State of HD/Blu-Ray encoding within Vegas

AtomicGreymon wrote on 10/17/2008, 8:50 PM

First off, I'd just like to say this isn't yet another "complaining" thread. On the whole, I've been very happy with Vegas since I started using it late last year (w/ VP8). I haven't really encountered any of the bugs people here report, maybe because up 'til now I've been working mainly with SD material and the majority of the glitches seem to be with AVCHD (think I'll avoid this one in favour of HDV, and hopefully AVC-Intra in the future when it's affordable, lol).

Anyway, I have been looking more into starting to edit HD recently, and part of that has been examining how Vegas is as far as encoding content for delivery on Blu-Ray, or just as files/etc.

As far as I can tell, the only real solution in Vegas at the moment for all-around encoding to Blu-Ray is the MainConcept MPEG-2 plug-in. While it does seem to give me good results when I go in and fiddle with the default profiles, I'd really prefer using H.264/AVC; as that seems to be the codec of choice for pretty much all commercial Blu-Ray discs.

I realize the Sony AVC option is there, but it seems limited in the extreme. Although you can create an m2ts file using it, selecting this apparently limits your choice of framerate to 29.970 or 25.000 (what if I wanted 23.976, which I did the last time I tried using it? If you output as an MP4, it seems to be possible, but why can't you have a m2ts with that framerate?... will BD authoring programs accept an MP4 file and wrap in a transport stream themselves?). The MPEG-2 plug-in, at least, has a 24p option in the HD profiles. Admittedly, you seem to be able to get all the options if you go with an *.avc file, but I'm not sure what I'm supposed to do with that type of file. Will DVDA, or Encore accept it? Even then, though, the Sony AVC codec seems to give less-than-stellar results; in fact I think I prefer the MainConcept MPEG-2 HD encodes.

I'd hoped the Mainconcept AVC plug-in would have more options, akin to its MPEG-2 predecessor; however the one included with Vegas is even more limited than the Sony AVC plug-in... lacking even the system tab so you can choose to create a transport stream instead of an *.mp4 file.

And then there's VC-1. I'd still rather use AVC, but I'd also probably choose VC-1 before MPEG-2. The Blu-Ray standard allows for VC-1 encoded material in an m2ts wrapper; yet I don't see this option in Vegas, and I'm not sure why. Correct me if I'm wrong, but VC-1 is essentially just WMV9 Advanced Profile; and Vegas seems to have an excellent implementation of this built-in. It seems to have a full range of framerate choice (or you can type in your own), all the way up to 1920x1080. And the quality seems to be impressive, from the few tests I've done so far.

So why don't we have the option in Vegas to wrap the WMV-encoded video in an m2ts, as the standard allows, to create a Blu-Ray compatible file?

Anyway, hopefully some of you with more experience in working with/encoding HD material in Vegas can point out some things I've missed. But I think I'd be satisfied with VP9 if all they did was remove the bugs people have been complaining about here, and improved our encoding options for HD material on Blu-Ray. We need a more fully-featured AVC plug-in from MainConcept that can create m2ts files, and the WMV9 encoder should be given the ability to do m2ts, as well.

Comments

blink3times wrote on 10/17/2008, 10:38 PM

I hear ya.

It's only partially Vegas's fault though. The truth of the matter is that the AVC/VC1 encoders out for public use just aren't that great yet. AVC has a max bit rate (for our use) of something 17 or 18m.... even though canon cams are now coming out at 24m you still can't author or burn at that rate. MPEG2 on the other hand can go 35m and beyond.... and at 35m it's just plain better. So for the time being you're better off sticking with mpeg2

The problem I find is within DVDa. As soon as you start customizing the blu ray templates too much, (or in other words break away from the standard slightly) DVDa wants to recompress everything. I can't for example burn a disk at 28m cbr without dvda wanting to recompress.

Soooo.... my present work around for maximum flexibility (which I need because I rarely burn at anything less than 28m cbr) is to export my work as M2V and a separate AC3 audio file. I will then import that to TSmuxeR (free download), and mux the audio/video over to a M2TS which I will then import to Ulead DVD Movie Factory. This will not recompress your work so long as the project settings match the project. I will then add the motion menus/chapters and such and burn.

Ulead will not however burn 24p or anything of that nature so when I have this kind of project then I have no choice but conform to DVDa demands.... either that or have my work recompressed :(

I've just recently been looking at DVDit Pro HD (from Roxio) as a better suited work around for all of this... but they want $500 for it and there is no trial (a lot of money to pay without a trial IMO). It's supposed to be pretty good though from what I have heard.

