Compressor vs. MpegStreamclip

Lately I've taken to using MpegStreamclip to do conversions rather than Compressor. The quality appears to me to be the same when converting from, say, HDV to ProRes, or when converting to H.264.

Am I missing something? I just find it quicker and simpler. But is there a downside that I don't know about?

Many thanks,

Harry.

I, and many professionals I know, use MPEG Streamclip all the time. I'm actually considering starting a campaign to ask people who use it daily to send 2 or 5 bucks to the developer, because it's amazing and should be rewarded.

I love MPEG Streamclip, but I always have reservations about using it early in the post-production pipeline:

Pros:
a) Very fast
b) Can demux clips that have video and audio muxed -- it may be the only tool that does this
c) Can extract from DVD -- a task at which Compressor is helpless
d) Very easy, very fast access to presets, compared with Compressor's clunky pages and pages of settings
e) Has shortcut access to many features, such as exporting to QuickTime vs. exporting to MPEG-4. Much easier than dealing with creating and maintaining lots of complicated presets like Compressor
f) Great, intuitive Batch List
g) Free, and easily downloadable. Also easy to install. I've even copied it directly from a PowerPC to an Intel Mac Pro, rather than doing a re-install, and it transferred over without a hitch
h) Can join multiple files, and fix some timecode breaks
i) Can enter In-Out points very quickly and easily to export only a portion of that file

Cons:
a) Does a comparably crappy job when it comes to frame-rate conversions, fields, and motion -- I've done tests, and even QuickTime Player performed better at frame-rate conversion
b) Doesn't have all the features in Compressor, for example Motion Detection
c) Can produce buggy clips that have timecode and metadata problems. For example, I was batch-converting clips from various sources (with lots of H.264 MPEG-4s) to DVCPro HD for editing, and almost all of those clips behaved strangely, such as showing up as larger than they should in the timeline until rendered, or showing the wrong part of the clip

So, basically, I restrict my use of it for the final stage -- compressed deliverables, a job at which I think MPEG Streamclip excels.


www.derekmok.com

We use it all the time to convert MP4s to Prores for titles and bugs, then back out to MP4 for screening, and also to bring H.264s in as ProRes. No problems. Not really many complicated timecode variations here in PAL land though.

Thanks very much for the input, Derek and Jude. I currently have a ton of stuff to convert from 720i at 30 to 1080p at 24. I take it that you have done all the testing and that Compressor is the way to go? What a pain. MPEG is so quick and easy, but if you're saying that it's not up to par I will take your advice.

Best,

Harry.

> We use it all the time to convert MP4s to Prores for titles and bugs, then back out to MP4
> for screening, and also to bring H.264s in as ProRes.

I actually can't confirm definitively that it's not a DVCPro HD issue. Whenever I've used ProRes or ProRes HQ, it's always been with much larger projects with more stable media. So I'm not ruling out that it might have been fine if we had been using ProRes (which had not been available on the station I had been saddled with).

But, what I can confirm is that this particular issue -- corrupted metadata resulting in wrong part of the clip being shown, clip appearing at the wrong size -- hasn't yet happened on occasions where I've used Compressor for the conversion. I did about 3TB of video-game clips coming in at various motley formats (DNxHD, H.264 etc.) for a spot with Compressor, going to ProRes HQ, and while it took three to four days total, there were no issues whatsoever.

I'm leaning on the side of slow but safe. Use Compressor for prepping clips for editing and mastering; use MPEG Streamclip for DVD extraction, demuxing, web deliveries and screeners. And now with the FCP world turned on its head, I'm looking for a third option. Who knows when Apple might decide Compressor should die without warning.


www.derekmok.com

I'm in the same boat, Derek. I thought Adobe Media Encoder would be comparable to Compressor but was very underwhelmed by it. However, I did get a free copy of Sorenson Squeeze with my Avid purchase so that'll be next on my list of things to try. I've heard good things about it.

My software:
Pro Maintenance Tools - Tools to keep Final Cut Studio, Final Cut Pro X, Avid Media Composer and Adobe Premiere Pro running smoothly and fix problems when they arise
Pro Media Tools - Edit QuickTime chapters and metadata, detect gamma shifts, edit markers, watch renders and more
More tools...

I was going to mention Media Encoder as well, Jon. I have zero experience with it, but it came as part of the 5.5 Creative Suite Production Premium package, so it's one of the half dozen new softwares I'm learning right now.


www.derekmok.com

It's Compressor, Squeeze, and maybe Media Encoder. Then it's Episode if all else fails.



www.strypesinpost.com

A couple years ago we tried to give money to the MPEG Streamclip guys. They actually would NOT take it!! If they've changed their position, please let us know, Jude!!

nice new banner Derek.

""" What you do with what you have, is more important than what you could do, with what you don't have."

> > > Knowledge + Action = Wisdom - J. Corbett 1992 """"

Episode Pro 6 now has ProRes encoding native, no funky plugin to Compressor. Neat. This product is becoming more and more a Swiss Army Knife, but mpegstreamclip is free.. . hard to compete with free.

But I'm not sure MSC can transcode from Windows 9 WMV to ProRes in one pass... can it?

How about AVCHD MTS files?

- Loren

Today's FCP 7 keytip:
Summon your Video Scopes with Option - 9 !

Your Final Cut Studio KeyGuide? Power Pack
with FCP7 KeyGuide --
now available at KeyGuide Central.
www.neotrondesign.com

> I'm not sure MSC can transcode from Windows 9 WMV to ProRes in one pass... can it?

I haven't done it, but MPEG Streamclip opens most WMVs just fine (with Flip4Mac -- I haven't tried with computers that don't have Flip4Mac) and I've used it to export from WMV to various formats. So I can't imagine why not.


www.derekmok.com