I'm starting to use CS 5.5 in earnest and am confused about how to export the entire timeline as a Lagarith AVI and what settings it takes to get it done as it should be. I'm using the 64-bit version on Windows 7.

My goals with Lagarith are twofold: back-up project as lossless but more importantly in order to create a AVI file which is part of the process when converting HDV programs to SD.

Let's fast forward to Adobe media encoder video tab!

1) For the purposes stated above, should I check off the "Prevent upsampling when decoding" or not? what ramifications does that have?

2) Should I choose YUY2 or YV12 for colorspace? What's better for Premiere encoding to MPEG-2 DVD after it gets converted/downscaled elsewhere to SD?

3) Now for the kicker. The aspect ratio for HDV source material is typically set to 1440 by 1080. When manually typing in either one of those dimensions it automatically comes up with the other as "wrong".

a) When I type in 1440 it gives me 1440 by 960.
b) When I type in 1080 it gives me 1620 by 1080.

There's no obvious way of getting around it.

Is there a square versus non square pixel issue here?

I don't want areas of black displayed when viewing the projected output file when the entire screen should be filled and 16:9.

Please lead me along the path here to a solution. How to I get 1440 by 1080?

4) Lastly, what does frame blending do? When should it be selected or left un-ticked? Does it make an important visual contribution?

Thanks in advance for contributions to my growing CS 5.5 knowledgebase.

Hi Bruce,

Are you following the HD2SD workflow as outlined here? HD to SD DVD – Best Methods | Creating Motion Graphics Blog | Blu-Ray DVD Authoring Menu | Precomposed (http://www.precomposed.com/blog/2009/07/hd-to-sd-dvd-best-methods/)

This is what I do, and I don't have to fiddle with any of the export settings you're mentioning. Just go to File > Export > Media Encoder and choose "Microsoft AVI" as the format, then choose the Lagarith codec, and in settings, choose "YV12".

The frame size (1440x1080) and all that should automatically match your footage, nothing else to change!

Once you get your downconverted SD avi. file, don't run it through AME for .m2v creation, defeats the purpose. I'm using the free "HC Encoder", then bring the results into Encore for authoring. There is no audio included in this method, but simply export a .wav file from original Premiere sequence (default 48k 16-bit stereo) and put that audio file alongside the .m2v in Encore then.

Thanks

Jeff Pulera

Jeff,

Thanks for your kind reply.

I've been out of state for a couple days and am scheduled (for now) to go on another trip until next week starting today/Friday.

If something changes I'll write you privately.

Please enjoy the holiday weekend.