What is Your Editing Drug of Choice?....for the 5D

[Perrone Ford]

Originally Posted by Bill Davis

Sorry, to take issue Perrone, but I'm here to tell you that while I agree nothing currently out there will edit NATIVE 5d H264 files smoothly, the automatic Pro Rez 422 downconvert now built directly into the Canon EOS Utility produces 1920 x 1080 Pro Rez 422 files that edit PERFECTLY SMOOTHLY on even a modestly configured machine like mine

Well, then you're not editing 5D/7D files, you're editing prores. Just like on the Avid when I import to DNxHD. It's smooth as butter when I bring in 5D/7D files that way. Or in Edius when it brings in Canopus HQ. The files are no longer H.264, they are DCT compressed. Cineform works similarly.

[Luc De Wandel]

I use my 5D mainly as C-cam on a steadycam, next to a Sony Z7 (HDV) and a Sony PDW-F350 (XDCAM HD). Final Cut Pro accepts all three formats happily in one timeline, with smooth editing and perfect final images as a result. It is by far the NLE of choice of all the editors I know. So I can highly recommend it.

As far as the $2500 hardware is concerned: the troublefree operation makes it worth more than that. No viruses, no trojans, no shutdowns, no 'device not found',...

[Nigel Barker]

Originally Posted by Perrone Ford

Honestly, nothing out there is really ready to do these 5D/7D files smoothly. If you can live with that, you should be in business. Like I said, I know it works in Avid MC5 because I've done it.

This is the conclusion that I am coming to despite the claims for CS5, MC5, EDIUS 5 etc

[Andrew Clark]

I think Ryan either got a little bewildered by all the replies or is no longer interested in editing!!

[Noa Put]

Originally Posted by Luc De Wandel

As far as the $2500 hardware is concerned: the troublefree operation makes it worth more than that. No viruses, no trojans, no shutdowns, no 'device not found',...

I have a 1000dollar "pc" hardware that has had no viruses, trojans, shutdowns or "no device found" problems either and has been trouble free since I got it and I can also drop whatever format in my NLE with smooth editing and perfect output. You don't need a Mac to get this all to you know.

[Luc De Wandel]

My dear countryfellow Noa, Don't think that I have no experience with PC's. I do. I have had an advertising agency for years. We had Macs in the graphic and creative departments and PC's in the accounting and commercial departments. I can assure you that we had about 10 times more trouble with the PC's than with the Macs, in every possible aspect.

So, why then was I so stupid to begin editing 5 years ago with a PC (Acer, top of the line with extra memory and disk space) and Pinnacle and later Adobe Première Pro? For the price: the Acer cost half the money of a Mac Pro. But... it cost me a few years of my life in aggravation, stress and pure anger. So now I have 4 Macs running with FCP and it's heaven, compared to the rubbish I had before. But that's just my experience, for what it's worth...


So if anyone asks me what edting software I would recommend, the choice narrows down to anything that will run smoothly on a Mac.

[Noa Put]

Strange thing is that I always had DELL's and while I hear people complaining about them they never let me down, I even still have a 2ghz and a 3ghz dell pc here that still work like they should and they don't give me weird error messages either.
A good configured pc with only the software on it that's needed is just as stable as a Mac, most of the problems appear because of bad configurations, bad written software and software like virusscanner, firewall, messenger....
On a production pc you just need to make clear choices what you want to do with it and only use it for that purpose and choose good quality parts and good written software, this always works.

I have premiere pro cs3 and Edius pro on my machine and Edius is rock solid, premiere not. It's just not designed to handle a lot of native M2T files without becoming unstable but that has nothing to do with the platform it's on, it's just cs3. It does works without a problem if I first combine files in one large file (I work with a hvr-dr60)
On the other hand I can trow whatever I want at Edius and it will handle it, the speed difference from teh moment you start capturing your files until you can start editing a very big. This again shows how important it is to choose the right tool if you want to have a stable pc.

[Michael Wisniewski]

Originally Posted by Luc De Wandel

... Acer ... Pinnacle ... Adobe Première Pro ...

I'm not surprised you had such a bad experience on the PC - in the past, those three names were exactly what I would have recommended you avoid. And you ended up putting them all together on one desktop! C'est la vie.

[Harry Simpson]

Let me first point out - the OP stated for the 5D so all those chiming in who don't even own the beast please qualify your remarks. These "full HD" .MOVs need to be dealt with in a consistent repeatable way for best output. I've rendered to 720 Mp4s just fine and looks great on computer but rendering to DVD (SD) is a challenge I've only conquered once with so so results. I wonder if it can be done.

I'm editing on a PC using Cineform HDLink conversions to AVI, then edit and render in Vegas Movie Studio HD 10, and then burn to DVD using DVD Architect 5 - I did a simple test short MOV last night pretty much just running through the workflow to a finished DVD which I then slapped into my DVD player
to watch on my older 30" HD tv - the sound was stuttering worse than a disco dj overdosing on crack! The video barely played with huge pixelation blocks etc. in a word - total trash!!

So I suggest DV Invo set up sub threads such as
5D Mk2 - PC - Cineform - Sony Vegas Studio 10 - DVD Archictect
just to discuss and share tried and true workflows.

