Vegas applies the internal SoFo DV-codec, what is one of the best in the market - so from that side no reason to use another one. However, you can do so, but have to deactive the SoFo codec then.

The mainconcept thing mentioned earlier is the encoder, but not the DV-codec.

Hi there,

I am quite perplexed as to some ppl suggesting that the SoFo DV codec is better than the Mainconcept one...isnt it generally accepted that the code is the same thing, just essentially renamed? Ive seen that in several posts...why not do what i did to test...render a big 1hr or longer file to mainconcept and then to Sofo...EXACTLY the same filesize, EXACTLY the same length of time to process, and i looked pretty closely on a large screen, EXACTLY the same looking to me...Huffy obviously looks different to me, and its obviously a different animal with filesizes and render times, i just dont get how the SoFo DV codec and the Mainconcept code/algorithm can be that different based on these results....what are the chances of completely different code performing identically? they cant be THAT different in this case...

Blackout

Blackout, any DV codec is going to produce a DV file. The DV format is relatively fixed so any similar length of material will produce a similar file size. The amount of work required to compress to DV is going to be near identical with any codec so the encoding time should be similar too (as long as the software is well-written, of course). Huffyuv is a radically different format so the file size and processing time should be different.

Where DV codecs differ is in the choices they make for encoding the video with as little loss or alteration as possible. It's easy to compress to DV. It's not easy to compress to DV well. A poorly encoded DV video is going to take the same number of bytes as one encoded well; it just consists of poorly chosen bytes. This is where the SonicFoundry DV codec excels. It's not faster or more effiecient that others, but it chooses the compressed bytes better so that when uncompressed the result is as close to the original as possible.

I'll hasten to add that i'm not suggesting that the MainConcept DV codec is poor. It's actually quite good and compares well to SonicFoundry's. There are some very poor ones out there though.

I think this came up before and got pushed down before anyone answered.

I know there is a default DV template, and the MC DV template. Is the SoFo DV encoder different than the one used by the default template, and if so, HOW do you access it?

I've been happy with the MC encoder (one used by the NTSC template) and so I haven't used the SoFo version, so how do I get to it or are we just talking about the same thing with different names, which is further confusing because there is also a MC encoder you can purchase outright, which is similar but also not the same one that's packaged with Vegas. Who wants to straighten this out?

I have been using the Main Concept DV codec because I have been using Premiere and by default that uses the MS DV wrapper. Force of habit has me still rendering out as Main Concept DV. The main thing now is that while you can render out 23.976/24 with the main concept codec I have found out that the only 23.976/24p dv files that will play back in VV vidCap module are ones written with the VV DV codec. It seems there is something in the header that only files created on the Panasonic DVX100 or rendered with VV 4.0b have. While I can not see (have not seen), yet, the actual quality differences between VV and MC it seems if you want to do 24p and have the correct (?) headers you need to use the VV DV codec.

The Main Concept DV codec and the Sonic Foundry DV codec are two completely different pieces of code. Sonic Foundry wrote their DV codec "in house" from scratch. Where the confusion arises is that Sonic Foundry does use the Main Concept MPEG1/2 codec, but SoFo's DV codec is their own.

I have tested a LOT of DV codecs for image quality over the last couple of years and SoFo's DV codec is probably the best looking one I have tested yet. It is measurably better than the Main Concept DV codec.

John

"we intend to be capturing from various sources inc. DV, beta sp, digi, 24p etc, and then also out putting back to tape at the best possible quality."

Might want to check out DV.com etc. for some of the more recent stuff available in the way of tape decks/formats and so on (more then just a codec, have to have something to put it on, record to). While the std DV format is cool, you do loose some of your data doing the conversion, & this can cause headaches. Several manufacturers are working, coming out with alternatives that are much less expensive then in the past - might even justify it (depending on your shop) by gaining some HD capabilities.