Alternative intermediate codec for Premiere Pro CS6

[The SphereX]

Hi folks !!!

Searching for an efficient intermediate codec to use in "Premiere Pro CS6", for now I ended up with "PICVideo M-JPEG". It's very space-saving, because I can set the bitrate down to 75 MBit/s without any noticeable difference compared to the original. Unfortunately, video files compressed with this codec imported into Premiere, result in a rather stuttering preview, especially when it comes to transitions. So i had to check out further codecs and came across ProRes, that seems to be recommended and used very commonly. And indeed, ProRes files play back without any problems in Premiere. BUT: I have to set the bitrate at least to 160 MBit/s :eek: to achieve the same quality as with "PICVideo M-JPEG" at only 75 MBit/s!!! So that's rather disappointing.

In a word: Does anybody know a real alternative to the "PICVideo M-JPEG" codec that

1.) achieves almost lossless quality at about 75 MBit/s
2.) can be edited in "Premiere Pro CS6" without frame drops when previewing

Video file specs

> 1920 x 1080
> 50 fps

System specs

> CPU: Intel Core i7-3770S, 4 x 3,10 GHz
> RAM: 1 x 8 GB GeIL EVO Corsa
> Motherboard: ASUS P8Z77-V LX
> Grafik: Intel HD Graphics 4000
> OS: Windows 7 Ultimate


Greetz,
The SphereX

[ChiDragon]

Maybe you could try another MJPEG codec, like BlackMagic.

The Blackmagic Codecs are included with the Desktop Video driver. You can download that driver from our website via the support center. If you go to the following url:

www.blackmagicdesign.com/support/

You will be asked for three things. For Host Computer Type choose Windows, for Product Series choose DeckLink, and for Product choose DeckLink SDI, then hit the Search button. On the page that it brings you to, under Downloads you should see a download for Desktop Video 9.7 for Windows. When you install Desktop Video on your hard drive it will look for compatible programs on the drive it is installed on to populate the Blackmagic Codecs into.

[The SphereX]

Thanks for your hint, but sadly the BlackMagic codec doesn't solve my problem, too.

Meanwhile I've checked a whole list of nameable intermediate codecs, but none seems to work well with Premiere (except ProRes). So slowly but surely I suspect, that no matter what codec you use, as long as it's not natively supported by Premiere, meaning the programme has to use VfW or DirectShow for decoding, you won't have a fluent preview. Too bad ... :(

Greetz,
The SphereX

[kolak]

Cineform, UtVideo, Grass Valley HQ, HQX and many others (most free) work fine with Premiere.
Premiere has poor preview- if you want to have proper preview you need to buy hardware HDMI/HD-SDI card.

Use Grass Valley Edius NLE- fast, reliable and with very good full screen preview. With CPU like yours it will fly with UtVideo, Cineform, HQ, HQX or Lossless codec. It loves UtVideo codec which is ridiculously fast.

[poisondeathray]

result in a rather stuttering preview, especially when it comes to transitions.

.
.


> Grafik: Intel HD Graphics 4000


This is an inadequate GPU. Most transitions and effects are GPU accelerated by the Mercury Playback Engine. To take full advantage you need a Nvidia card , CUDA enabled

[The SphereX]

@ kolak

" ... Use Grass Valley Edius ... With CPU like yours it will fly with ... "

Thanks! Sounds promising. I'll give it a try.

@ poisondeathray

I don't think, that I need an extra powerful GPU to be able to play back a boringly normal crossfade in realtime with an Intel Core i7-3770S under the hood, don't I?

Greetz,
The SphereX

[benwaggoner]

I'd recommend picking something that Premiere has a built-in preset for, as they'll obviously have done tuning around those. There are a bunch of MPEG-2 I-frame only options.

Canopus HQ has some weird metadata issues if you plan to do any downstream encoding from them. Aspect ratio and progressive/interlaced often don't show up correctly in many tools.

ProRes is only good on Mac.

Cineform is great, but you have to pay for it.

DNxHD has good, free cross-platform versions. That might be where I'd start if you want to do 10-bit.

[poisondeathray]

There is a free version of cineform , "Go Pro Cineform Studio"

Sorry, but you won't get near lossless 1920x1080p50 at ~75Mb/s with an I-frame codec for typical footage. Unless your perception of "near lossless quality" is very different. Usually the more compressed, the more difficult to decode, the worse scrubbing performance

The GPU provides benefits for more than simple transitions, think when you have multiple layers with transitions and effects - those are rendered in real time , even on 4K footage. You don't need an expensive quadro, even a "cheap" consumer card will work


You can also try decreasing your preview quality

Another option is to use a proxy workflow. ie. use lower quality, lower res files to edit, swap back in full quality originals on final render.