AtomicGreymon wrote on 10/17/2008, 11:09 PM

I've looked at DVDit Pro HD before, and it looks like a pretty good program. However, I've also got Encore CS3 (hopefully CS4 in the next week or two), and that has pretty good DVD/Blu-Ray burning features itself. Admittedly, I haven't tried importing any of the HD MPEG-2 m2ts encodes that I've done in Vegas, but Encore never had a problem with any of my customized SD MPEG-2 encodes... I never stuck with the default profiles for that, either.

DVDit Pro HD only seems to have MPEG-2 encoding, like Vegas. I assume the VC-1 and AVC pass-through means it'll accept already-encoded content without re-encoding; but it doesn't contain encoders for either format itself.

I'm still hoping that Vegas Pro 9 will incorporate a better version of the Mainconcept AVC encoder... the full version is sitting on the MC site for all to see; it obviously exists. We can only hope that Sony recognizes the importance of providing a decent AVC solution, now that HD is really starting to take off. According to the MC site, their MPEG-2 encoder price isn't much off the (non-pro; but even that makes transport streams) AVC one... so maybe they should try licensing it for use in Vegas the same way the did for the MPEG-2 one. It would be a worthwhile addition.

With AVC, we could probably do without VC-1... though I'm still not sure how the WMV9 Advanced Profile solution available within VP8 *isn't* VC-1 already aside from the lack of a m2ts wrapper and maybe some flags, I dunno.

Terje wrote on 10/17/2008, 11:51 PM

However, I've also got Encore CS3

I'd just stick with CS3 and CS4 when it comes out. It should be fairly clear to anyone by now that SCS has no interest whatsoever in Blu-Ray and couldn't give a rats azz about people who'd like to deliver content on this format. Given the support in Sony for this format, I find this utterly unbelievable, but there you go: SCS doesn't really want to support the format and their kicking and screaming is currently overpowering our ability to drag.

AtomicGreymon wrote on 10/18/2008, 12:01 AM

Well, it's hard to believe they don't care at all; Sony was one of the main contributors behind developing, and marketing Blu-Ray in the first place.

It's true there doesn't seem to be much anyone can do about VP8, however when it came out Blu-Ray didn't have nearly the acceptance it does now... burners were 2 or 3x what you can get one for currently, and BD-R/RE blanks so expensive it didn't make any sense to buy them in the first place.

Those things have all changed, though, and let's hope once Sony sees what Adobe and others are doing in terms of Blu-Ray format support, they'll follow suit. I'm willing to give them the benefit of one more version to provide better BD encoding options. x264 implements the most AVC options of any encoder software, I believe, and it doesn't even cost anything. And the implementation of AVC within Nero gives pretty good quality for a reasonable price. It shouldn't be out of the question for VP9 to provide a decent AVC solution with all the necessary options.

farss wrote on 10/18/2008, 12:37 AM

Sony / SCS do have BD authoring solutions apart from DVDA.

Bob.

AtomicGreymon wrote on 10/18/2008, 12:44 AM

Sony / SCS do have BD authoring solutions apart from DVDA.

Yes, true enough, lol; but not exactly affordable for an individual (most individuals, anyway). My post wasn't really about how well or poorly DVDA authors Blu-Ray, though. I don't have a problem with the software, in that respect. With DVDA5 and Encore, I can author pretty much any kind of disc I want.

But as far as Vegas goes, I'm limited to MPEG-2, which is what I was trying to address with my initial post. AVC seems to be the format of choice for Blu-Ray; Vegas 9 should have a proper AVC solution.

DVDA is a fine commercial version of Blu-Print... it's a commercial equivalent of that new Blu-Code thing that I'd like SCS to stick in Vegas.

farss wrote on 10/18/2008, 3:54 AM

Just a wild guess but the issue could have something to do with licencing. The mpeg-2 codec seems to be on a sort of per unit basis, I think. So if you replicate a few 1,000 SD DVDs the owners of the mpeg-2 IP get a fee for each copy. I don't know if that kind of deal exists for AVCHD. I believe it does for VC-1, pretty certain I recall M$ saying way back that was something in favour of VC-1, a simpler licencing scheme.
I could have this somewhat wrong but you could check some of it out at MPEG LA. Just checking now I see that VC-1 isn't just the property of Microsoft.

On a slightly different slant DVDA will not let you use mp3 audio, I believe that also could be a licencing issue. The mp3 codec included with Vegas does not cover distribution, well not last time I checked.

