Edit and output video without modifying any pixels?

That subject line sounds cryptic, I'm sure, but I need to assemble numerous snippets of animated pixel art into what should become a somewhat lengthy animation. Final Cut should perform no internal resizing and no compression prior to output; all input files are 240x160 without exception. Stills are PNG to take advantage of the Alpha channel, but the animated clips are uncompressed QuickTime with a single, unique RGB value reserved for the background for chroma-keying (all layering is to be all-or-nothing with regard to the Alpha/keying; there is no partial transparency at play).
All I need is to compile these clips together, layer a few elements on top of each other, and tweak the timing here and there. Beyond that, Final Cut should leave everything exactly like it found it, down to the pixel. (I'll worry about the output format and compression later.)
Is this possible (and easy) in Final Cut Express? In my disastrous trials with Adobe Premiere Elements (v.1), Premiere insisted on internally resizing the clips for editing, which fuzzed up the images and defeated the chroma keying (as if the fuzziness wasn't bothersome enough). It's possible this was due to user error, but as far as I can tell, nothing can prevent Premiere from reprocessing everything into its native DV dimensions, which is quite destructive toward pixel art. Anyway, I'm frustrated enough with Premiere that I'm willing to purchase Final Cut, if it can meet these requirements easily.
Thanks much for any information you can provide. Oh, and if Final Cut could possibly output the entire sequence as an animated GIF, that'd be fantastic, but I tend to think it'd be a little too heavy-handed (even though my total palette is well below 256 colors) because it's used to crunching fancy true-color videos instead of this basic pixel art.

After some further research, it seems my best approach for this project will be to compose my small QuickTime clips with all layering done beforehand, then assemble them with a utility such as QuickTime Pro or MPEG Streamclip, as discussed here:
http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?messageID=7813920&#7813920
MPEG Streamclip, in fact, seems to work quite well in my initial tests. If the clips are numbered sequentially, dropping them into the application assembles them beautifully. And it's free!
Thanks again to those who replied.

Similar Messages

How do I convert a VLC file to imovie. I have managed to download the mini dvd disc from the video camera onto a USB and have saved the file on my desktop but have no clue how to get it into iMovie so I can edit and send via email. Any ideas!!!

How do I convert a VLC file to iMovie.
I've managed to download the mini dvd from the video camera onto a USB and have save onto my Desktop.
But have no idea how to convert to iMovie so I can edit and attach video to an email and Facebook.

Edit WMV
http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/using/moviemaker/getstarted/default.mspx
and http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windowsmedia/forpros/encoder/default.mspx
Also... I have NOT used those products, I only forward due to other mentions
Convert http://premierepro.wikia.com/wiki/FAQ:How_do_I_convert_my_files%3F
Edit Vob http://premierepro.wikia.com/wiki/FAQ:How_do_I_import_VOB_files_/_edit_a_DVD%3F
$99 http://www.corel.com/servlet/Satellite/us/en/Product/1175714228541#tabview=tab0
$99 http://www.womble.com/products/mvw.html
$80 http://www.nchsoftware.com/prism/index.html
$75 http://www.videoredo.com/en/index.htm
$75 http://www.magix.com/us/movie-edit-pro/
$70 http://www.nchsoftware.com/prism/index.html Converter
$40 http://www.daniusoft.com/dvd-ripper.html#135
$40 http://www.deskshare.com/dmc.aspx Digital Media Converter
$00 http://www.squared5.com/ MPEG Streamclip Converter
$00 http://www.erightsoft.com/SUPER.html Multi-Converter
$00 http://www.virtualdub.org/ Mpeg to AVI Converter

Logic can output video to Firewire, any chance we can convert to DVI?

Logic can output video to Firewire, any chance we can convert tbe video data in firewire to DVI and connect to a display?
Thanks!

DV-Video to DVI Converter

I have a macmini on order, I wonder if I can pair the wireless apple keyboard and magic touchpad without using any other input devices, especially, since everything is brand new and not yet paired.

I have a macmini on order, I wonder if I can pair the wireless apple keyboard and magic touchpad without using any other input devices, especially, since everything is brand new and not yet paired.

You may just want to save yourself any possible issues
by just hooking up a wired keyboard and mouse on first
start up. Any USB keyboard and mouse should work.
There have been many that have had problems on first boot
using the Bluetooth devices.

