Obtaining Highest Quality for Vimeo??

[Wally Alarcon]

Hey everyone. Sorry to bum rush and have my first post as a question but I been lurking around this site for a long time. But I realize in vimeo, there are a lot of good very clear HD quality films.

Here is mine: Concour d'Dubs on Vimeo

I had made a car video using the Panasonic HVX200 with Adobe Premiere CS3 and will soon get CS4. But when I uploaded it and export them, it wasn't as good quality most videos on vimeo using the same camera as mine in HD. Is there something I'm doing wrong when exporting, or maybe the camera settings?

I was using 720p at 30fps in the HVX200.

My PC is custom built:

2.50Ghz Intel Cor 2 Quad
8 GB DDR 2 (1300?) Ram
265 GTX Nvidia
Asus QPro Mobo

It's all pretty much for filming. I would add the rest of the specs but it wouldn't be important.

I also didn't use capturing when using the HVX200, since there was an update for Premiere, I can just use a USB and drag and drop the .MXF from the P2 card. Here was my settings I use to export:

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v3...mysettings.jpg

Well again sorry if this is considered a n00b question and I hope this was detailed to find a solution. Thanks again!!

[Brian Barkley]

Just curious, was that in Windows Media Player, or Quicktime, or what??

I think Windows Media Player HD might be a good way to export.

[Wally Alarcon]

Originally Posted by Brian Barkley

Just curious, was that in Windows Media Player, or Quicktime, or what??

I think Windows Media Player HD might be a good way to export.

When I export I have it as a H.264 format. That's what claims to be the best for Vimeo.

[Seth Bloombaum]

Originally Posted by Wally Alarcon

...But when I uploaded it and export them, it wasn't as good quality most videos on vimeo using the same camera as mine in HD. Is there something I'm doing wrong when exporting, or maybe the camera settings?...

Your export settings *look* fine. They follow best-practices, as far as I know them.

Your subject and how it's shot will be stressful for any compression codec. Combination of high-speed of the backgrounds, lots of detail, and lots of camera movement (hand-held camera).

It's pretty clear in some of the road shots, things start going fast and the resolution degrades. What's more disturbing, in my opinion, is that there are plenty of frame drops in the parking lot footage. That really shouldn't be happening.

The Mainconcept h.264 codec you're using should be fine. The possibilities are - not enough bitrate for your encode, or, Vimeo's transcode isn't good enough for this footage. Are the other videos you're comparing to of the same motion and detail complexity?

As to camera settings - how does it look when you're editing? If it's ok there, likely there's nothing wrong with your camera settings.

Of all this, the only things within your control are:
* Rerender, same settings but higher bitrate, say 12MBps.
* Rerender, same settings but variable bitrate (VBR), peaking up to 12MBps. (I'd probably try this first - could be the winner)
* Test other codecs. Do you have other h.264 / AVC / MPEG4 codecs available?

Some tricks - apply a *very* slight gaussian blur to your final project before rendering. I don't know what settings would apply in CS3/CS4, but you'd add just enough to be barely visually perceptable when previewing on the largest screen you have available.

Slightly crush the blacks. Best done with a color-curves type filter while watching waveform scope, the idea here is that you take everything that's about 15% (15ire) on the scope, and crush it down to zero, without affecting what's above 15.

[Robert M Wright]

I'd suggest VBR encoding, rather than CBR encoding. You could also set the keyframe interval to something like 300 frames (under "Advanced Settings"). I know Vimeo suggests a much smaller keyframe interval, but that doesn't make much sense, since they transcode the video anyway. A large keyframe interval will give you more efficient compression (as far as image quality at any particular bitrate). I'd also suggest shooting 24p for web video (when reasonable to do so). Shooting 24p, rather than 30p, can also improve image quality at any particular bitrate (less frames to compress per second of video = more bits per frame). I don't see any options for motion search radius, or options to set the number of B frames between I or P frames.

If you just can't seem to get the quality you want from the MainConcept encoder that comes with Premier, you could give x264 a try. It's freeware, and one of the best H.264 encoders out there (and offers a whale of a lot of options, to optimize compression).

[Robert M Wright]

I just looked at the video (on Vimeo and the original uploaded file). There's just way to much motion (and a lot of transitions) to expect it to look much better than that after Vimeo transcodes it.

[Wally Alarcon]

Originally Posted by Seth Bloombaum

Some tricks - apply a *very* slight gaussian blur to your final project before rendering. I don't know what settings would apply in CS3/CS4, but you'd add just enough to be barely visually perceptable when previewing on the largest screen you have available.

You have any good examples of a slight gaussian effect?

Originally Posted by Seth Bloombaum

Slightly crush the blacks. Best done with a color-curves type filter while watching waveform scope, the idea here is that you take everything that's about 15% (15ire) on the scope, and crush it down to zero, without affecting what's above 15.

I don't understand what you're saying here, sorry I'm kind of an amateur on this lol.

Originally Posted by Robert M Wright

I just looked at the video (on Vimeo and the original uploaded file). There's just way to much motion (and a lot of transitions) to expect it to look much better than that after Vimeo transcodes it.

So basically the subject I am filming is too much for a good quality? Well I have another meet Sunday and I will use 24p instead of 30p, (if I am able to rent the camera).

Also, to upload the footage from the Panasonic HXV200, is it a good idea to upload it directly USB by opening the folder to drag and drop the file from the P2 card to the computer and use the files raw in CS3 instead of using a program to capture the footage since it is by P2 card not by a miniDV tape or something.

[Seth Bloombaum]

Try .001 or .002 values for Gaussian blur. Not really sure what Premiere offers for this - I don't currently have access to it.

Crushing the blacks. The idea here is to take some of the dark greys that "read" as black, and make them true black. Some NLEs have a "black restore" filter. If so, this is the easy way. The slightly more difficult way is to to use color correction or color curves to take these dark greys/colors to black. Sorry, again, I don't have a workflow or filters to recommend specific to Premiere.

The methods I'm writing are possible in all pro NLEs, but terminology is different, filters have different names, etc. You might do some posting or searching over in the Premiere forum.

The high motion, both of subjects and camera, is certainly stressing the codecs and breaking/bending them. This shows in the areas where there are frame drops and the resolution reductions. If you want to shoot fast subjects with a jerky handheld camera style I'm not going to argue with your choices - go for the look you want. But, yes, it is difficult video to distribute in HD over a free/low cost internet hosting service, and that means that you work harder and achieve less quality then some other clips you may be comparing your video to.

[Jack Zhang]

Just a reminder for Vimeo Basic users: This won't really matter if you encode in higher quality anymore since the original file will be gone a week after you upload now.

For basic users, I recommend what Vimeo recommends. A H.264 MP4 file around 4-5Mbps with 192k AAC audio.

You're a Plus user, that's a little different. I'm looking at the settings and you should encode in 1280x720 with a Pixel aspect ratio of 1.000.