Bob.

craftech wrote on 10/18/2008, 7:09 AM

Where are your customers for Blu-Ray discs coming from? I have yet to have a single customer ask me for a Blu-Ray version of anything?

John

AtomicGreymon wrote on 10/18/2008, 2:38 PM

No customers for this; mostly it's just stuff I'd like to do for myself.

john-beale wrote on 10/18/2008, 3:55 PM

So far I've had no requests for Blu-Ray either. Two customers have requested the raw HDV files, either on DVD-R or just transferred to a USB hard drive.

craftech wrote on 10/18/2008, 4:16 PM

I ask these questions in response to the truly obnoxious dialogue from the Blu-Ray drones a year ago on this forum. Hindsite should dictate that it wasn't worth the personal attacks over a stupid issue whose answer should have been obvious to anyone thinking past their flames.
None of this lack of interest came as any surprise to me, but Blu-Ray "won" and the predictable happened. Customers didn't cheer.
I mean, I'm game if any customers start asking for Blu-Ray versions, but no one has. Healthy format and price competition for Hi-Def was apparently out of the question" so one "winner" was all that some of these people could imagine.

Thus Blu-Ray "won the war" and no one showed up for the victory celebration.

Oh well the holidays are just around the corner and people will flock to Blu-Ray - you just watch.

John

blink3times wrote on 10/18/2008, 4:37 PM

LOL.

Well I hate to re-hash this mess, but personally speaking I think the wonderful world of hi def would have been further ahead now if HD DVD won... the prices were certainly hitting near the right ball park. You do notice BTW how the prices have not dropped much since HD DVD's demise ;)

I will say though that burning REAL hd dvd's was still very much in the dark which really put a question mark on hi def from our perspective.

But having used Blu Ray for a while now, I'm just as content... and burning hi quality disks was what I was really interested in... which I can do now. The question is whether or not interest will pick up because if it doesn't then I can see myself having to transcode my Blu Ray disks over to something as I have had to do with my HD DVD disks.

Having said all of that.... Iron Man on Blu reportedly took 20% away from DVD. Now this was reported early in the game... we'll see where the numbers are in another couple of months.

But I wouldn't expect too much from Blu at Christmas.... not in this economy anyway.

AtomicGreymon wrote on 10/18/2008, 4:53 PM

Having said all of that.... Iron Man on Blu reportedly took 20% away from DVD. Now this was reported early in the game... we'll see where the numbers are in another couple of months.

That wouldn't surprise me. Iron Man was my first purchase on Blu-Ray (along with the 5-disc Bladerunner set). And I'm sure that the release of WALL•E next month will also see pretty good sales on BD.

Anyway, this debate aside, I just hope VP9 includes a better AVC encoding solution than the 2 currently available codecs; both of which are extremely limited. I'll also have to explore CS4's HD encoding options when I get it, though; I'm hoping next week or the week after.

Just a wild guess but the issue could have something to do with licencing. The mpeg-2 codec seems to be on a sort of per unit basis, I think. So if you replicate a few 1,000 SD DVDs the owners of the mpeg-2 IP get a fee for each copy. I don't know if that kind of deal exists for AVCHD. I believe it does for VC-1, pretty certain I recall M$ saying way back that was something in favour of VC-1, a simpler licencing scheme.

Isn't this more of an issue to be dealt with at the replication stage, though; not when you're authoring the disc in DVDA, Encore, DVDit Pro HD, or whatever other program you may be using. Whatever royalty you need to pay per unit replicated for the use of AVC or VC-1 instead of MPEG-2 shouldn't impact whether Vegas gives you the choice to use them or not.

farss wrote on 10/18/2008, 9:57 PM

"Isn't this more of an issue to be dealt with at the replication stage, though; not when you're authoring the disc in DVDA, Encore, DVDit Pro HD, or whatever other program you may be using. Whatever royalty you need to pay per unit replicated for the use of AVC or VC-1 instead of MPEG-2 shouldn't impact whether Vegas gives you the choice to use them or not. "

It'll have everything to do with what the licences that SCS has negotiated on our behalf cover. I'd seriously doubt that the programmers did extra work to limit the numbers we can type into a dialogue box just for fun, there has to be a reason and a good one at that. I can't say for certain but licencing is the most obvious one.

As I said, for SD DVDs the owners of the IP don't seem to care much. They get a one off payment for each copy of Vegas sold via the MC codec licence. If we burn 10 or 100 DVDs the fee is so low it's just not worth the hassle of them chasing the few cents. If you replicate then they do get some money via bulk licences that the replication houses buy. That's for SD DVDs.

