Average POTN user 5dmk2 video to share workflow (i put it on smugmug)

Yeah no worries Johnathan, yeah the location is a ripper - i knew that the street where they were house sitting was close to the river but very glad i brought my tripod as it was a seriously lazy mans shooting day out. Step onto balcony and 100 boats cruise past... with the 100-400 i could crop in on a boat at what felt like nearly 1km and read their registration - wow 21MP My connection is not so great, for HD i have to pause and wait a bit for it to pre load. Did you mean quality of the 100-400 as a pro or con here? not that i mind - its hard to keep her steady even IS and on a tripod. And ive never loved the IQ from this lens although mediocre lenses is all that Mk2 footage seems to need seeing as it doesnt use 22mp to shoot.

No worries Mitch - seems you have a plethora of good 5d links there! glad i could contribute... do i get a by line on the review to potn link ? hehehe ill have to update those links with you should i upgrade my account or should Andy give me a free account to demonstrate and bring lots of traffic there i dont want to privacy and password protect all my personal content only to leave demo stuff on public display on my standard account.. but i like to contribute to the net community and chat about it on here.

Theodore: wow i didnt realise that pc power was required even to view these streamed files... i suppose it makes sense - it sends the file to you and its still proper hd footage needing to be buffered and played - i cant seem to get these H.264 files to play properly on my pc - only once they are uploaded - wierd - as i can view the original files pretty much fine using quicktime player. Hahaha yeah the beer was a corona... my intended shot was as i got it out of the esky it was icy and i wanted to shoot the ice melting - but it was 37degrees (100F) so it kinda didnt last long. And when i opened it it went everywhere!

Final cut pro seems to be the dux nuts of video... man i just cannot afford another toy! hahaha that and im angling for a boat aswell arrgh!

im only using Premiere Pro CS3 now for edits... completely stable and predictable... wish it had a basic mode for lazy editing. (i used to spend 8-12hrs editing clips - i just do not have the time now)

I think I may have a much cheaper way of doing this, and possibly faster (I transcode TV broadcasts and DVDs etc...). If I'm not mistaken the output is baseline H264 in MOV with PCM audio.

Would someone mind posting a few seconds (or one minute) of untouched output somewhere for download so I can confirm this?

http://www.sendspace.c​om/file/wnydn7

for those who want a small snippet of HD video - just one of the scenes from my lil short - about 100mb - dryfitre wanted a straight from camera file so here it is...

The video quality is better than most camcorders I've seen, but if you look at the trees in the background (upper right) you'll notice a lot of "swimming" blocks. It looks like there's a major shift every time an I-frame (Independent frame) comes up. A similar effect happens with the trees in the first video posted and looks kind of like the trees are jumping. It could be the focus is changing very rapidly, but it happens in fairly regular intervals and doesn't actually look more focused in my eyes.

There is also a large amount of chroma noise/artifacting in the middle part of the water that I don't really know a reliable way of dealing with, but I doubt most people would notice as it's relatively stationary.

I have a small clip that was encoded at 5 Mbps (about 1/4th the original bitrate). I did a little bit of denoising and added a short fade in, but it still looks pretty bad. Tweaking saturation and similar things is fairly easy and fast, but I'd rather not mess with that at this stage.

http://www.sendspace.c​om/file/zirbjy

Do NOT use Quicktime to play back this file unless you have the pro version as it may play incorrectly, if at all. Use the Combined Community Codec Pack (CCCP, free and open source) or CoreAVC Pro ($15) with a direct show enable player like Media player classic (included in CCCP), windows media player or Zoomplayer (included in CCCP) to play this file. If you prefer a stand-alone solution VLCcan be used with or without installing.

I used x264to encode this file with filtering done in avisynth. Once you have everything set up and filters picked out the process can be pretty much automated (minus picking scene cuts and adding fades). Furthermore it is possible to stitch together, or append, files once they have been encoded without re-encoding them.

All of the software I used for this is free and open source. I was hoping to get a lot more done today; I will try to find or start writing up a simple guide tomorrow if anyone is interested.

http://forum.doom9.org​/ is a great place to learn about encoding, but I do not know how newbie friendly it is.

