How to convert 16:9 DV footage into Pro Res 422HD???

I am going to be working on a DV 24p Advanced feature. It was shot in 16:9 (not sure if anamorphic or letterbox yet).

I will be doing the color correction with Color.

I would like to work in the Pro Res 422 Color space, and probably finish on HDCAM tape.

What is the best way to convert my DV media? Can I make a quicktime of the whole movie in DV, then take it into compressor to convert to Pro ResHD 422? What are the results like with this workflow?

Any advice greatly appreciated.

Set color's output to be 1920x1080 prores. Should work like a charm.

You may want to investigate my filters for Color that denoise, sharpen and upsample chroma as they can help in the blow up to HD.


Graeme

[www.nattress.com] - Plugins for FCP-X

Hi Graeme,

But when do I convert the footage to Pro Res - I presume before I take it into Color?

What is the workflow for using your filters?

I will have a film that was shot on DV and has been edited on DV. For this final stage I want to take it "up" to Pro-Res and want to know the best way to do it.

Any help greatly appreciated,

Ewoo

No need. Just take DV to Color, colour it, and export out as prores HD.

With my filters, I use the chroma smooth set to 4:1:1, then chroma sharpen, which I tweak. I may then use sharpen, or Denoise set to sharpening mode to finish off. Result can look very good. I'm using a similar tree to restore some old VHS footage.

Graeme

So, while I am working in Color, will I be working in a 4:2:2 Color space in this workflow?

Ewoo

Hi,

I haven't attempted to do this before. However, it seems to me that you will be working in a
4:1:1 or 4:2:0 space IF you decide to upres when you output from Color.

As for when to upres the footage (Again, I haven't done this), I thought it would make sense to
upres it before you bring it into Color in order to make any use out of the superior color space, in
your case 4:2:2. However, after observing this thread, I happened to think that you wouldn't
magically have upres-ed data which give you more color information than what your original
format had captured. By this, I mean you will anyway have the same color information, but only
in a wide color gamut of 4:2:2. I think that's why Graeme has suggested to upres your footage
after the grading since you won't gain anything by doing it beforehand. If there's anything, I
assume working on 4:2:2 will be slower than working on 4:1:1.

Hope this make sense.

Nook Kim

What you said makes sense to me.....

However my understanding is that even though the original DV footage is in 4:1:1, there will be some advantage to doing the Color correction in 4:2:2 - there will be a greater range of potential colors to work with and less sampling.

That said, I have not seen what the practical advantages are, and am hoping someone here can tell me if it's worth it - will we really "see" the difference?

Ewoo

Anyone???

Sure, you'll convert from DV 4:1:1 to ProRes 4:2:2 HD inside Color. It's as good a place as any to do it. I do it and it works great.

Graeme

Hi Graeme,

So....I'm certainly still learning about how all this works.....and there is an issue that isn't clear to me.....

With this workflow, will I be doing my actual color corrections in the 4:2:2 color space, or will that color space only be created on output, after my corrections have been made?

If I would be working in 4:1:1, would I expect my final product to look different that if the original DV footage had been converted to 4:2:2 prior to performing the color corrections. (for example would I have more latidude to saturate certain shots or shift chroma, push gain etc in 4:2:2 without creating artifacts or other displeasing results)?

Secondly, if working in 4:2:2 before output is beneficial, is the best way to convert the footage to use Color by applying the Natress filters previously mentioned, then outputting to 4:2:2 with Color, then bringing the converted footage back into Color again, to do the actual creative color correction work?

There are probably numerous errors in my thinking on these issues.....but like I say....I am trying to get a handle on how all this stuff works.....

Thanks in advance,

Ewoo

If you colour in Color, no matter what the source, it gets bumped to RGB 4:4:4 for colouring. If you add my plugins into Color, you can do that bump to 4:4:4 with improved quality. You can do all this bumping up at the same time and process as you colour the video in Color.

Graeme

Hi Graeme,

Thanks.....now I understand!

Also....it makes the workflow very, very easy.....I don't have to do an extra render or anything.....

