Capturing HV20 Footage

[Mike Dulay]

Thomas,

Yes, the uncompressed/huffyuv/lagarith/msu files are large because they are lossless (I'm capt obvious 8-). They're not meant for viewing but work well for final render. One trick is to create two versions, one in lossless and another in WMV9/XviD. The WMV9/XViD usually looks good enough for web output or a small LCD. But when you project it to a wall you will notice the compression by the loss of some detail (flat colors on a spackled wall). You can use the WMV9/XviD file for editing. Then when you're happy with your timeline you can rename the WMV9/XViD file to something else. And then use the Lossless version with the exact same name. Reopen your project and it will pickup the new files. Do your final render.

Another alternative is to recompress your lossless to cineform via Vegas. It's another extra hour of re-rendering and the chroma upsample makes it look weird in wmp/mpc but it will look great for final render and can be viewed real time.

From the practical perspective, I tend to render in WMV9/XViD since my output is bound for web. But if I ever want to inflict some high resolution vacation videos to my hapless visitors on the DLP projector ... I can confidently create the high quality MPEG2 or H.264 versions from the lossless versions (which I can regenerate later on).

---
BTW, you should look at Steve's vegas .dll script or his standalone exe. It even automates the virtualdub part for you.

[Gavin Ouckama]

Is there a codec that will give me the full 1920x1080? I did XVid and it did 1440x1080, so things looked a little squished. Or, is there a setting somewhere in VDub or the codec that does this?

Thanks ...

[Thomas R. Dickens]

I want to edit my material for a hopeful release in theaters (true 24 frames per second). My special effects, done in After Effects, and Lightwave 3D, will be done at 24 true frames per second. All of these effects shots will have to be reedited into the film edit, with the proper sound sync, etc. and I do not want any ghosting/double frames/artifacts/interlacing, etc.

Of couse, there will be the need to put it to dVD or HD DVD at a later date (30fps), but that is another topic.

Since I am editing for 24 fps, when I output from VirtualDubMod the default frame rate that comes up, under the Video Frame Rate Control: is 23.976 fps. You can change it to 24 frames per second but there is a warning that Changing the framerate will cause audio/video desynchronization. There is also an option to change the frame rate "So video and audio durations match" (24.013 fps).

My question is: should I just leave it at 23.976, change it to 24, or change it to the 24.013 fps? Before I edit this entire film I want to make sure I am setting the proper settings for all the footage so nothing bites me on this in a few months or something.

Also, should my project in Vegas be set to 23.976, 24, or 24.013? Maybe I just leave it at 23.976, and do final render at 24?

Will this cause interlacing or some other issues if I don't go with 24 or 24.013 the whole way through?

I just want to do the right thing and not have any mistakes.

Thank you,

Thomas

[Mike Dulay]

@Gavin
The aspect ratio and size isn't a limitation of the codec but of the file format you choose to encode in. If you choose XviD the compressor has an option to define non-square pixels if you want to retain 1440x1080 as the dimensions. But so far, I've found that MPC/WMP/etc ignore the flag. But if you encode in WMV (via Windows Movie Maker or Vegas) you can create a WMV format that is properly 16:9 on display. The way I get around it is to override the MPC settings to 16:9 or do it from the projector. Now if you're using MediaCenter then I understand your pain. It doesn't recognize non-square in AVI files so you'd need to resize the video.

Now, for a totally free solution. Yes, you can do it in Virtualdub. You need to go to the Video -> Filter -> Add -> Resize -> W; 1920, H: 1080. Choose either Bicubic or Bilinear (it's practically the same method used by HDV to unsquish) -> Save As -> Full Processing mode (needed when using filters). Most NLEs can do this for you. I prefer to do it on final render rather than as a prestep, only because I think (blind faith) the NLE will do a better job mixing other effects that way.

@Thomas
Personally I would leave the source files in their original 24p (23.796) format and then drop them into the 24p timeline. Let Vegas figure it out on the final render. I've mixed 30f+60i/24p/+60i sources on a borrowed Vegas box and it handled it well. I'm no professional though, you may want to visit the Vegas forums in DVInfo.net for a better answer.

[Thomas R. Dickens]

Steve,

I am using your stand alone script. It is working wonderfully!! Thank you immensly. I wish I had this from the start. So much dragging and dropping of hundreds of files was making me crazy.

One thing... It is set to Uncomressed AVI with DOES create immense files. When, before, when I was doing it "by hand", before your .exe version, I was using the "MPA" uncompressed it also was huge, but these "Uncompressed AVIs" are immense!!! They are making the MPAs look small!

I would set it to MPA, but I do not see that on your pulldown on Compression area, like I did when I set the compression by hand in VirtualDubMod (yet I do have MPA in my AVsynth plugins). Is MPA unavailable with your tool? If not, how to you put it there?

Also, can you change sizes in your .exe? I was making low res versions at 75% scale before. I will try the WMP9 at full scale as well and see if that works.

Thanks again,

Thomas

[Thomas R. Dickens]

Since the conversions take Soooo long, and I have to make high and low res conversions can I open more than one 24p Pulldown Removal Workflow Engine at the same time? It doesn't seem to take up much cpu power or ram, but I didn't know if it would mess something up to run 2 groups at the same time, such as one high res and one low res both running, or two different high res batches running on the same computer.
Thank you,
Thomas

[Steve Szudzik]

Thomas, my guess is that it would work ok, though you probably would want to specify separate working directories, or choose not to remove the temporary DGIndex files.

--Steve

[Cliff S. Williams]

Hi everyone,
It sounds like you all know what you're talking about when it comes to capturing 24p off the HV20. So, here's my issue: When I first got my HV20, I shot 1.5 minutes in HDV mode (I think, but it might have been DV), then grabbed it off the miniDV onto my PC using HDVSplit. I then bought Adobe Premiere Elements 3.0, shot some more footage (this time for sure with HDV mode and a lapel mic), and now can't capture it using either HDVSplit or Adobe. I set my camcorder to "Play" mode, start either HDVSplit or Adobe and try to capture, but it says there is no device connected or it's not recognized. I read somewhere that this could be due to the fact that I recorded HDV and DV on one miniDV. But, I don't see why that would do anything. Does anyone have any tips? Thanks.

[Peter J Alessandria]

Originally Posted by Cliff S. Williams

Hi everyone,
It sounds like you all know what you're talking about when it comes to capturing 24p off the HV20. So, here's my issue: When I first got my HV20, I shot 1.5 minutes in HDV mode (I think, but it might have been DV), then grabbed it off the miniDV onto my PC using HDVSplit. I then bought Adobe Premiere Elements 3.0, shot some more footage (this time for sure with HDV mode and a lapel mic), and now can't capture it using either HDVSplit or Adobe. I set my camcorder to "Play" mode, start either HDVSplit or Adobe and try to capture, but it says there is no device connected or it's not recognized. I read somewhere that this could be due to the fact that I recorded HDV and DV on one miniDV. But, I don't see why that would do anything. Does anyone have any tips? Thanks.

Sounds like maybe an Windows XP driver issue? I'm pretty sure you need XP SP2 (service pack 2) to get the HDV device driver. If you captured DV first, then put the camera in HDV output mode, Windows gets very confused. Search this forum for specifics, but you should check the device manager under "sound, video game controllers" (not "Imaging Devices") for "AV/C tape device/subunit" or something to that effect.