Bravo! Very nice work. I enjoyed it. Makes me want to pull out my DVX and go shoot. Thank you!

gee dryfire... thats quite a compression - from 101mb to 12mb... looks good though!

the green boat in the foreground is where the focus was on and the camera was not touched in this sequence. So focus was not adjusted. I do see that 'shift' you speak of... i shot alot of this into the sun (it was getting low on the horizon ) so i know that could explain a bit of the glare factor - although that doesnt influence compression straight from the camera... i have learned more about the shooting modes now too so i can easier influence and keep track of the paramaters used (aperture, iso etc) - i dare say into sun this would have chosen the smallest aperture - which couldnt have helped with IQ.

i can see the chroma noise you speak of in the original - it probably wasnt a very nice file to give you - i should maybe give you something a little cleaner and consistent with a standard light... the noise is less evident in your compressed format - if i can see it at all.

I have grabbed the original 100mb file and your 12mb file and sent it to smugmug to see how they go with it on the auto upload so i will see how it comes out in the wash so to speak... would be really nice to be sending files 12% of original size to smugmug to be viewed by my family etc. rather than 800 mb for 5mins. They are uploading as we speak and ive put them into a new folder called boat test - i made sure you got a name credit there - nothing worse than plagiarism

Cheers for that... is avisynth compatable with vista 64? i had a quick read up... seems like it may be something a little over my head in my limited available time to learn it...

what is the dimensions of the video you encoded?

dryfire - how would one encode using x264? would it appear as an option in say premiere pro cs3 once you download the codec ? or does it need to be fed through a different program... ie make a clip of combined videos and spit it out as video.xxx (which format?) and then encode using x264..?

you can tell im new at this

Lol, I'm happy you liked the name. I believe Avisynth is compatible with every version of windows starting from windows 2000 . It may look complicated, but the amount of stuff you'll need to do is fairly minimal. Avisynth is a professional grade frame server and can do a lot of things 95% of people do not need to do. A lot of people use it without even knowing.

Once I come up with a filtering pattern I like for the source the work is pretty much automated. It is even possible to do a lot of basic video editing (cuts, fades, typesetting, etc..) with avisynth by only editing a few lines of code or by using megui. I plan to format such a script as a guide for those who don't have or want to buy CS2/3/4.

The resolution for that clip is 1280x720 at a frame rate of 30fps (the original frame rate). Something I forgot to mention earlier is that the 5D appears to capture 30 unique frames per second, not 24 with a duplicate every 5 frames.

The easiest way to encode with x264 that I know of is using megui. You can find some information about it here and a guide here.

When you're done, I'd suggest using a lossless codec like lagarith to output from premiere (make sure your output is in the YV12 colorspace). Once that's done simply drag and drop the file into megui and select a profile from the drop box--something like "x264: 2-pass HQ." Then under tools select "Bitrate Calculator" and enter your desired filesize or desired bitrate and hit apply. After that hit "Enqueue." Go the the Queue tab and hit start.

I'm sure there are faster ways, but I don't keep up with front ends. I've been doing this type of work for 4 years and I much prefer methods that give me as much control as possible.

Do you know how smugmug handles encoding? It may be possible to format your videos so they don't actually re-encode your work as I'm pretty sure they don't use very good/time intensive settings.

Cheers dryfire - do you have a real name? Ill dig a little deeper into your suggested links... judging by the lack of interest by other partys im either on my own in what im up to or they havent realised they will want this information later on...

I sent both files to smugmug... you can see them side by side - even if this information helps people share movies at hi res i figuire the conversation cant hurt... i cannot see too much difference in the converted smugmug files... i tell you what tho... sending 12mb is much preferred to sending 100mb

this is as much info as i lazily found about smugmug encoding

http://www.smugmug.com​/help/video-sharing

im sure if i asked they would fill us in more on it --- ANDY Care to chime in? or one of your staff? your x264 converted files seemed to easily upload and be available fairly quickly... and as mentioned comparable to the conversion done on a 100mb file... maybe your conversion is same or similar to the one used there... would make sense for smugmug to not be tucking 100mb 20sec files away in its server...

looking forward to more playin with my new toy...

keep us posted..

nicko

PPS: I just sent smugmug a help query and link to this thread - will keep you posted if they have some more information regarding more detailed encoding requirements (if that information is available to the public of course)

You look like you've dived head first into the AVCHD video thing with the camera. Kudos to you. I'm not a video expert, but I have picked up a few things here and there with owning a Canon HV20, so I'll try to help share my experiences with you.

