Canopus Eduis 3.0 Vs. Liquid Edition 6.0 For HDV Capture and Real time editing

Steven Gotz · March 22nd, 2005, 11:47 AM

I think that an intermediate codec is the appropriate solution. As long as you have a video card that can help you view the output on an external monitor.

There are ways to edit the long GOP, and they work OK, but I prefer to stick with the Aspect HD solution. The additional effects and transitions that all work in realtime with my underpowered PC just solves too many problems.

Joel Corral · March 22nd, 2005, 11:57 AM

<<<-- Originally posted by Steven Gotz : By the way, you can cross-grade to Edius for only $499 - which actually makes Joel's argument a bit stronger. Plus you get some other cool stuff - like a keyboard.

I believe that the trade-in period is over. Besides, my PC isn't powerful enough to handle the new hardware. It only matches the minimum speed. I won't be upgrading until at least this summer. The trip to Greece this June is taking all my serious cash. -->>>

steven why don't you download the demo from there site? give it a shot you'll be suprized at how well your machine will do.

Ron Evans · March 22nd, 2005, 12:06 PM

I have AMD XP2500 and on this machine the conversion time for Canopus HQ and the Cineform intermediate file is about the same ( about 2 times realtime ) Once in this intermediate form both Premiere Pro 1.5.1 and Edius Pro3 will playback the files. My machine is not powerful enough to playback the mt2 files without picture breakup and eventually stopping. Also my machine is not able to use the capture utilities of either Edius PRo3 or Premiere 1.5.1 since they either display a preview screen or convert on capture both of which end in the program stopping!!! CapDVHS and Cineform capture will however capture from my FX1 with no problems and I can then convert in non realtime to the intermediate files. I see little difference between the programs as far as compute power is concerned ( they both think my machine is inadequate!!!!) I thought of upgrading to a more powerful processor but will wait until I can afford a dual now.

Ron Evans

Joel Corral · March 22nd, 2005, 12:21 PM

yes dual is the way to go. and 2 gigs of ram won't hurt either.

Kevin Shaw · March 22nd, 2005, 01:11 PM

A few clarifications regarding the Canopus HDV offerings:

Both the software-only and hardware-supported Edius products can edit using either the native HDV format or the Canopus HQ codec. But I don't know anyone who's using native HDV in Edius because it would make no sense to do so: that reduces performance to unworkable levels with no benefit in terms of workflow. Based on all the comments I've seen around the internet, there is no one finding any meaningful benefit to doing native HDV editing, and all the popular solutions are using some sort of intermediate codec (e.g. Cineform, Canopus HQ, Apple AIC).

As things stand today Canopus appears to easily have the most advanced HDV solutions, with a reasonable workflow and greatest variety of real-time HDV editing features. The catch is that their approach requires a little more horsepower compared to others for both the capture and editing phases, but a high-end single-processor PC is adequate for basic HDV work in Edius. If you really want to do significant HDV editing you need to plan to buy a dual-processor computer no matter what solution you're using, because it's just too much data to work well otherwise. You'll find some Mac users claiming they're doing HDV work on a single-processor G4 system, but if you press them they'll probably admit they have to render almost all of their changes to play them back. Editing HDV on one processor is like trying to haul a load of scrap iron on a bicycle: you can do it, but it's going to be slow going!

Ken Hodson · March 22nd, 2005, 01:34 PM

" If you really want to do significant HDV editing you need to plan to buy a dual-processor computer no matter what solution you're using"

That is simply not true. The Cineform AspectHD solution offers ample performance from a single 800+ bus P4. The latest release v3 has just doubled the number of RT streams in the PPro timeline. 3-4 in 1080i or around 6 in my prefered 720p. At $800 including PPro, audition, and Encore, it can hardly be considered overpriced for what you get.

Kevin Shaw · March 22nd, 2005, 02:07 PM

"The Cineform AspectHD solution offers ample performance from a single 800+ bus P4. The latest release v3 has just doubled the number of RT streams in the PPro timeline. 3-4 in 1080i or around 6 in my prefered 720p. At $800 including PPro, audition, and Encore, it can hardly be considered overpriced for what you get."

