Codec H264 on a PC at DVinfo.net

Miguel Lopez · January 9th, 2006, 05:38 PM

Can i create quicktimes with h264 codec in a PC?
can i do it with vegas video?

Thanks!

Brian Valente · January 21st, 2006, 12:45 AM

Miguel -

I am struggling with this right now. From what I can tell, there is no direct output to h.264. The Sony Vegas forums seem to confirm this at sonymedia.com

My current theory is to output uncompressed .avi and export it to h.264 from within the QT7 player (choose Export...)

Emre Safak · January 21st, 2006, 07:18 AM

"Yes" to both questions. You need Quicktime 7.0 and Sony Vegas 6.0c. Quicktime H.264 Tutorial.

Brian Valente · January 21st, 2006, 11:40 AM

Which is great - except QT7 consistently blows up with a buffer overflow error every time I select "Export..." SD or HDV.

Frustrating.

Emre Safak · January 21st, 2006, 03:54 PM

Does it do that with 7.04?

Brian Valente · January 21st, 2006, 03:56 PM

yep - latest and greatest. 7.04 QT and vegas 6.0c. If I open an uncompressed HDV out and choose export, it just crashes... no warning or anything

Emre Safak · January 21st, 2006, 04:52 PM

Does this thread help?

Brian Valente · January 21st, 2006, 05:42 PM

That's great - thanks for the lead. I don't know, but I will give it a whirl in Sorenson and report back the results.

I would say the QT Pro 7 (7.04 at least) on PC crashes consistently when trying to export anything (buffer overrun).

George Ellis · January 23rd, 2006, 04:02 PM

And yet another thread points to this application... http://www.alfanet.it/squared5/streamclipwindows.html

Brian Valente · January 23rd, 2006, 05:24 PM

Results report: Sorenson 4.3 does the trick. I earlier assumed h.264 would be under Quicktime and actually say "H.264", but as pointed out elsewhere you need to use the settings of MPEG4/AVC. They are all there!

So the workflow for creating h.264 from PC for me is:

Import HDV footage into vegas using CineForm intermediate
edit/grade
export as uncompressed
open in Sorenson Squeeze
Squeeze using MPEG4/AVC1080i (or whatever format I want)

Thanks - I hope this helps someone else in a similar predicament

Kevin Shaw · January 23rd, 2006, 07:02 PM

Brian: have you tried comparing the results you get that way with H.264 to what you can get by encoding directly to Windows Media with a similar bit rate? If so, what specific differences do you notice between these two options in terms of video image quality?

Brian Valente · January 23rd, 2006, 07:06 PM

If anyone is interested I can try that out and let you know the results

Kevin Shaw · January 23rd, 2006, 07:17 PM

Brian: please do, and while you're at it let us know how long each approach takes (from start to finish) to output a minute of your typical edited video.

Keith Wakeham · January 23rd, 2006, 07:17 PM

I got the sorenson trial and some HDV footage from the HD100 and sorenson does a pretty good job. Unfortunately I was looking for h.264 in a quicktime mov container, but the sorenson encodes some nice h.264 in an mp4 container so I shouldn't complain.

I just wanted to do a raw hdv encode, so i used mpegtohdtv to convert the m2t files to mpg, loaded up in sorenson squeeze 4.3 trial and fired it off on some encodes.

It's great for exporting to several formats. I used cleaner before but I like sorenson squeeze now and think its a great program.

For HD I found that h.264 looked really good and so did wmv, but at similar bitrate I think h.264 looked shaper but it also changed the colours, it made it more vibrant and seemed to increase the contrast while wmv seemed to keep the colours much more accurately. It might just be it stretching the NTSC white and black to computer white and black but it still seems to be changing the colour. Anyone else have this problem? I think I'm going to try and do some more footage to recreate this problem.

Dan Euritt · January 24th, 2006, 02:23 PM

if you are serious about creating h.264, you need to check out the nero encoder... it does a really good job.

wmv vs. h.264... can you create vbr footage with the h.264 encoders? it can make a big difference in quality and file size... h.264 will take more computing horsepower to play, so it won't be as compatible as wmv, on slower computers.

if you look at the nero encoder settings, there is a "quicktime compatability" setting, that apparently disables bidirectional prediction, in order for the clip to play back well with the qt player... at least i think that's the reason.

so you could be trading off quality over compatibility with h.264, because the qt player may not be able to handle the full h.264 standard.

January 9th, 2006, 05:38 PM	#1
Miguel Lopez Regular Crew Join Date: Mar 2003 Location: Madrid, Spain Posts: 187	Codec H264 on a PC Can i create quicktimes with h264 codec in a PC? can i do it with vegas video? Thanks!

