HDV project to SD DVD

[Adam Slaght]

Ok, I have searched all the HD to SD threads and am still wondering what the best choice for down-converting an HDV(1080P) project in PP CS3 to a SD DVD is. All footage was shot, captured and edited in HD. I have tried the option below with mediocre results.
1. Direct to Encore from timelime settings, NTSC Widescreen High Quality(5 on the slider), VBR 2 pass with bitrate settings 3,5,9.

The project is a spring musical(2 hours) here is my setup:
Macbook Pro 15"2.2ghz 4GB Ram, 500Gb HD

Any advice would be greatly appreciated

Thanks

[Adam Slaght]

Now bigger problem!!! I really need some help here fellas. I have dealine for this project on coming up on Friday adn I am stuck. The project I have is actually 2 PP projects that are both about an hour long that will be combined for the final DVD.

When I go to try and render one of the segmetns from HD to a SD DVD, the render locks up around 20,000 frames...everytime. I have tried exporting to encore, freezes. I have tried exporting the movie,frezes, I have tried cutting the full edited project into smaller ones(12min),frezzes.

I have tried the following settings to no avail:

Export to encore,
NTSC Widescreen High, Quality(5 on the slider), VBR 2 pass with bitrate settings 3,5,9
NTSC Widescreen Medium, Quality(3 on the slider), VBR 1 pass with bitrate settings 1.5,4,9

Export movie,
H264 codec
DV(Quality 3)


I am sure it is something I am overlooking(crosses fingers). I dont have enough time to go back and downconvert the footage in the camera and reedit. I need help ASAP.

Thank you in advance.
Adam

[Andrew Kufahl]

I'm a Vegas user, so I don't know how much help I can really be. But I hate to see someone needing help like this...

I don't know why you are freezing at 20,000 frames. But, here are some questions I have:

1. How many total frames are there?
2. How long do you wait before you consider it to be "frozen"?

In regard to your first question, could you clarify what you mean by "mediocre"? Can I assume you mean you aren't happy with the quality? If so, I've found that I don't usually like the results of VBR. From what I know about VBR versus CBR, VBR is probably a smarter way to go... but for me it usually seems to result in inconsistent quality. So, I normally go with CBR. As far as what bit rate I use... it is the familiar trade-off between quality and size. If size isn't an issue, I usually go minimally with 5. If size is an issue, I start at 5 and work my way down until the quality is unacceptable, at which point I will re-think some edits.

Sorry I can be of more help regarding the tools you are using. I hope everything works out for you.

Andrew

[Eric Addison]

Do you have any effects added to any of your clips? I've seen that error before and it was a result of using an older plug-in or filter.

Something else you could try would be creating 2 DV AVI files (one for each part), and import those into Encore and put them on the same timeline.

[Richard Wakefield]

try in PPro: 'export' - 'movie' - 'microsoft dv avi'
then use Encore afterwards

good luck!

[Adam Slaght]

Ok Andrew the total frames is 101,564. The freeze is the macbook pro screen showing the "must restart" screen. I will try CBR with the bite rate set at 5 and see if that works. Storage is not and issue, just getting the stupid thing not to freeze is my big issue right now.

Eric, there are no effects. Just straight HDV footage, front to end.

I will try the avi adn microsoft avi this morning and see if that will work. My only concern there is quality of the finsished video.

I usually just export to encore with chapter markers and done. But this is my first HD footage, HD project then downconverted to SD DVD. So far editing was fine, but major road block with this render issue.

Thanks for the help so far, hopefully it works itself out this morning.

[Greg Clark]

Originally Posted by Adam Slaght

llas. I have dealine for this project on coming up on Friday adn I am stuck. The project I have is actually 2 PP projects that are both about an hour long that will be combined for the final DVD. Adam

I don't know why people try to include so much footage on one DVD. The quality suffers. The DVD might not play in cheaper players. A two DVD set is the way to go.

[Paolo Ciccone]

Originally Posted by Adam Slaght

I will try the avi adn microsoft avi this morning and see if that will work.

Don't waste time with AVI, the poster was assuming that you are on Windows. You need to save the footage to MPEG2 in order to generate a DVD. This can be done from the NLE or inside Encore.
In order to avoid halting a long export you can export to a sequence of frames (TIFF) and then export the audio. In that way if it stops in the middle you can resume from where it stopped. I'll do some tests and let you know.

[Adam Slaght]

Thanks Paolo, that would be greatly appreciated.

I figured after I started looking at the export choices and didn't see AVI or Microsoft AVI that it must be a windows option not Mac.

After readign about TIFF, I will need to export to a TIFF file, then export audio only, then reassemble the two in encore, correct?

Greg, the 2 disk set may be an option for the final output. However, right now I cant even get one of the hour long segements to render correctly.

[Paolo Ciccone]

Adam, yes, you are correct. BTW, the export to TIFF sequence is always a good choice when handling long footage. On top of giving fault recovery you can use it to apply localized changes to your footage without re-rendering one massive movie file.

Steps involved:

1-Select File/Export/Movie
2-In the General section select File type TIFF. Range: Entire sequence. Uncheck the "Add to project when finished"
3-In the video section uncheck the "Recompress" option
4-Create a new folder, select it and then confirm the export

If the export breaks in the middle go to your sequence, set the work area to include only the frames that are no exported and then export again, this time selecting "Work area" in the range option.

Now, you have two options, depending on what software you have. If you have After Effects you can load the sequence of images as such, add the audio and export a high-quality MPEG2 from there. Or, you can load the sequence of images inside QuickTime Pro (Shift-Cmd-O) and then export to any .mov file you want. Add that file as an Encore asset, add audio and you are set to go.

[Adam Slaght]

Thank you Paolo,

I do have After Effects, I use the full CS3 suite.

I will try this workflow here shortly(crosses fingers)

I also just read over on the Adobe forums that to get MPEG2 transcoding in the AME to work, uncheck the "hide extension" button in the file save dialog box and then render.

Will give that try as well and post back.

Thank you again for the help it is greatly appreciated.
Adam

[Adam Slaght]

Well after hours of trying...still NO go with the render.

I tried everything that was suggested.

Paolo, the TIFF froze before it even got to 1%.

I tried umounting the hard drive then remounting, showing files ext, exporting in .mov. I also tried saving to the hard drive on the macbook pro and nothing is working.

The external HD is a 500gb with only 160GB used.

I am now wondering if my system is not big enough to handle the project. It is a Macbook pro 2.2ghz intel duo, 4Gb ram.

Is there something I should be checking or clicking to tell PP to downconvert HD to SD? I simply made the HD project with HD footage and was then just clicking export. Is there something else I shoudl be doing?


I am at my wits end and the friday deadline is looming.

Please help!!!!

[Paolo Ciccone]

All right, let's start from the beginning. Which *exact* version of Premiere are you using? How much memory do you have? What version of Mac OS afre you using?

[Adam Slaght]

Alright, here is my setup...

15" Macbook Pro 2.2 ghz Intel Duo
4gb Ram
Mac osx 10.4
external 500gb hard drive(eSata) 160used
Premier Pro CS3

[Paolo Ciccone]

Which *exact* version of PPro do you have. Use the About box to find out.