Discrepancy between HD monitor and output video

Howdy community,
I have a weird problem with Final Cut Pro 7. I have an Asus VW266H HD monitor, set at a good viewing angle on my desk. When I was editing some footage, it looked WAY too dark, so I used a color correction filter and brought the blacks up to 95. The resulting image in the FCP viewer window is the one you see on the left in my screen shot. I hope you can imagine just how dark the original footage was. I was reasonably satisfied with how the footage looked, especially since it wasn't looking "milky" like it can if you lighten/whiten too much in post.
So then I exported the footage, and got the image on the right (in my screen shot). These two images are from the same second of video, on the same monitor. NO changes were made between the exported version in QT on the right and the FCP viewer image on the left.
Why does my monitor and/or the final cut viewer window show me an image that does not represent my output? If the image in final cut and the exported version in quick time look so different, how can I trust my eye in final cut?
Obviously, this is a huge problem.
Please help!!!

If that is the case, how does the editor control how the image looks to others?
You can't. This general problem has been around since the advent of moving pictures. Wander over to the video wall at any big box store and look at the displays. There won't be two that appear alike. All you can do is control the image you send out.
If you are seriously interested in image integrity, get yourself a output device from AJA, BlackMagic, Matrox, etc that can send a qualified signal and a calibrated broadcast TV monitor to to view that signal. Then you'll know what it really looks like.
To paraphrase the old Yiddish saying, "A man with two clocks can never be sure of the time, but, man with an atomic clock, will know."
Good luck.
x

Photo editing and occasional video stuff - which Macbook Pro for me?

Hi guys! I'm seriously considering buying a Macbook Pro to replace my current desktop PC. My intuition is telling me to get 16GB of RAM and to not settle for a two core processor. This, however, isn't too easy on the wallet.
I do photo editing quite regularly, working with raw files that have 20-ish megapixels. This includes simple adjustments in Lightroom, and more advanced editing in Photoshop. Sometimes I also do simple video editing, working with 1080p material, typically shot with a DSLR.
I'm not looking for a serious pro machine - simply something that wouldn't be too frustrating in this kind of work. In photography I consider myself to be a serious hobbyist, and the video work is somewhere between amateur, prosumer and consumer level stuff.
What kind of tips and suggestions can you give me? Looking forward to hearing your ideas!

Thanks. I've been thinking that I'd use my current 24" monitor with the macbook as well. Maybe a bigger screen on the laptop itself would be nice on the road - but I don't consider that a necessity.
Any comments on the performance difference between the dual-core and quad-core processors?

S16 24fps - DVCPro HD 25 fps - 24 fps editing and output?

I'm new on this forum so "hi everybody!"
We're about to shoot a short feature on S16 film and I'm in charge of postproduction.
Last feature we made was shot on S16@24 fps -> HDCam SR telecine -> Betacam SP -> 24fps edit on Avid Film Composer -> EDL -> HDCam SR conformation, color grading and titling -> 35mm shoot.
The thing was, finding for free a HDcam SR deck and an Avid for conformation, color grading, titling etc... was really painful.
So now that we have less money than last time and that HD technologies evolved, I'm considering DVCPro HD instead of HDCam SR.
If the movie is good enough, we may get more money to go back to film on a 35mm print but nothing's sure right now. If the film isn't good enough, we'll stay in DVD/BluRay world.
The big question is "24 fps or 25 fps shooting?" (24 being the standard for film and BluRay/HD-DVD (ok, HD-DVDead) but can be an issue in my post production process)
I know for I can only make 25 fps DVCPro HD tapes in my Pal world (talking "1 film frame for 1 TC frame").
I know I can transfer 25 fps DV on FCP and edit everything at 24 fps with Cinema Tools.
But can I transfer 25 fps DVCPro HD to FCP with Cinema Tools (online editing), edit them at 24 fps and output a "BluRay quality" 24 fps video file? (for the 35mm shooting part I'm not affraid as I'll need TGA/Tiff frame sequences so one frame is one frame, there's no footage speed or anything involved)
I'll need a good 24 fps video file for the audio post part...
The goal is to stay in the digital domain after the telecine, and never use the original negative again (juste like we did for the last short feature we made). So no keycodes/flex or anything.
I know DVCPro HD is not as good as HDCam SR or even an original negative cut scan, but we won't have enough money for that and I was pretty impressed by the DVCPro HD->35mm footage I've seen so far.
Thanks
Marc