Ken: that's a fair statement, except Cineform reportedly only supports a handful of editing features in real time and hasn't (at least until now) been able to offer full-quality HD preview output, plus rendering times for finished projects are reportedly quite slow even with dual processors. (As is true for other HDV editing options.) So although $800 for the Cineform/Premiere bundle isn't a bad deal, it's not necessarily a better deal than spending a few hundred for Edius Pro 3 and then building or buying a hot-shot computer to back it up. It all depends how far you want to push your HDV editing and how much you can afford to spend to do so. Even with Cineform, the benefits in terms of reduced rendering time from dual processors would be worth the extra investment in base hardware.

Ed Szarleta · March 22nd, 2005, 04:30 PM

OK, let's put all the speculation aside and get to the facts.

I own a 3.2 Dual Xeon and have ran LE 6.1 with Long GOP on it with my FX1 footage. I get about 3 layers in RT on this setup. No more. That's with transitions and color correction only.

I own a 3.2 P4 box with AspectHD (which will soon be going on my Xeon Box) and I get a solid 4 layers with the same transitions and color correction.

There is no way Edius SW only solution can outperform LE 6.1 Pro in Long GOP.

A few people claim there Edius SW only solution is performing well for what they are doing, which might be true, but let's compare apples to apples.

AspectHD easily outperforms the Edius SW only solution. There is no comparison. Noticed I said software solution. I am sure the NX series trumps the AspectHD solution, but everyone here seems to be using the sofware only in Long GOP and AspectHD beats it easily.

Kevin Shaw · March 22nd, 2005, 05:02 PM

Ed: the problem here is that you're not specifying what editing features you can support in real time on those setups. I've seen screen shots from people who have the Premiere Pro/Cineform software showing that the total number of filters and effects available in real time can be counted on your fingers, whereas with Edius it's pretty much the entire feature set of the application. I don't have any comparable information for Liquid Edition, but what little feedback I've seen for that is that most people can't get it to work reliably with HDV footage.

Ultimately I don't see a conflict in what we're saying here. Cineform is a good value for basic HDV work on single-processor computers if you don't need full-quality HD monitoring or a wide range of real-time editing features. Liquid Edition may be pretty good at editing native HDV if you can get it to work, and again if you don't need true HD monitoring. Edius will do HDV on high-end single processor systems but not older ones, and offers the most advanced HDV solution available if you can afford a fast computer and a Canopus HDV hardware card. On this last point there isn't any competition, because Canopus is the only company shipping an HDV solution with full-quality HD monitoring as an out-of-the-box option.

Ed Szarleta · March 22nd, 2005, 05:23 PM

I posted above about what RT capabilities I have. I do mostly narrative work and dissolves and color correction are all I use. If you are doing PIP and Page curls, I would guess it would tax the best machines out there. I don't have time to test things I don't use, so I apologize for not delving deeper into the RT capabilities of all products. As far as RT Monitoring in AspectHD...I have it. My 6600GT with component out to my Mitsu HD monitor works just fine and dandy.

Kevin Shaw · March 22nd, 2005, 05:57 PM

"As far as RT Monitoring in AspectHD...I have it. My 6600GT with component out to my Mitsu HD monitor works just fine and dandy."

Ed: you're right, it is now possible to generate draft-quality HD ouptut from Premiere Pro/Cineform using a high-end video card costing around $200-250, which brings the total price of this solution to over $1000. That's still a lot less than the complete Edius NX bundle costs, but as you said we shouldn't compare apples to oranges. Cineform is an excellent compromise if you don't need anything beyond the supported feature set, and if you're not picky about whether your monitoring output is full quality 1080i video. And then there's the empty slot on the NX hardware card for a future real-time HD DVD encoder, but that's a subject for next year.

Cineform is apparently more hardware-efficient than Edius, but that doesn't make it more advanced. Gotta look at the overall picture...

Steven Gotz · March 22nd, 2005, 11:13 PM

You guys keep posting large numbers like we didn't already own Premiere Pro. Many of us do. If, perhaps, you didn't have anything, it might be a good idea to try Edius. But since I already own Premiere Pro, I chose a solution that was right for me.

Aspect HD.

Gary Bettan · March 24th, 2005, 08:47 AM

Excellent point Steven. Aspect HD is a great way for Premiere Pro editors to migrate to HDV. The workflow is actually very smooth, and as was mentioned, you aren't going to have to buy a new computer to run it.

Working with a digital intermediary technology (what a mouthful) takes getting used to. But I think the results are worth it. Premiere editors save a TON of time and money.