January 21st, 2006, 12:45 AM	#2
Brian Valente Major Player Join Date: Jan 2005 Location: Hollywood, CA Posts: 293	Miguel - I am struggling with this right now. From what I can tell, there is no direct output to h.264. The Sony Vegas forums seem to confirm this at sonymedia.com My current theory is to output uncompressed .avi and export it to h.264 from within the QT7 player (choose Export...) __________________ ========================== Brian Valente Redrock Microsystems

January 21st, 2006, 11:40 AM	#4
Brian Valente Major Player Join Date: Jan 2005 Location: Hollywood, CA Posts: 293	Which is great - except QT7 consistently blows up with a buffer overflow error every time I select "Export..." SD or HDV. Frustrating. __________________ ========================== Brian Valente Redrock Microsystems

January 21st, 2006, 03:56 PM	#6
Brian Valente Major Player Join Date: Jan 2005 Location: Hollywood, CA Posts: 293	yep - latest and greatest. 7.04 QT and vegas 6.0c. If I open an uncompressed HDV out and choose export, it just crashes... no warning or anything __________________ ========================== Brian Valente Redrock Microsystems

January 21st, 2006, 05:42 PM	#8
Brian Valente Major Player Join Date: Jan 2005 Location: Hollywood, CA Posts: 293	That's great - thanks for the lead. I don't know, but I will give it a whirl in Sorenson and report back the results. I would say the QT Pro 7 (7.04 at least) on PC crashes consistently when trying to export anything (buffer overrun). __________________ ========================== Brian Valente Redrock Microsystems

January 21st, 2006, 07:18 AM	#3
Emre Safak Trustee Join Date: Feb 2004 Location: Brookline, MA Posts: 1,447	"Yes" to both questions. You need Quicktime 7.0 and Sony Vegas 6.0c. Quicktime H.264 Tutorial.

January 21st, 2006, 03:54 PM	#5
Emre Safak Trustee Join Date: Feb 2004 Location: Brookline, MA Posts: 1,447	Does it do that with 7.04?

January 21st, 2006, 04:52 PM	#7
Emre Safak Trustee Join Date: Feb 2004 Location: Brookline, MA Posts: 1,447	Does this thread help?

January 23rd, 2006, 04:02 PM	#9
George Ellis Trustee Join Date: Feb 2004 Location: Suwanee, GA Posts: 1,241	And yet another thread points to this application... http://www.alfanet.it/squared5/streamclipwindows.html

January 23rd, 2006, 05:24 PM	#10
Brian Valente Major Player Join Date: Jan 2005 Location: Hollywood, CA Posts: 293	Results report: Sorenson 4.3 does the trick. I earlier assumed h.264 would be under Quicktime and actually say "H.264", but as pointed out elsewhere you need to use the settings of MPEG4/AVC. They are all there! So the workflow for creating h.264 from PC for me is: Import HDV footage into vegas using CineForm intermediate edit/grade export as uncompressed open in Sorenson Squeeze Squeeze using MPEG4/AVC1080i (or whatever format I want) Thanks - I hope this helps someone else in a similar predicament __________________ ========================== Brian Valente Redrock Microsystems

January 23rd, 2006, 07:02 PM	#11
Kevin Shaw Inner Circle Join Date: Sep 2004 Location: Sacramento, CA Posts: 2,488	Brian: have you tried comparing the results you get that way with H.264 to what you can get by encoding directly to Windows Media with a similar bit rate? If so, what specific differences do you notice between these two options in terms of video image quality?

January 23rd, 2006, 07:06 PM	#12
Brian Valente Major Player Join Date: Jan 2005 Location: Hollywood, CA Posts: 293	If anyone is interested I can try that out and let you know the results __________________ ========================== Brian Valente Redrock Microsystems

January 23rd, 2006, 07:17 PM	#13
Kevin Shaw Inner Circle Join Date: Sep 2004 Location: Sacramento, CA Posts: 2,488	Brian: please do, and while you're at it let us know how long each approach takes (from start to finish) to output a minute of your typical edited video.

January 23rd, 2006, 07:17 PM	#14
Keith Wakeham Major Player Join Date: Jan 2005 Location: St. John's, NL, Canada Posts: 416	I got the sorenson trial and some HDV footage from the HD100 and sorenson does a pretty good job. Unfortunately I was looking for h.264 in a quicktime mov container, but the sorenson encodes some nice h.264 in an mp4 container so I shouldn't complain. I just wanted to do a raw hdv encode, so i used mpegtohdtv to convert the m2t files to mpg, loaded up in sorenson squeeze 4.3 trial and fired it off on some encodes. It's great for exporting to several formats. I used cleaner before but I like sorenson squeeze now and think its a great program. For HD I found that h.264 looked really good and so did wmv, but at similar bitrate I think h.264 looked shaper but it also changed the colours, it made it more vibrant and seemed to increase the contrast while wmv seemed to keep the colours much more accurately. It might just be it stretching the NTSC white and black to computer white and black but it still seems to be changing the colour. Anyone else have this problem? I think I'm going to try and do some more footage to recreate this problem. __________________ www.engr.mun.ca/~wakeham/index.htm

January 24th, 2006, 02:23 PM	#15
Dan Euritt Trustee Join Date: Mar 2004 Location: Carlsbad CA Posts: 1,132	if you are serious about creating h.264, you need to check out the nero encoder... it does a really good job. wmv vs. h.264... can you create vbr footage with the h.264 encoders? it can make a big difference in quality and file size... h.264 will take more computing horsepower to play, so it won't be as compatible as wmv, on slower computers. if you look at the nero encoder settings, there is a "quicktime compatability" setting, that apparently disables bidirectional prediction, in order for the clip to play back well with the qt player... at least i think that's the reason. so you could be trading off quality over compatibility with h.264, because the qt player may not be able to handle the full h.264 standard.