FYI: Video Demo of Film workflow and Liquid 7.x

[Paolo Ciccone]

Hey Stephen, least I could do after you took the time to make the QT file. Why don't you just rename my file with the same name of the original that you posted so that people that download it from now will get the smaller version.

Thanks again for the great tutorial.

[Stephen L. Noe]

Liquid 7.1 now INCLUDES MagicBullet II Movie looks for free. 55 movie looks in all inserted as a standard FX editor in the library rack.

It just gets better and better!

[Nima Taheri]

Great stuff Stephen, thank you!

So if you want to edit footage in AvidProHD, you import the uncompressed Targa-files into Avid, and thus have imported uncompressed HDV from the HD100?

Also, when selecting presets, what is the difference between the "HDV 720/25p" and the "720/24p" (except the framerate of course). Since I am in PAL-land, I'm looking for a way to get 720/25p in Avid.

[Stephen L. Noe]

Hi Nima,

Not exactly. Liquid uncompresses the frames when you select "uncompressed 2vuy" as the timeline codec. The exercise in the video is to show that the audio stays in sync and indeed the program does export the 24fps as needed by the film post house.

I'll work up a tutorial for the PAL amongst us. Essentially it is the same except the control panel settings are different in order to accomodate PAL
s framerate. The workflow would be identicle.

[Ram Ganesh]

Originally Posted by Stephen L. Noe

Now that the workflow is available to the masses, there is no reason ANYONE can't cut a film with ProHD. The sky is open.

Whats the difference between this Avid 7.1 workflow and Premier+Cineform or Vegas+Cineform workflows?

[Jake Strickbine]

Originally Posted by Ram Ganesh

Whats the difference between this Avid 7.1 workflow and Premier+Cineform or Vegas+Cineform workflows?

Both workflows get you where you're going just fine. Cineform is a wavelet-based intermediate codec that allows a big speed boost when working within Premier or Vegas when compared to working with native HDV, which tends to choke those systems up.

Liquid, on the other hand, handles the native MPEG streams a lot better than Premier or Vegas, which lessens the need for an intermediate codec. However, any CC, compositing work, or effects need to be rendered out uncompressed when working with Liquid, as native HDV doesn't recompress well at all.

If you absolutely have to work with a lot of footage, Cineform's codec can be a huge space saver when compared to uncompressed files, and holds up extremely well through multiple generations of compression. Beyond that- it's really six of one, half a dozen of the other. If you're already working in Liquid, there's little viable reason for you to switch to Cineform via Premier or Vegas, and vice versa. Any of these workflows can take you where you need to go with minimal fuss.

[Steve Mullen]

Originally Posted by Jake Strickbine

However, any CC, compositing work, or effects need to be rendered out uncompressed when working with Liquid, ...

Question. Do FX need to finish rendering before you can view them?

[Jake Strickbine]

Well, that depends on the system you're using. Simple CC and transitions will often preview out in real time or close to real time straight out of your NLE- but you'll still need to render them out before sending your finished project either back to tape or into your DVD authoring software, etc. As far as I know, Liquid, PP2 (with Cineform) and Vegas (with Cineform) will all give you decent preview out of light effects work without hiccups. It just depends on how intensive the effects are and how many layers are involved.

[Stephen L. Noe]

Originally Posted by Jake Strickbine

However, any CC, compositing work, or effects need to be rendered out uncompressed when working with Liquid, as native HDV doesn't recompress well at all.

Actually you get the choice of render/fuse codecs with Liquid (MP@HL, RGB-AVI, or 2vuy uncompressed).

There are a lot of advantages to the Liquid workflow over any other method, especially for ProHD and film (as displayed above). RT HD timeline preview up to 6 layers out VGA second head to HDTV is gold. Dumping straight back to HDV tape right from the timeline is a tremendous advantage. The native way is definately advantageous.

I'll work on some more tut's...

[Steve Mullen]

Sounding better and better for native HDV.

I'm reviewing the FOCUS and it might be good to do it and Liquid 7.1 since I wouldn't have to wait for Apple's 24p support. I assume I would just set the Focus to make .m2t AVI's rather than movies. Correct?

[Stephen L. Noe]

Correct. Allow the FS to capture the m2t's and then import them into Liquid. I have not gotten far enough with experimentation to figure out what it does with the timecode. Liquid normally will assign TC (and disregard embedded TC) when it imports files into the rack. I'm checking into it...

Otherwise the workflow would be the same and Liquid will maintain the framerate as if it were captured with the logging tool. The only thing in question is the TC on imported files at this point.

To reiterated. TC is maintained as usual when using the logging tool and frame accurate recaptures via time code work properly when the source was the tape and the capture method is the logging tool. Importing files is different than capture in that Liquid usually assigns TC.

[Ram Ganesh]

Originally Posted by Steve Mullen

Sounding better and better for native HDV.

you mean in this in a mac prespective or you recommend it for PC based editing as well?

[Jake Strickbine]

Originally Posted by Stephen L. Noe

Actually you get the choice of render/fuse codecs with Liquid (MP@HL, RGB-AVI, or 2vuy uncompressed).

Of those three choices, only one is good enough for doing serious finishing work, and it can eat up an ungodly amount of hard drive space if your project is long format and requires a lot of CC or FX work.

I'm not going to cheerlead for one of these systems over the others at the current time because I see tradeoffs across the board. The PP2+Cineform workflow gives you the advantages of built-in After Effects integration and the ability to work with a variable bitrate codec that gets you very close the robustness of uncompressed frames at a small fraction of the hard drive real estate. The downside is that you're performing your work using a proprietary codec, and everything you do will have to be transcoded to a standardized format on its way out the door.

Liquid gives you 24p support right out of the box, and rock solid native performance with smart GOP splicing for substantially less money than PP2 (or Vegas) + Cineform. The only potential downside being that any work that requires recompression will need to be rendered via a different method than MPEG, which will cost you a lot of your initial advantages, as well as potentially costing you a lot of storage real estate.

Avid is building smart GOP splicing into Xpress Pro 5.5 and Media Composer 2.5 as we speak- so there will be even more options to consider, although MC will be the only one of the two offering 24p support for the JVC, and it will come at an extremely high price point compared to the other solutions.

I still say that the process of choosing an NLE depends mostly on how much effects work and CC you traditionally perform. If you're typically just a capture, edit, and print to tape type of practitioner, it's hard to see any reason to look beyond Liquid as your NLE. If you deal with a lot of footage and/or do a lot of post work, you're going to see benefit from using an NLE that offers you a robust intermediate codec, which will allow you to do your work at a high quality without having to step all the way up to uncompressed frames.

[Ram Ganesh]

great mini review jake -

[Steve Mullen]

You nailed it Jake. The questions are HOW LONG is your Timeline and HOW DEEP is it.

Stephen has raised a critical issue to some -- will FS timecode come in? Does Liquid assign a timecode IF there is already timecode present in the file?

Still waiting for the Focus.

I export back to D-VHS or HDV or to the IOLINK DVD recorder. That makes Liquid's no conform solution very attractive to me. However, if you CC every frame then Smart GOP Splicing is no advantage. Unless, of course, Liquid conforms really fast. Don't know.

EDIUS supports both native and intermediate editing. This means you are set for any kind of work. So I'm not picking winners in any way. Also, I'm open to PC or Mac solutions since I have both.