QuickTime Conversion and Compressor

Why is QuickTime Conversion faster than Compressor when exporting, what appears to me, to be identical custom settings?

I did a test of a 1 min clip and exported it two different ways thru QT Conversion and Compressor. Compressor was approx 12 percent slower than QTC for each exported clip.

I'm running the most current FCP and QuickTime on a Quad 3.0 Intel with 5GB of RAM.

-- Jeff

Compressor has multi-pass settings -- better quality for the same data rate. I'm thinking that's the main difference.

However, I've noticed a disturbing trend where Compressor 2 is slower than Compressor, and Compressor 3 is slower than Compressor 2. I'm hoping there's some setting I'm missing, but a 50-minute program I had to encode into MPEG-2 last week took about 90-120 minutes using the 150-minute preset, on a Dual 2GHz PowerPC G5. That's about double what Compressor 2 used to take on that machine. Hopefully somebody can point out what I'm missing.


www.derekmok.com

Derek, is it possible that v3 runs better on Intel machines? I don't have G5 stats to compare to (I upgraded from a G4) but I haven't seen a dramatic slowdown between v2 and v3. There's also the benefit of maxing out the multiple cores using a Virtual Cluster, which isn't available on a PowerPC.

I'll have to try some QT Conversion tests to compare with Compressor; I'm so used to exporting full-size QTs I don't really use the Conversion option...

JK

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SCQT! Self-contained QuickTime ? pass it on!

I have a 2.66 Quad Intel 5GB RAM and while trying to use 2 of the 4 cores in a virtual cluster proved slower than rendering normally.

While I was in the Apple store I used one of the 8-cores and did a Compressor test, I couldn't set up a virtual cluster (needed password) so I guess its not much different then rendering on my machine but rendering a 49 second clip with the default settings took 3 and a bit minutes, after turning on Frame Controls and changing Rate Conversions from Fast (nearest frame) to Better (Motion Compensated) pushed the render beyond 15 minutes.

There's things I really like about Compressor, but its a bit challenging to find the right settings if you do a wide variety of projects.

Whoa, whoa whoa...I've been outputting a FCP QT then using Compressor to batch them to straight h264 files and it seems a lot faster. Mind you, I'm not doing any scientifically accurate testing per se, but it seems like it's a lot faster then having FCP output each one to QT. I've got a virtual cluster set up on my machine which is a MacQuad, 3G RAM running FCP 6.0.1. None of my files are more then two minutes and most, during our broadcast anyway, are around 20-30secs. Up until last week I wasn't using Compressor at all but I like being able to set up the batch and then go back into FCP, pull thumbnail images, set up our Anystream for final compression and delivery, etc...I'll be following this thread, good info.

I actually like that I can dig in and tweak the settings to where I want them, but it would be nice if Apple provided more documentation/overview on how to get the most out of Compressor (and some of their presets are a joke). I know a lot of editors who almost never touch it because they just don't understand it.

That being said, I really miss Cleaner! Bring back the Wizard!!

JK

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SCQT! Self-contained QuickTime ? pass it on!

The duration it takes to encode is one thing. I never actually got identical results (both time wise and quality) from QT conversion and compressor. I tried exporting something with similar h.264 settings on QT conversion and the quality seemed pretty bad compared to what i got off Compressor.


From Larry Jordan's site:
"I have never been comfortable with exporting using QuickTime Conversion. For one thing, it automatically down-samples your movie to 8-bit. For another, it will not be as good a quality as Sorenson Squeeze for the web, or Compressor for DVD. Third, Apple removed the MPEG-2 compression option with the release of QuickTime 7. Finally, the codecs it contains, while adequate for home use, are not up to professional standards either in terms of file size or image quality."
- [www.larryjordan.biz]

I am still trying to figure out what the best compression setting IS! I have HD 1080i video which I have put into FCP. I am on FCP5 and Compressor 2. Everyone raves about QT H264 but for me it has never come out that great! I have tried DVDPROHD and it is okay but I am still trying to fine that really HD output that my original video has. The film was originally taken with a HD Mini DVD Camera. Obviously my video is not a hollywood production but I still want to get the best output I can within my working parameters. Oh, and my quicktime H264 would not input into DVD Studio Pro. My video is only 4 minutes long and after compression I am putting it into a DVD+R which I understand is the standard for most computers to be able to see. I would appreciate any suggestions as to everyone's experience with compression settings and which ones you have found to be the best.

Kjoske,

You're trying to do two different things at the same time and getting things mixed up.

If you want to put video onto a DVD, the compression setting is MPEG-2. Period. That's the only format that a playable DVD will accept and the only format that DVD Studio Pro will work with to make a standard definition DVD. Use the 16:9, 90-minute DVD preset in Compressor to output the video and drag the resulting MPEG2 file into DVDSPro (don't forget the audio file as well).

You can make an HD-DVD with your high-definition footage but it will ONLY play back on another Mac or an HD DVD player (and good luck finding someone who still uses one of those). If that's OK, then you can the HD DVD settings in Compressor and you'll get something closer to your original footage. Or else buy a Blu-Ray burner and Adobe Encore or Toast to make Blue-Ray DVDs.

The other formats you mention are a mix of editing and presentation formats. There's no need to transcode your video into DVCProHD unless you were converting it to fit in a DVCProHD project for example. Same with any other HD codec. H.264 is the standard for web or computer based playback and that's what you should be using if you want to see high-quality output. You'll need to pick higher settings if what you've tried hasn't worked (Try Web>Quicktime >LAN). But don't try to re-import an H.264 file back into FCP or DVDSpro -- compressing it this way should be the final step before putting it online or sending out the QT file.

Make sense?

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SCQT! Self-contained QuickTime ? pass it on!

I have imported HD files from my Canon HF100 camcorder and they reside on my hard drive as MTS files.

I have been unable to import them into Final Cut Pro, which doesn't recognize them.

Is there a conversion I need to do before trying to importing them? Is it something I can accomplish within FCP Studio 2?

Thanks in advance for your help.

First once you plug in the camera into the computer and open the FCP it must show the record button activated then go to the i link and turn it off on your camera, then it should start recording, if you do not see it on the canvas it is NOT imputing. You need to create a "scratch" file and name it so the camera will know where the video will go. Set input speed at 29fps. I was on a Sony HD We had the same problem, I don't exactly remember what we did cuz I did it about 8 months ago, but I think this is it. With your scratch file set-up the video will be inputted into your hard drive. I put mine into a lacie hard drive because the files are so hugh and it untied my space on my computer hard drive. When I edit the video I work from the external hard drive which has all my video and my FÇP working file.
Hope it helps.