1) If you want to use audio, I suggest picking up a shotgun mic such as the Rode VideoMic. It mounts in your camera's hotshoe. Unfortunately, it does require its own power source (batteries) and it you'll need to plug the audio into the 5D Mk II mic input. That should dramatically improve your audio.

2) With regards to the encoding, are you looking to push 720 or 1080? Keep in mind that 1920x1080 is 2.25x the pixel count of 1280x720. And 1280x720 is 2.6x the pixel count of typical DVD quality (NTSC 720x480). I convert DVDs to H.264 and I'm pretty satisfied with a bit rate of 1500 kpbs. It comes out to be 1.5 hours = 1GB file. For 720P content, 1500 is just too low. I would say in my personal experience with transcoding H.264, I'd stay around 2000-4500. I'm not sure if you used multi-pass encoding, but if didn't you should and that should help make the video a bit better.

3) For remote playing on your television.. assuming you have a 720P or 1080 TV, you have several options. If your TV has an RGB or DVI/HDMI input, then you can try to plug your computer directly into your TV. Some RGB interfaces on TVs are picky, so this may not work 100%. DVI/HDMI is much easier for computers to interface with TVs directly. Your computer will just need to support DVI out and your TV will need to have an HDMI in. I'm not sure where you can pick up the cables from in Perth, but in the US these cables can be purchase relatively inexpensively at http://www.monoprice.c​om …&p_id=2661&seq=​1&format=2

If you didn't want to go through this hassle, you can also use an Xbox 360 or Sony PS3 for HD playback. With the Xbox 360, if you have XP Media Center edition or Vista Ultimate, this will work out of the box with HomePNP. With the Sony PS3, you'll need install software that will support DNLA. Both the Xbox and PS3 will play H.264 (AVCHD) videos directly from your computer (once you get everything configured.)

If you want to use iTunes to sync video, you can go the AppleTV format. However, AppleTV only supports up to 720 video.

Note there are some restrictions on what the PS3 and Xbox 360 will play. I'm unfamiliar with the 360 but the PS3 will only play High Profile Level 4.1 AVC or lower. This limits you to 9 reference frames and some other things. Most good front ends will let you pick your profile and level.

For things like the iPod I think the restriction is something like main profile level 2.1, but with a screen that tiny I'd just use one click converter.

Super-Nicko : My first name is Marc. All of my online cohorts know me as dryfire.

Nicko, I am one of the video geeks at SmugMug. I was looking through the help desk inbox and saw your email. I have been a member here at POTN for a while but never really posted. Now that I work for SmugMug, I guess I better start pulling my weight.

So, what are the requirements? The stock answer is pretty much any AVI, MOV, MPG type movie will upload. There are a ton of other formats that are accepted but the key is the codecs. We have a list here: http://www.dgrin.com/f​orumdisplay.php?f=46

The 5D MkII codecs should be ok as I have not heard any reports of problems with it. But other cameras may need to be converted before upload. I use MPEG StreamClip from Squared5.com anytime I need to convert a customers video. It works well.

What settings do I use? h.264 with AAC audio. I do all of my editing in Final Cut Studio 2 and export out using h.264.

We are currently supporting 720p. But, We are working in beta testing right now on full 1080p support. Please take a look here for more info on that: http://blogs.smugmug.c​om …nons-new-5d-mkii-amazing/

I am available if you have any questions. I also moderate the video support forum on Dgrin. There are some great SmugMug video related threads there that might answer any other questions that you may have.

--Doc

Doc, thanks from a whole lot of us for your involvment! This whole dang 5D2 thing is going to grow into something big, and we need the infrastructure support (or at least some helpful input)!