- You don't have to learn a new NLE. Premiere Pro is a very powerful editor, with a great feature set.

- You don't have to go and buy a dual processor computer. This is a very important point that should not be overlooked. P Pro w/ Aspect HD will run great in a P4 2.2 Ghz machine with a GB of RAM. Even a laptop!

- You still keep the Adobe workflow and integration with their other apps - After Effects, PhotoShop, Encore & Audition. This will only get stronger and better with future releases.

- With new Dual head graphic cardcs like the PNY540V you can get real-time HD previews out to an HD TV.

Gary

Joel Corral · March 25th, 2005, 12:33 PM

<<<-- Originally posted by Gary Bettan :
- This will only get stronger and better with future releases.
Gary -->>>

yes, i do agree "in time" Premiere will be stronger and better, but there solution just isn't there yet.

Steven Gotz · March 25th, 2005, 02:24 PM

Joel,

I am really interested in what you think is wrong with Premiere Pro and Cineform Aspect HD 3.0

Which technical issues, or workflow issues are you unhappy with?

I know that the solution is not perfect, but it works great for me. It could be faster. But the effects are sufficient for my needs, as are the transitions. And the realtime editing is great.

I would like to buy a new video card that can handle monitoring the HDV editing like I have when editing DV. But that will come.

March 22nd, 2005, 11:47 AM	#76
Steven Gotz Trustee Join Date: May 2002 Location: Clermont, FL Posts: 1,520	I think that an intermediate codec is the appropriate solution. As long as you have a video card that can help you view the output on an external monitor. There are ways to edit the long GOP, and they work OK, but I prefer to stick with the Aspect HD solution. The additional effects and transitions that all work in realtime with my underpowered PC just solves too many problems. __________________ Steven Gotz http://www.stevengotz.com

March 22nd, 2005, 01:34 PM	#81
Ken Hodson Trustee Join Date: Aug 2003 Location: Vancouver BC Canada Posts: 1,315	" If you really want to do significant HDV editing you need to plan to buy a dual-processor computer no matter what solution you're using" That is simply not true. The Cineform AspectHD solution offers ample performance from a single 800+ bus P4. The latest release v3 has just doubled the number of RT streams in the PPro timeline. 3-4 in 1080i or around 6 in my prefered 720p. At $800 including PPro, audition, and Encore, it can hardly be considered overpriced for what you get. __________________ Damnit Jim, I'm a film maker not a sysytems tech.

March 22nd, 2005, 11:13 PM	#87
Steven Gotz Trustee Join Date: May 2002 Location: Clermont, FL Posts: 1,520	You guys keep posting large numbers like we didn't already own Premiere Pro. Many of us do. If, perhaps, you didn't have anything, it might be a good idea to try Edius. But since I already own Premiere Pro, I chose a solution that was right for me. Aspect HD. __________________ Steven Gotz http://www.stevengotz.com

March 24th, 2005, 08:47 AM	#88
Gary Bettan Sponsor: Electronic Mailbox Join Date: Mar 2002 Location: Glen Cove, NY Posts: 758	Excellent point Steven. Aspect HD is a great way for Premiere Pro editors to migrate to HDV. The workflow is actually very smooth, and as was mentioned, you aren't going to have to buy a new computer to run it. Working with a digital intermediary technology (what a mouthful) takes getting used to. But I think the results are worth it. Premiere editors save a TON of time and money. - You don't have to learn a new NLE. Premiere Pro is a very powerful editor, with a great feature set. - You don't have to go and buy a dual processor computer. This is a very important point that should not be overlooked. P Pro w/ Aspect HD will run great in a P4 2.2 Ghz machine with a GB of RAM. Even a laptop! - You still keep the Adobe workflow and integration with their other apps - After Effects, PhotoShop, Encore & Audition. This will only get stronger and better with future releases. - With new Dual head graphic cardcs like the PNY540V you can get real-time HD previews out to an HD TV. Gary __________________ Check out http://www.videoguys.com 800 323-2325 We are the video editing and live video production experts! DV InfoNet members save 5%! Use Coupon Code DVINFO5OFF

