Some problems with HD movie processing in After Effects

Question

Hello all!
Composing a movie, I needed a bit sophisticated for Premiere Pro colour correction (details are posted in the Premiere forum: http://forums.adobe.com/message/3064888#3064888)
In a couple of words, I wanted to do multiple layers colour correction so as to match look of some clips shooted in different conditions.
I had no problem with creating several layers and masking them as I wanted. However, what killed me, AE blured HD movie, so I had to cease experimenting.
I wonder if someone else has encountered the same issue?

Answer 1

shooternz, Todd, Mylenium, thanks a lot for your willingness to help!
So that our conversation would be more efficient and effective I rather provide footages themselves instead of mere screenshots.
Here is the original source: http://www.filefactory.com/file/b2h9564/n/00030.MTS As we can see, it’s quality is far from being perfect.
So as to stabilise video, I applied proDAD Mercalli plug-in. The outcome is still acceptable: http://www.filefactory.com/file/b2h83d8/n/00030_Stabilised_.mp4
The next manipulations with multiple layers colour correction were done in AE.
First method was using Adobe dynamic links from Pr Pro to AE. After Effects created composition automatically, recognising all the necessary settings. The second one was creating new AE project, importing the source and dragging it into ‘Create a new composition’ icon – all the necessary composition settings were also created automatically.
Therefore, in first case I didn’t do a finger touch over rendering settings – all changes done in AE were automatically transferred into Pr Pro.
In second case I used ‘Best settings’ in ‘Render Settings’, ‘H.264’ in ‘Output module’ and 16 Mbps bitrate in ‘Format Options’.
Here is the result: http://www.filefactory.com/file/b2h86ch/n/Idyll._00030.mp4 (In fist case I assessed the result after exporting the footage from Pr Pro into MP4 file)
Effects applied in AE while doing colour correction: ‘Auto Levels’ and ‘Curves’.
Please, tell me if some other details are missed.