5D Mk2 - PC - Cineform - Sony Vegas Studio 10 workd well for files played on computer but that's about it.

Bout ready to get a MAC and FC just for my video!! Especially if that's what it takes to produce a decent DVD.

Or should I just burn to BluRay only - greater success with this from this combination on the PC??

[Noa Put]

the OP stated for the 5D so all those chiming in who don't even own the beast please qualify your remarks.

Don't know for sure but does a 7d and 550d not produce the same type files with the same bitate then a 5D?

[Noa Put]

Originally Posted by Harry Simpson

Bout ready to get a MAC and FC just for my video!! Especially if that's what it takes to produce a decent DVD.

I just got my 550d and barely got to testing it but a few days ago I imported the raw mpeg4 files into edius pro (those file were 1920x1080 with avg bitrate of 40/45mbs, trancoded to canopus hq, export as canopus hq avi file, import into tmpgenc 4.0 express and transcoded to dvd compliant file and then used encore cs3 to make my dvd. Nothing wrong with it, sound was good, image was good. And it was done on a 3 year old pc.

[Perrone Ford]

Originally Posted by Noa Put

Don't know for sure but does a 7d and 550d not produce the same type files with the same bitate then a 5D?

Sort of. The 7D/550D produce a similar file with a just slightly higher bit rate than the 5D.

[Perrone Ford]

Originally Posted by Harry Simpson

Let me first point out - the OP stated for the 5D so all those chiming in who don't even own the beast please qualify your remarks. These "full HD" .MOVs need to be dealt with in a consistent repeatable way for best output. I've rendered to 720 Mp4s just fine and looks great on computer but rendering to DVD (SD) is a challenge I've only conquered once with so so results. I wonder if it can be done.

Qualify my remarks? The file structure of the 5D and 7D is quite similar with the 7D/550D have a slightly higher bit rate. They are wrapped in the same container, and for the purposes of editing, are essentially indistinguishable.

You wonder if rendering these files to a DVD can be done? Of course. There is nothing special about getting these files to DVD that doesn't exist in any professional workflow going from HD to SD.

Originally Posted by Harry Simpson

I'm editing on a PC using Cineform HDLink conversions to AVI, then edit and render in Vegas Movie Studio HD 10, and then burn to DVD using DVD Architect 5 - I did a simple test short MOV last night pretty much just running through the workflow to a finished DVD which I then slapped into my DVD player
to watch on my older 30" HD tv - the sound was stuttering worse than a disco dj overdosing on crack! The video barely played with huge pixelation blocks etc. in a word - total trash!!

So you are using a decidedly consumer NLE to try and accomplish was is probably a pretty pro level task. Should still work assuming you are doing things correctly. If your DVD came out poorly, it had nothing to do with what came out of the camera. It's been converted twice by that point (once in the transcode to Cineform, and again in the transcode to Mpeg2 to make your DVD). So don't fault the camera for that, it's the workflow.

Originally Posted by Harry Simpson

So I suggest DV Invo set up sub threads such as
5D Mk2 - PC - Cineform - Sony Vegas Studio 10 - DVD Archictect
just to discuss and share tried and true workflows.

Why? We've got a dozen threads on how to do HD -> SD already. You have an error in your workflow somewhere (likely in the Mpeg2 encode step), but that should be easily solved. Work with someone here on how to encode for DVD and that should take care of the problem.

Originally Posted by Harry Simpson

5D Mk2 - PC - Cineform - Sony Vegas Studio 10 workd well for files played on computer but that's about it.

Then you likely need to increase your understanding of how to encode for final delivery.

Originally Posted by Harry Simpson

Bout ready to get a MAC and FC just for my video!! Especially if that's what it takes to produce a decent DVD.

That won't solve your problem. In fact, it's often MORE difficult to do this on a Mac, as there are more pieces involved. Ask in the Final Cut Pro section about using Compressor and the completely un-obvious need for frame controls.

Originally Posted by Harry Simpson

Or should I just burn to BluRay only - greater success with this from this combination on the PC??

Up to you. I've done both with complete success on numerous occasions.

[Harry Simpson]

Perrone,

I was in that HD-SD discussion for a while and it was all over the map. I know my video is fine and that the workflow is the problem. I just have not found a way to consistently produce great results. I know you use a lot of third party open source apps which is fine but i respectfully don't know wtf i'm doing when I get into these apps. They have more choices than I can intelligently set.

You're right the HD-SD discussion is all over here with some such as yourself reporting glowing success and others like myself never quite getting there. Is there not a cookbook path somewhere to take a full HD progressive MOV to a DVD in SD with great picture and sound. I mean this isn't creative- it's technical and should be a repeatable path.

Would you say the burn to BluRay simplifies this for the full HD MOV rendering to disc?

[Luc De Wandel]

Originally Posted by Michael Wisniewski

I'm not surprised you had such a bad experience on the PC - in the past, those three names were exactly what I would have recommended you avoid. And you ended up putting them all together on one desktop! C'est la vie.

If only someone would have told me that at the time! Of course, I wasn't checking this marvelous forum back then... My fault.