View Single Post
Old 9th February 2003, 14:26   #1  |  Link
easy2Bcheesy
Moderator
 
easy2Bcheesy's Avatar
 
Join Date: Feb 2002
Posts: 643
PAL to NTSC and NTSC to PAL

I've noticed many posts in the past about the process of converting footage from one format to another, either NTSC to PAL or PAL to NTSC.

I've come to the conclusion that the best consumer level tool to get is **easily** Canopus ProCoder. It's far superior to any avisynth script I've seen, and almost as good as some of the enormously expensive production house converters.

First of all, it's incredibly easy to use - you can input quicktimes, avis, anything - and just specify the output format (MS DV PAL/NTSC, Quicktime PAL/NTSC, MPEG2 PAL/NTSC)...

What I'm doing is recording UK TV shows onto my Philips DVD Recorder and then re-encoding them into NTSC using ProCoder to send to my friends in the USA. So in this case, PAL to NTSC. I use a lot of NTSC to PAL conversion footage at work, so I've tested both.

You simply demux the VOBs elementary files (M2V and AC3) and input the M2V into ProCoder, set up to output NTSC. I used a 1-Pass VBR at 'Highest Quality'. It's not fast (4.3fps on my 1.2gig Athlon) but the results are almost as good as some of the commercial £80,000 standards converters I've used.

I've also used ProCoder's NTSC to PAL conversion. Again, the quality is more than acceptable. The NTSC to PAL conversion is much better than the PAL to NTSC conversion. This is because it's stripping frames out of the former and blending them, as opposed to the latter where it is having to create new frames.

I've just done two two-hour sets of footage and the sync is PERFECT. It's even *exactly* the same length as the input footage. So no lip sync problems at all.


Most of the current conversion methods I've seen on field-based footage involve deinterlacing at some point - not good when you're effectively halving the clarity of the picture. ProCoder has a pretty decent field-blending algorhythm and keeps detail high. Impressive.

I've yet to try either process on progressive frame footage, but the results will obviously be a lot better (just resizing of frames and blending, no mucking about with blending fields).


I do a lot of standards conversion at work and I think that for this feature alone, ProCoder is worth getting at $699.

Last edited by easy2Bcheesy; 10th February 2003 at 10:55.
easy2Bcheesy is offline   Reply With Quote