Premiere Pro 2 - Inconsistent Cutting?

[Cyberpro60]

Premiere Pro 2 cutting problem:

I imported an avi clip into Premiere Pro 2 and cut it at the exact frame where I wanted it to end [using frame accurate cutting]. I then added a second clip to the timeline [with no intervening spaces or transitions] and previewed the result which was exactly what I wanted.

Problem: When I play back my video after rendering I note that there are extra frames in the movie that come AFTER my cut point. In other words, the frames that I had specifically cut out are still there !!!!

To make sure that I had made no mistake I went back to Premiere and stepped through the timeline frame by frame and noted that the clip ended precisely where I had made the cut. I even checked the cut using the trim monitor and the result was the same as when I stepped through on the timeline.

The only inconsistency that I noted was that, very occasionally, when playing back the clip at normal speed, these cut out/invisible frames showed up about once in every four or five attempts.

I am completely at a loss to explain how cut frames can keep reappearing in my movie like this !!!! What is causing this problem and how do I eliminate it?

Note: As a workaround I adjusted the opacity of the clip to zero in the last few frames however this should have not been necessary and is not quite what I wanted.

[krisq]

is it dv you're trying to edit?

[Cyberpro60]

is it dv you're trying to edit?

Erm .... I think the answer to that has to be a yes krisq.

As indicated in my post - it was an .AVI file [encoded using XviD I believe] that was my original source.

[krisq]

then it's not DV. .avi is just a container :). pp2.0 has very crappy support for xvid/divx encodings. it is recommended to re-encode to some lossless format where every frame is a keyframe. try lagarith or huffyuv.

[Cyberpro60]

I tried another video project - this time I converted to DV format using VirtualDub and Panasonic's DV codec before working in PP2.

I am still editing this job at the moment but from what I have seen I think the problem is still with me as I can see frames that are supposedly cut still appearing when I play through the area where its been cut. What the final output contains remains to be seen.

nb: I picked the Panasonic codec because it is supposed to be a video format the PP2 prefers. I haven't tried huffyuv or lagarith yet. I will give huffyuv a trial but I haven't even heard of lagarith but will do some research.

I must admit that I am surprised at this problem. I would have thought that cutting & editing are primary functions of NLE programs like PP2 and I am more than a little annoyed at its singular failings given the inconsiderable cost of this software.

BTW: If PP2 is so crappy what NLE editor do you think is better?

[krisq]

Make sure your project settings are correct. The most important thing is field order. You need to know if your material is top field first, bottom field first or maybe progressive and set the project accordingly. I won't get into details but you shouldn't re-encode to DV, try lagarith.
As for another NL editor, you can try Sony Vegas.

[Blue_MiSfit]

PP3 has improved things a lot.

I have done lots of HuffYUV / Lagarith input to Premiere. The only issue is the very high data rate makes your hard drive beg for forgiveness, so it's almost impractical to edit more than 1-2 streams off a single hard drive.

One thing you can try is using AviSynth. There's a plugin for Premiere out there that can feed uncompressed video into Premiere from AviSynth. Very handy!

Also, whatever you do, DON'T use premiere's built in VFW output module. It's hopeless. Install Debugmode Frameserver to render a false AVI that can then be fed into VirtualDub's VFW engine. Output HuffYUV / Lagarith again to maintain lossless. MUCH MUCH MUCH better results, promise.

PM me if you need more help. I've been jumping through Premiere hoops for a solid year, and have figured out solid workflows for working with progressive content that isn't DV :)

~MiSfit

[nicco]

Also, whatever you do, DON'T use premiere's built in VFW output module. It's hopeless. Install Debugmode Frameserver to render a false AVI that can then be fed into VirtualDub's VFW engine. Output HuffYUV / Lagarith again to maintain lossless. MUCH MUCH MUCH better results, promise.

totally agree! Use frameserve for divx/xvid/x264 encoding!

Premiere-->Frameserve-->Avisynth-->encoding software (Vdub, MeGUI, etc)

@Blue_MiSfit
In your experience is faster frameserving directly from premiere while encoding or exporting the entire movie in HuffYuv and then encode?

[Blue_MiSfit]

Hard to say. I like to output a HuffYUV avi, so that if I need to run avisynth filters on it later, I can easily do that - repeatably.

~MiSfit