By the way....can you explain what your filters do to improve the conversion?

Also....does Color use the same engine that Compressor uses to do the conversion, or does it do it it's own way? If I am using a Kona card, will it be using the Kona to do the conversion, or does it just happen through Compressor OR Color's own compression system?

This is such an interesting thread. I've never known that the Color converts all the footage
I throw at to 4:4:4 space. I'm going to have to dig out some DV footage and do some
test. Also, the things that I've shoot in 4:2:2 space, too!

To Graeme,
Is there any other programs that does this conversion during the import process? If the Color
is one of the few ones, I really don't see any reason to complain about the software. I just wonder
if this is the nature of any color grading systems.

Best,

Nook Kim

FCP converts all video to 4:4:4 YCbCr before any effects are applied too! Really, you'll find it hard to do general effects and stuff on chroma subsampled data. Practically every app works this way - they always decompress into a full 4:4:4 buffer.

Now, how they get the 4:4:4 from 4:1:1 is different all over the place. FCP dupes chroma samples so you get blocky chroma. Actually, this is good from a generational performance, whereas Avid smooths the chroma and this is bad for generational loss, causing chroma smear. See [www.nattress.com]

However, if you're not rendering back and forth to DV codec or tape, say, it's safe to smooth or upsample the chroma for special effects, keying or uprezzing to HD say.

So, Color will do as FCP does and dupe chroma samples, so what I do is apply some filter trees that come with my color plugins, [www.nattress.com] to tidy up the chroma. You can see in the examples that the bleeding red is brought back in line, or the extreme chroma effect isn't blocky after I've done the filter tree.

Hope that explains what can be done. You can do these kinds of things in FCP too - I have filters for that too, but I find Color a better environment for them, especially if you go out to full 4:4:4 dpx files for filmout say, or 4:4:4 HDCAM SR.

Graeme

Hi Graeme,

That is one valuable information that makes me feel really happy about using FCP.
I need to get your plug-in's ASAP to be able to see the glory of what it can do.
By the way, I always find it very difficult to find these inside information of what
the software actually do without the users knowing it. Is there any resources that
you would recommend to get to know more of this kind of knowledge?
I read manuals fairly often, and I love FCS's manuals for extra knowledge I get from
them. However, I could ask for more.

Thanks in advance. I know you're extremely busy at the moment.

Best,

Nook Kim

Well, I always ask people to download the demos and try them out first to see if they like them before purchase. I'd never want people to buy just on my say so as I'm ever do biassed towards my own products :-)

Alexis Hurkman's encyclopedia of colour correction has some good learning material in it. That's what comes to mind off hand.

Other than that, I'll just have to make more time to write more articles....

Graeme

>>I'd never want people to buy just on my say so as I'm ever do biassed towards my own products :-) <<

Then I'll say it. Graeme's plug-ins are, without exception, always a good buy. I've got several packs, including the new Color kit, and I know that quite a few of the top Color guys do too. They add a lot of great functions and, as usual, are always easy to install and use. Really! Check them out here : Nattress' Color Plugins

Thanks for all this info Graeme.....

Very helpful and now I feel I have a workflow that should give me decent results.....

Thanks

Ewoo

And don't forget if you need more details, just to ask, or email me.

Graeme

Hi Graeme,

Another related question....

If we decide in the short term to do an SD output onto digibeta, only going through FCP (not Color), then what is the best workflow?

So....I have 23.98p DV footage in a 23.98 DV sequence.

I have a Kona 3 card and SDI out to digibeta.

In order to get to a 4:4:4 color space in FCP do I need to put my footage into a 10 bit uncompressed sequence, which will need to be rendered etc. Then do my Color effects etc with the 3 way color corrector. Then put on any chroma smoothing filters etc. Then go out to tape?

Thanks in advance,

Ewoo

Sure ProRes or uncompressed give you much higher color depth. But when you output Uncompressed, ProRes and "Same as Original", it would be great, but if you are going to ultimately output back to DV tape. In fact, your end product will look worse since it will take another DV compression hit during the Edit to Tape.