Best Quicktime codec for 'Look'

[Anthony Fiorentino]

I've searched previous posts and couldn't find an answer on this specific subject.

What is everyone's preferred codec within a Quicktime for Film Look or pure 24p?

For no real reason, I've been using Sorenson 3 basic - but haven't really toyed with the other compression schemes. Has anyone ever really scrutinzed the available QT codecs?

[Rob Lohman]

In general it is a bad idea to pick any codec for a "film look" (whatever that
is, read the numerous LONG threads in the film look forum). Why is this?
Because a codec should encode the movie with the given bitrate as best
as it can, which means staying as close to the LOOK of the ORIGINAL MOVIE
as possible!

The only job a codec has is to try and generate smaller files while maintaining
the same look (this sometimes fails). The more it deviates from the look the
more bad the codec is or you are giving it bad settings (like a bitrate of
10 kbps).

The "look" is primarely achieved in producten. Recording at 24 fps, recording
clean and good audio, using good camera movies and framing. Having good
lighting and acting. Then in post-production by doing proper editing, sound
mixing and color corrections / effects.

The finaly delivery system (media & codec) then tries to maintain all of this
as best as possible.

I hope this has cleared some things up. For QuickTime delivery a lot of people
are indeed using Sorenson (3) or MPEG-4. Now that QuickTime 7 is out with
the new H.264 codec more people might start using that.