This could well be totally different for the BD codecs. The IP owners could and in fact do seem to have a multi tiered licencing system dependant on what you're using the codec for. No doubt though offer them enough money and they'll let you have what you want.

Hyperthetical scenario but not an unlikley one. Maybe they want $10 per copy of Vegas for what licences you get now. Perhaps for what you're asking for they wanted $500. How many Vegas users would happily pay an extra $500 for a Vegas upgrade to get that, not many at all I'd suspect.

Bob.

Coursedesign wrote on 10/18/2008, 10:37 PM

The way Blu-Ray is handled by Sony (not SCS) is 100% Sales Prevention.

Accountant types in charge of maximizing revenues.

Increase the selling price = increase the revenues, simple math.

Of course the one assumption they are leaning on is well tested by many many former companies worldwide.

And a few that saw the problem in time and reversed course.

I doubt that will happen here, it seems too ingrained.

Then the next technology will pop up, with a higher capacity, less expensive media, and a simpler licensing scheme, perhaps even open source.

And BD will be mentioned in a footnote in the history of video formats, with a memorial to the accountants who buried it.

AtomicGreymon wrote on 10/18/2008, 11:13 PM

It'll have everything to do with what the licences that SCS has negotiated on our behalf cover. I'd seriously doubt that the programmers did extra work to limit the numbers we can type into a dialogue box just for fun, there has to be a reason and a good one at that. I can't say for certain but licencing is the most obvious one.

I do imagine there's a reason for everything they do; but I have no clue what it would be for allowing 29.970 and 25.000 framerate AVC m2ts files and not 23.976. I don't see how licensing could have much to do with framerate.

Hyperthetical scenario but not an unlikley one. Maybe they want $10 per copy of Vegas for what licences you get now. Perhaps for what you're asking for they wanted $500. How many Vegas users would happily pay an extra $500 for a Vegas upgrade to get that, not many at all I'd suspect.

You can get Mainconcept's standalone AVC encoder for around that price; which is a solution I may eventually have to take, if VP9 doesn't offer something better than 8.0. It'll be useful seeing what Adobe's CS4 apps offer in terms of AVC encoding; that at least might give SCS some indication of what they should be offering in VP9.

All I'm really interested in as a proper AVC version of the MC MPEG-2 encoder we have now, with the system tab intact. I might not be willing to pay $500, but I'd probably be willing to go an extra $100 or $150. Failling that, I suppose x264 is always free, and quite good from what I've read.

johnmeyer wrote on 10/19/2008, 9:40 AM

This seems like a rehash of past threads. The pros and cons of Blu-Ray vs. HD DVD or against some hypothetical future generic HD technology from China or elsewhere really doesn't get to the real reason for the slow adoption. A lot of us predicted this, long before the HD vs. Blu-Ray fight was over.

The problem wasn't the standards fight, or the relative merits of one vs. the other, but instead the slow adoption is due to the following:

Relatively small advantage compare to previous format changes.

When we went from 78 to 33 1/3 rpm records, the adoption was swift because the improvement was dramatic. Same thing happened going from LP records to CDs where the sound improvement was only part of the deal, and lack of wear, instant access to tracks, size/storage, and many other factors made the improvement irresistible.

When we went from VHS to DVD, we had a similar plethora of reasons to change, including fantastic quality improvement, instant access to video via chapters, subtitles, multiple audio tracks, angles, digital multi-track sound, and many more. It was a no-brainer and was one of the most successful consumer product introductions in history.

By contrast, with Blu-Ray (and HD-DVD), all we get is a better picture. This might be good enough, but the retailers have done a TERRIBLE job showing off that difference. Much of what you see in showrooms is up-res'd DVD or 720p coming off satellite. In those cases where Blu-Ray is shown directly, it is often shown by itself, and not in comparison to the earlier technology.

I finally saw a Blu-Ray comparison disc at Costco a few days ago, where the left side of the screen showed the DVD resolution and the right side showed Blu-Ray. It was the least inspirational demo I've ever seen. Except for a few scenes, the differences really weren't all that apparent.

It was not compelling.

We are about to have the forced changeover to digital broadcast in this country. All that will do is make a lot of low-income people very angry when their TV sets no longer function. All those who have cable and satellite will not be affected. I have DirecTV, with a 10-year-old satellite dish, and I haven't seen one single change to my SD broadcast package. I still get mostly 4:3 material in SD, and it is clear that DirecTV is in no hurry to abandon the SD customer base.