March 25th, 2005, 02:24 PM	#90
Steven Gotz Trustee Join Date: May 2002 Location: Clermont, FL Posts: 1,520	Joel, I am really interested in what you think is wrong with Premiere Pro and Cineform Aspect HD 3.0 Which technical issues, or workflow issues are you unhappy with? I know that the solution is not perfect, but it works great for me. It could be faster. But the effects are sufficient for my needs, as are the transitions. And the realtime editing is great. I would like to buy a new video card that can handle monitoring the HDV editing like I have when editing DV. But that will come. __________________ Steven Gotz http://www.stevengotz.com

March 22nd, 2005, 11:57 AM	#77
Joel Corral Major Player Join Date: Nov 2003 Location: Brea, CA Posts: 356	<<<-- Originally posted by Steven Gotz : By the way, you can cross-grade to Edius for only $499 - which actually makes Joel's argument a bit stronger. Plus you get some other cool stuff - like a keyboard. I believe that the trade-in period is over. Besides, my PC isn't powerful enough to handle the new hardware. It only matches the minimum speed. I won't be upgrading until at least this summer. The trip to Greece this June is taking all my serious cash. -->>> steven why don't you download the demo from there site? give it a shot you'll be suprized at how well your machine will do.

March 22nd, 2005, 12:06 PM	#78
Ron Evans Inner Circle Join Date: Mar 2003 Location: Ottawa, Ontario, Canada Posts: 4,220	I have AMD XP2500 and on this machine the conversion time for Canopus HQ and the Cineform intermediate file is about the same ( about 2 times realtime ) Once in this intermediate form both Premiere Pro 1.5.1 and Edius Pro3 will playback the files. My machine is not powerful enough to playback the mt2 files without picture breakup and eventually stopping. Also my machine is not able to use the capture utilities of either Edius PRo3 or Premiere 1.5.1 since they either display a preview screen or convert on capture both of which end in the program stopping!!! CapDVHS and Cineform capture will however capture from my FX1 with no problems and I can then convert in non realtime to the intermediate files. I see little difference between the programs as far as compute power is concerned ( they both think my machine is inadequate!!!!) I thought of upgrading to a more powerful processor but will wait until I can afford a dual now. Ron Evans

March 22nd, 2005, 12:21 PM	#79
Joel Corral Major Player Join Date: Nov 2003 Location: Brea, CA Posts: 356	yes dual is the way to go. and 2 gigs of ram won't hurt either.

March 22nd, 2005, 01:11 PM	#80
Kevin Shaw Inner Circle Join Date: Sep 2004 Location: Sacramento, CA Posts: 2,488	A few clarifications regarding the Canopus HDV offerings: Both the software-only and hardware-supported Edius products can edit using either the native HDV format or the Canopus HQ codec. But I don't know anyone who's using native HDV in Edius because it would make no sense to do so: that reduces performance to unworkable levels with no benefit in terms of workflow. Based on all the comments I've seen around the internet, there is no one finding any meaningful benefit to doing native HDV editing, and all the popular solutions are using some sort of intermediate codec (e.g. Cineform, Canopus HQ, Apple AIC). As things stand today Canopus appears to easily have the most advanced HDV solutions, with a reasonable workflow and greatest variety of real-time HDV editing features. The catch is that their approach requires a little more horsepower compared to others for both the capture and editing phases, but a high-end single-processor PC is adequate for basic HDV work in Edius. If you really want to do significant HDV editing you need to plan to buy a dual-processor computer no matter what solution you're using, because it's just too much data to work well otherwise. You'll find some Mac users claiming they're doing HDV work on a single-processor G4 system, but if you press them they'll probably admit they have to render almost all of their changes to play them back. Editing HDV on one processor is like trying to haul a load of scrap iron on a bicycle: you can do it, but it's going to be slow going!

March 22nd, 2005, 02:07 PM	#82
Kevin Shaw Inner Circle Join Date: Sep 2004 Location: Sacramento, CA Posts: 2,488	"The Cineform AspectHD solution offers ample performance from a single 800+ bus P4. The latest release v3 has just doubled the number of RT streams in the PPro timeline. 3-4 in 1080i or around 6 in my prefered 720p. At $800 including PPro, audition, and Encore, it can hardly be considered overpriced for what you get." Ken: that's a fair statement, except Cineform reportedly only supports a handful of editing features in real time and hasn't (at least until now) been able to offer full-quality HD preview output, plus rendering times for finished projects are reportedly quite slow even with dual processors. (As is true for other HDV editing options.) So although $800 for the Cineform/Premiere bundle isn't a bad deal, it's not necessarily a better deal than spending a few hundred for Edius Pro 3 and then building or buying a hot-shot computer to back it up. It all depends how far you want to push your HDV editing and how much you can afford to spend to do so. Even with Cineform, the benefits in terms of reduced rendering time from dual processors would be worth the extra investment in base hardware.

