported .mp4 files are all exactly 261 bytes in size and are unplayable.

Has anyone else tried this?

Tom Pauncz wrote on 4/22/2013, 10:42 AM

Facebook Alert!

Update to Mercalli V3 SAL has just been released by proDad to address the issues brought up here and elsewhere.

Tom

Laurence wrote on 4/22/2013, 10:53 AM

I saw the Facebook post but can't find the update. I redownloaded from my original email link (version 3.0.212.2) and that made no change in this problem.

Grazie wrote on 4/22/2013, 11:13 AM

Hi Tom.

Not getting any "formal" notifs?

Eyes peeled and staring!

G