P.S. I've been predicting this for several years. It has been 2.5 years since HD players started shipping, and they still aren't a big deal. Here's my original prediction:

This is from exactly two years ago: HDDVD and BluRay are getting nervous? (from March 14, 2006)

[2nd edit]Check this other post out: Mixing Camera Types; Future (from March 27, 2006)

AtomicGreymon wrote on 10/19/2008, 9:54 AM

lol, my original intent with this thread wasn't to discuss HD-DVD vs. Blu-Ray (not sure how that got started), but the ability of Vegas/DVDA to encode the formats used on BD (or HD-DVD, I guess, as they both use the exact same codecs anyway).

I finally saw a Blu-Ray comparison disc at Costco a few days ago, where the left side of the screen showed the DVD resolution and the right side showed Blu-Ray. It was the least inspirational demo I've ever seen. Except for a few scenes, the differences really weren't all that apparent.

I dunno; even on my 22" CRT moitor (normally at 2048x1536,but I go down to 1920x1440 to play a Blu-Ray), the difference is pretty noticeable. On the low-end HDTVs, sold these days for anywhere up to $1000; and the non-1080p models, it's true you can't take full advantage of Blu-Ray. But on one of good 1080p sets, preferably a 120Hz model, it can be a pretty stark contrast. I'm not planning on paying for non-1080p HD cable until it's so standard that it's the same as SD (I only watch 1.5-2 hours of cable a week, anyway; most of what I watch is coming off discs), but Blu-Ray seems to be worth the minor increase in cost relative to DVD.

At the moment the only Blu-Ray titles I have are Iron Man and Bladerunner, but both those benefit quite a bit from Blu-Ray.

craftech wrote on 10/19/2008, 1:14 PM

The problem wasn't the standards fight, or the relative merits of one vs. the other, but instead the slow adoption is due to the following:

Relatively small advantage compare to previous format changes.
=================
Relatively small advantage compare to previous format changes......at a higher overall cost that hasn't abated much.

John

bsuratt wrote on 10/19/2008, 2:12 PM

You can add the AC3 audio file directly in MovieFactory by selecting "edit" and add the audio file in that function. MF will do the MUX and save you a step.

johnmeyer wrote on 10/19/2008, 2:12 PM

blink3times wrote on 10/19/2008, 3:17 PM

"You can add the AC3 audio file directly in MovieFactory by selecting "edit" and add the audio file in that function. MF will do the MUX and save you a step."

Yes... but then you will find that the entire video re-encodes. You're much better off to mux the M2V and AC3 in TSmuxer first... THEN import to MF. This way there is no re-encoding.

bsuratt wrote on 10/19/2008, 6:18 PM

My experience has been that only the audio is muxed... not a re-encode of the video.

AtomicGreymon wrote on 10/19/2008, 6:31 PM

I didn't mean that the resolution advantages of Blu-Ray vs. DVD cannot be significant. Instead, I was only trying to state that most demonstrations that people see in the stores, and most installations in people's homes don't give the viewer a chance to see what Blu-Ray and real HD can look like.

Yeah, that much is true. Most chain stores like Best Buy, or Future Shop do a poor job of demonstration. And a great many people don't seem to be truly interested in picture quality; just the status symbol of having a massive TV. As a result, they usually end up with a mediocre TV and pay ludicrous prices for monster cables. It's unfortunate, but just because the market is flooded with indiscriminate consumers doesn't stop me from setting up a decent HD system, and playing Blu-Ray properly, on a good TV, in my own home. Whether or not other people do the same doesn't really interest me.

When you add to that the fact that Blu-Ray looks like just another round shiny disc and doesn't have any other major advantages to the viewer/customer, it therefore doesn't make people feel like it is a "gotta have" purchase.

Well, maybe it would've been cooler-looking if Blu-Ray had in fact been some kind of cube with weird holographic patterns flashing inside... but then that would've made backwards compatibility even more difficult, lol.

But the topper is what others have said in many other posts: most of the "advantages" in Blu-Ray are advantages for the big media companies in the form of controlling how content can be used, by whom, under what circumstances, etc. It is the same thing that makes Vista such an unattractive proposition for so many people. If I buy content and want to watch it on my iPod instead of my big-screen TV, I should be able to do that, but I can't with modern DRM-restricted media.

True. All the additional protections on Blu-Ray is a disadvantage; HD-DVD didn't even have AACS as manadatory. However, AnyDVD HD will remove all the encryption, and even allow you to rip and re-encode for iPod if you really want to wait the amount of time it would take to convert 2 hours of H.264 HD footage down to something the iPod can play.