March 22nd, 2005, 04:30 PM	#83
Ed Szarleta Regular Crew Join Date: Mar 2004 Location: Florida Posts: 156	OK, let's put all the speculation aside and get to the facts. I own a 3.2 Dual Xeon and have ran LE 6.1 with Long GOP on it with my FX1 footage. I get about 3 layers in RT on this setup. No more. That's with transitions and color correction only. I own a 3.2 P4 box with AspectHD (which will soon be going on my Xeon Box) and I get a solid 4 layers with the same transitions and color correction. There is no way Edius SW only solution can outperform LE 6.1 Pro in Long GOP. A few people claim there Edius SW only solution is performing well for what they are doing, which might be true, but let's compare apples to apples. AspectHD easily outperforms the Edius SW only solution. There is no comparison. Noticed I said software solution. I am sure the NX series trumps the AspectHD solution, but everyone here seems to be using the sofware only in Long GOP and AspectHD beats it easily.

March 22nd, 2005, 05:02 PM	#84
Kevin Shaw Inner Circle Join Date: Sep 2004 Location: Sacramento, CA Posts: 2,488	Ed: the problem here is that you're not specifying what editing features you can support in real time on those setups. I've seen screen shots from people who have the Premiere Pro/Cineform software showing that the total number of filters and effects available in real time can be counted on your fingers, whereas with Edius it's pretty much the entire feature set of the application. I don't have any comparable information for Liquid Edition, but what little feedback I've seen for that is that most people can't get it to work reliably with HDV footage. Ultimately I don't see a conflict in what we're saying here. Cineform is a good value for basic HDV work on single-processor computers if you don't need full-quality HD monitoring or a wide range of real-time editing features. Liquid Edition may be pretty good at editing native HDV if you can get it to work, and again if you don't need true HD monitoring. Edius will do HDV on high-end single processor systems but not older ones, and offers the most advanced HDV solution available if you can afford a fast computer and a Canopus HDV hardware card. On this last point there isn't any competition, because Canopus is the only company shipping an HDV solution with full-quality HD monitoring as an out-of-the-box option.

March 22nd, 2005, 05:23 PM	#85
Ed Szarleta Regular Crew Join Date: Mar 2004 Location: Florida Posts: 156	I posted above about what RT capabilities I have. I do mostly narrative work and dissolves and color correction are all I use. If you are doing PIP and Page curls, I would guess it would tax the best machines out there. I don't have time to test things I don't use, so I apologize for not delving deeper into the RT capabilities of all products. As far as RT Monitoring in AspectHD...I have it. My 6600GT with component out to my Mitsu HD monitor works just fine and dandy.

March 22nd, 2005, 05:57 PM	#86
Kevin Shaw Inner Circle Join Date: Sep 2004 Location: Sacramento, CA Posts: 2,488	"As far as RT Monitoring in AspectHD...I have it. My 6600GT with component out to my Mitsu HD monitor works just fine and dandy." Ed: you're right, it is now possible to generate draft-quality HD ouptut from Premiere Pro/Cineform using a high-end video card costing around $200-250, which brings the total price of this solution to over $1000. That's still a lot less than the complete Edius NX bundle costs, but as you said we shouldn't compare apples to oranges. Cineform is an excellent compromise if you don't need anything beyond the supported feature set, and if you're not picky about whether your monitoring output is full quality 1080i video. And then there's the empty slot on the NX hardware card for a future real-time HD DVD encoder, but that's a subject for next year. Cineform is apparently more hardware-efficient than Edius, but that doesn't make it more advanced. Gotta look at the overall picture...

March 25th, 2005, 12:33 PM	#89
Joel Corral Major Player Join Date: Nov 2003 Location: Brea, CA Posts: 356	<<<-- Originally posted by Gary Bettan : - This will only get stronger and better with future releases. Gary -->>> yes, i do agree "in time" Premiere will be stronger and better, but there solution just isn't there yet.