I moved from shooting Sony DVCAM to Sony HDV format for underwater video last year, but have been waiting to upgrade my output/editing solution. I assumed the options would also be greatly expanded the longer I wait.

I now would like to get some higher quality output without spending a big chunk of change. Problem: I have Premiere Pro 1.5 and cannot get rid of color banding in my blue water column shots. I assume that is because I am capturing, processing and exporting all in 8-bit color.

Obviously I am stuck with 8-bit source since I shoot with HDV.

Can 10-bit Prospect HD fix my 8-bit Premiere Pro 1.5 exports without having to upgrade my PPro? Will upgrading to PPro CS3 with it's 10-bit color support solve my color banding problems on export? Or will I also need to purchase Prospect HD? Besides speed, will Prospect add significant necessity? Don't get me wrong, I love the idea of faster efficient production with Cineform and will soon go that route when revenue remotely approaches expenses, but with an average of one production a year, rendering at night for two weeks is not going to kill my schedule.

Thanks in advance!

Well, I don't think PPro 1.5 supports more than 8-bit color, but I could be wrong. So even if you had Prospect HD it may not help.

Do you by chance have After Effects?

Something you could do is download the Prospect HD trial and install that, capture in Premiere Pro 1.5 or using HD Link (Cineform's capture utility) and see if that helps your banding issue.

I'm sure David Newman will have more to say as I'm no Cineform guru.

Old version of Prospect HD (ver 1.x) did support 10-bits in 1.5, however we have since dropped 1.5 support as PPro 2.0 and CS3 natively support deeper color. You blue gradients will be greatly helped with 10-bit compression and 32-bit float internal processing.