[kolak]

I'd recommend picking something that Premiere has a built-in preset for, as they'll obviously have done tuning around those. There are a bunch of MPEG-2 I-frame only options.

Canopus HQ has some weird metadata issues if you plan to do any downstream encoding from them. Aspect ratio and progressive/interlaced often don't show up correctly in many tools.

ProRes is only good on Mac.

Cineform is great, but you have to pay for it.

DNxHD has good, free cross-platform versions. That might be where I'd start if you want to do 10-bit.

If file is coming from Edius and you read "GV custom" metadata properly (specially in AVI) than it has all info set correctly- this includes field order, aspect ratio and also TC and some other metadata. Carbon Coder reads this correctly.

[benwaggoner]

If file is coming from Edius and you read "GV custom" metadata properly (specially in AVI) than it has all info set correctly- this includes field order, aspect ratio and also TC and some other metadata. Carbon Coder reads this correctly.
I have seen cases where Carbon Coder does not read the metadata correctly, particularly in distinguishing between prog/TFF/BFF. It appears to just default to the last settings used with a similar Canopus HQ file. I also see anamorphic 1440x1080 showing up as 4:3 aspect ratio.

[kolak]

Hmmm- are the files coming from Edius? Please note that Edius sets all flags according to main project settings. All metadata is not a feature of Canopus HQ codec itself (correct flagging applies to other codecs including uncompressed formats), but fact that Grass Valley uses own method of storing metadata in AVI. Not many apps read this data properly (as this is GV own method), but Carbon Coder does (or should). You can also verify it by importing file back to Edius and checking all flags there.

I just done quick few exports and everything is fine. Flags are the same as Edius project settings.
It may be also related to CC setting called: "Applied modified source option to similar sources".

[benwaggoner]

Hmmm- are the files coming from Edius? Please note that Edius sets all flags according to main project settings. All metadata is not a feature of Canopus HQ codec itself (correct flagging applies to other codecs including uncompressed formats), but fact that Grass Valley uses own method of storing metadata in AVI. Not many apps read this data properly (as this is GV own method), but Carbon Coder does (or should). You can also verify it by importing file back to Edius and checking all flags there.
These are files that were provided for a third party, and I don't have any details how they were authored.

It's quite possible they weren't encoded with Edius directly, or that Edius was misconfigured.

I just done quick few exports and everything is fine. Flags are the same as Edius project settings.
Well, that's good news. Any chance could could provide me with a test file like this? I can be just a few frames.

It may be also related to CC setting called: "Applied modified source option to similar sources".
Almost certainly.

[kolak]

Ben- check your PM box.

[benwaggoner]

Ben- check your PM box.
I did, and I can confirm the files worked perfectly in Carbon.

Also, the brand-new MediaInfo 0.7.63 correctly reads aspect ratio from the Canopus files now, but doesn't get field info.

Video
ID : 0
Format : Canopus HQ
Codec ID : CUVC
Codec ID/Info : Canopus HQ
Duration : 400ms
Bit rate : 56.9 Mbps
Width : 1 440 pixels
Height : 1 080 pixels
Display aspect ratio : 16:9
Frame rate : 25.000 fps
Bits/(Pixel*Frame) : 1.464
Stream size : 2.71 MiB (93%)

[kolak]

Hmm- maybe you can drop sample to the developer- this info is in AVI headers somewhere. TC is actually in "clear" form- just look in HEX editor in Vdub. It should be easy to add.
Also note that GV codecs are FREE now including encoding part and there is also MAC version for HQ and HQX.

[benwaggoner]

Hmm- maybe you can drop sample to the developer- this info is in AVI headers somewhere. TC is actually in "clear" form- just look in HEX editor in Vdub. It should be easy to add.
I sent Digimetrics your files about 30 minutes ago :).

Also note that GV codecs are FREE now including encoding part and there is also MAC version for HQ and HQX.
Good to note.

Do you think the HQ/HQX codecs are better than DNxHD for this kind of use?

[kolak]

HQ is bit lower quality than DNxHD, but 8bit only (with Alpha channel if needed). HQ is limited to specific (broadcast standard) frame sizes.
HQX is 10bit (also with Alpha if needed) with quality, which can go way above DNxHD (typically 3:1 at highest settings). It has almost unrestricted frame size (8Kx8K is not a problem at all), when used in MOV can be exported as 10bit out of AE (AVI works at 10bit only in Edius). Nice thing about them is bitrate control- you can limit peak and Q sensitivity- very useful to have such a control. They work extremely fast in Edius- nothing comes close as a whole setup. AVID+ DNxHD looks like a joke in comparison.

HQX white paper:

http://www.grassvalley.com/docs/WhitePapers/professional/GV-4097M_HQX_Whitepaper.pdf