Leonard Wong wrote in post #7001543
You look like you've dived head first into the AVCHD video thing with the camera. Kudos to you. I'm not a video expert, but I have picked up a few things here and there with owning a Canon HV20, so I'll try to help share my experiences with you.

1) If you want to use audio, I suggest picking up a shotgun mic such as the Rode VideoMic. It mounts in your camera's hotshoe. Unfortunately, it does require its own power source (batteries) and it you'll need to plug the audio into the 5D Mk II mic input. That should dramatically improve your audio.

2) With regards to the encoding, are you looking to push 720 or 1080? Keep in mind that 1920x1080 is 2.25x the pixel count of 1280x720. And 1280x720 is 2.6x the pixel count of typical DVD quality (NTSC 720x480). I convert DVDs to H.264 and I'm pretty satisfied with a bit rate of 1500 kpbs. It comes out to be 1.5 hours = 1GB file. For 720P content, 1500 is just too low. I would say in my personal experience with transcoding H.264, I'd stay around 2000-4500. I'm not sure if you used multi-pass encoding, but if didn't you should and that should help make the video a bit better.

3) For remote playing on your television.. assuming you have a 720P or 1080 TV, you have several options. If your TV has an RGB or DVI/HDMI input, then you can try to plug your computer directly into your TV. Some RGB interfaces on TVs are picky, so this may not work 100%. DVI/HDMI is much easier for computers to interface with TVs directly. Your computer will just need to support DVI out and your TV will need to have an HDMI in. I'm not sure where you can pick up the cables from in Perth, but in the US these cables can be purchase relatively inexpensively at http://www.monoprice.c​om …&p_id=2661&seq=​1&format=2

If you didn't want to go through this hassle, you can also use an Xbox 360 or Sony PS3 for HD playback. With the Xbox 360, if you have XP Media Center edition or Vista Ultimate, this will work out of the box with HomePNP. With the Sony PS3, you'll need install software that will support DNLA. Both the Xbox and PS3 will play H.264 (AVCHD) videos directly from your computer (once you get everything configured.)

If you want to use iTunes to sync video, you can go the AppleTV format. However, AppleTV only supports up to 720 video.

Thankyou Leonard for taking the time to post and help out me and im sure others out there in the same boat... im about to go hunting for shotgun mic prices on the net now

Ive just encoded a vid of my christmas stuff - carved it down to a more interesting 6min instead of 10 boring mins... sharing it with family on smugmug so set it to come in under 500mb with 2 passes... these outputted files play terribly on my pc - they look great once uploaded to smugmug tho - smooth, so im going to look for another player and see if its quicktime thats the culprit... i mean the file size is alot smaller than the originals but plays at what looks like 15fps as a mp4 - the originals play fine as standalone files straight off the camera... wierd

thanks for the size and bitrate advice... im amazed how nice the files look even with quite heavy encoding and relativeley small output files...

i have a crap (good 4 years ago) rear pro as my main telly and a sd 42"plasma as well so im all out of good display options... best is convert to dvd and watch... its still nice And after buying a Wii not too long ago - no chance for another toy haha - thanks for the tip tho - im sure others will be quite interested.... would be nice to access the files direct...

And thanks Doc again for popping into our forum as per my email request... always efficient you smugmug lot... Thanks also for the beta fullHD test account...

all my new video posts to smugmug are now also available in true fullHD for those using a 1080p monitor old ones are as is...

"Yeah no worries Johnathan, yeah the location is a ripper - i knew that the street where they were house sitting was close to the river but very glad i brought my tripod as it was a seriously lazy mans shooting day out. Step onto balcony and 100 boats cruise past... with the 100-400 i could crop in on a boat at what felt like nearly 1km and read their registration - wow 21MP My connection is not so great, for HD i have to pause and wait a bit for it to pre load. Did you mean quality of the 100-400 as a pro or con here? not that i mind - its hard to keep her steady even IS and on a tripod. And ive never loved the IQ from this lens although mediocre lenses is all that Mk2 footage seems to need seeing as it doesnt use 22mp to shoot."

I ment that The 100-400 L looked good in the video.Have you tried the micro lens adjustment . I have read that that really makes the 100-400 IQ very sharp. I would love to have the 5DII but not in the budget for now. Johnathan