Rendering

GrizzlyIke wrote on 2/23/2015, 1:59 PM
I rendered a video of my grandaughter's dance competion - what a mess!
Can anybody tell me where I can find out what all the templates mean and which ones produce the best results? I rendered once as an .mpg and again as HD wmv.
In both cases everything was out of focus. In the wmv, the dancers were just blurs running around. The titles where blury and not solid color. In the .veg fiie everything is great and the lettering is crystal clear and solid. By the way, I moved the preview screen to my second monitor and enlarged it so the picture fills about 1/3+ of the screen, so I don't think size is the real issue. Right now I can't pass the video on - its too embarassing. Thanks for you help.

Comments

SecondWind-SK wrote on 2/23/2015, 3:55 PM
You may have selected a very low bit rate. Since you chose Windows Media Video I assume you will share your video with others to play on a computer. If your original footage is HD try the WMV template for "8Mbps HD 1080-30P. I would be a good idea to set the loop region, the little yellow triangle in the upper left corner of the time line, to a small portion of your video, maybe a minute or less that contains some text and some of the program material. That way your render will not take very long. You can check results quickly. Then try a test with Main Concept AVC/AAC using the Apple iPad/iPhone 4 720p30 Video template. This will result in a file about 1/4 the file size but still look reasonable good. The bit rate is a good indicator of picture quality: higher is better, lower helps reduce file sizes. Experiment. If you still don't get satisfactory results, post the original footage file type from your camera, That will help you get advice on a suitable render template.
Arthur.S wrote on 2/23/2015, 5:18 PM
Do you know what format your video was originally? .mpg. .avi. avchd, etc etc...
johnmeyer wrote on 2/23/2015, 6:44 PM
1. What was the resolution of your original video? 1920x1080? 720x480? Something else

2. Are you planning to email the video to your family? Are you trying to put it on DVD? Are you going to put it on a Blu-Ray disc? Are you going to put it on a memory stick and mail it to them?

Answers to these questions will change the answer to your question.

I'll go ahead and make an assumption to each of these in order to give you something. I'll assume that your video was 1920x1080 (fairly standard, modern HD resolution). I'll further assume that you are either going to email it to them, or put it on a memory stick, and they'll then play it on their computer.

If you are going to email it, upload it, or put it on a memory stick, I'd recommend using either the MainConcept or Sony AVC/MP4 codecs. Pick a template that has a "=" in front of it, and then, before rendering, click on the Custom button in the Render As dialog, and make sure the "Average Bitrate" is at least 10,000,000 bps.
GrizzlyIke wrote on 2/25/2015, 4:12 PM
First, thanks to you all for your speedy responses and for helping me solve my rendering problem. Solved, but I’m not sure why from the technical standpoint.

The dance competition video I’m working with was captured from an internet website (not my camcorder) using WM Recorder/Video Clone. The file I ended up with had the following characteristics:
Format: .wmv Size: 71.4 Mb Frame: 1200x672 Bitrate: 3192 kbps Frame Rate: 20 f/sec

I moved the file into Vegas Pro 13, added a credit scroll followed two text titles at the front and a credit scroll at the end. I could not render this as a Windows Media Video file. I tried three different options. At the end of the first scroll I got a Vegas error message. If I removed the scroll, the message popped up at the end of the titles.

I went to the Main Concept AVC/AAC and rendered using the Apple iPad/iPhone 4 720p30 Video template recommended by SecondWind-SK. Voila! A tack sharp full-screen video with the following characteristic:
Format: .mp4 Size: 80.1 Mb Frame: 1280x720 Bitrate: 2956k bps Frame Rate: 20 f/sec

Just for the heck of it I rendered again using the Sony Tablet template. Another tack sharp video but a rather large file:
Format: .mp4 Size: 445 Mb Frame: 1920x1080 Bitrate: 16454 kbps Frame Rate: 20 f/sec

I then used WM Converter Lite to convert the original .wmv dance file to .mpg. This yielded slightly different characteristics:
Format: .mpg Size: 72.5 Mb Frame: 1200x672 Bitrate: 2913 kbps Frame Rate: 25 f/sec
Rendering this file (I added a title event to the front) using a Windows Media Video template produced a nice sharp full-screen video.
Format: .wmv Size: 144 Mb Frame: 1280x720 Bitrate: 6291 kbps Frame Rate: 29 f/sec

Is there anywhere one can learn all about the different templates and the advantages and disadvantages of each? For example if a captured file is .wmv, am I better off leaving it as is and rendering to .mp4 using a template I know will work, or should I convert to .mpg and render to .wmv?

Again thanks for your help. I hope you’ll find my above ramblings interesting if not helpful.