I'm new on this forum so "hi everybody!"
We're about to shoot a short feature on S16 film and I'm in charge of postproduction.
Last feature we made was shot on S16@24 fps -> HDCam SR telecine -> Betacam SP -> 24fps edit on Avid Film Composer -> EDL -> HDCam SR conformation, color grading and titling -> 35mm shoot.
The thing was, finding for free a HDcam SR deck and an Avid for conformation, color grading, titling etc... was really painful.
So now that we have less money than last time and that HD technologies evolved, I'm considering DVCPro HD instead of HDCam SR.
If the movie is good enough, we may get more money to go back to film on a 35mm print but nothing's sure right now. If the film isn't good enough, we'll stay in DVD/BluRay world.
The big question is "24 fps or 25 fps shooting?" (24 being the standard for film and BluRay/HD-DVD (ok, HD-DVDead) but can be an issue in my post production process)
I know for I can only make 25 fps DVCPro HD tapes in my Pal world (talking "1 film frame for 1 TC frame").
I know I can transfer 25 fps DV on FCP and edit everything at 24 fps with Cinema Tools.
But can I transfer 25 fps DVCPro HD to FCP with Cinema Tools (online editing), edit them at 24 fps and output a "BluRay quality" 24 fps video file? (for the 35mm shooting part I'm not affraid as I'll need TGA/Tiff frame sequences so one frame is one frame, there's no footage speed or anything involved)
I'll need a good 24 fps video file for the audio post part...
The goal is to stay in the digital domain after the telecine, and never use the original negative again (juste like we did for the last short feature we made). So no keycodes/flex or anything.
I know DVCPro HD is not as good as HDCam SR or even an original negative cut scan, but we won't have enough money for that and I was pretty impressed by the DVCPro HD->35mm footage I've seen so far.
Thanks
Marc

How to edit and splice video clips

I have 3 video clips that I wish to edit and join together.

Use Premiere Elements, not Photoshop Elements:
Adobe Premiere Elements Help | Help and tutorials

Resizing pixel art video without affecting the pixels with blur.

Hello everyone,
First I would like to mention that I did searched for an answer to my issue on the forum but only found a thread by Rowby Goren from Jan 4, 2010, who asked a similar pixel resize question regarding to still images in CS4. He was answered to use Photoshop for this kind of task. My issue on the other hand is for handling a video that can only be edited in Premiere. I'm using CS6. My issue is as follows:
I work a lot with pixel art animation in 320x240 resolution. Usually I'm making a 320x240 scene of background and characters and the final result should be a doubled sized. So each pixel is actually 2 times larger. Just like old adventure games from the good old days that most of us remember. It works great with old style games creation engines however when I want to make a video with my pixel art creation in Premiere, I couldn't achieve an exact and clean doubled pixel when resizing the source by 200%. It always gets blurry. Does anyone knows if Premiere has any switch off option for scalling blur?
I have created an image that describes the issue. It's just a simple pixel art image that I picked up on google search. I saved and uploaded it as PNG for best quality, I just hope it won't get compressed after the upload. Any assitance will be appreciated!
Thanks,
Gal Shemesh

Thanks Jim, I am aware of the fact that it's a degraded image that doesn't have any antializing effect on it. And that's what I'm trying to achieve in Premiere, although it's currently impossible. Until now I'm doing exactly what you suggested, which is to double the size in Photoshop or other tool that doesn't affect any antializing on the image and then I import it into Premiere. However this also makes a problem when you want to move objects on the screen as the imported images which are doubled size, won't show well on the 1:1 pixel grid when you move them around the screen. So let's say each move on the X axis to the left or right (which represents a move by 1 pixel) should be moved twice in order to meet the doubled sized images pixel grid.
Take a look on the picture I created to see what I mean. I've duplicated the box image and I'm trying to position each box one next to another in a 3d space look. The left boxes is the original image of the 2 boxes, and the right image is the doubled sized image that was created outside of Premiere. Please note that I've the entire screenshot twice larger so you could see the difference. And please ignore the fact that there is no antializing on the right image as I made this simulation in Photoshop so the pixels will be clean to show the problem.
So, if you aware of how a pixel grid looks like, check the left image. The position of the boxes on each other is the way it should be as each pixel from each box keeps the relation of a 1:1 pixel grid. However on the right image I first doubled the original box image to prevent 'blurring' effect when scalling up in Premiere, put it on a 1:1 pixel canvas (where the image has 2:2 pixel grid by now) just like how it will be in Premiere, and tried to position the boxes one next to another. See that there's a confusion between the pixels on the 1:1 grid as they got merged one INTO another without saving the relation of a doubled pixel grid. Where if there was any option to work in doubled sized pixles in Premiere, it would have look like this:
So importing a doubled size images into Premiere like you suggested is way hard to keep tracking the moving objects in the scene, as you must remember to move them twice the times to each direction. Which means that if you want to move an object from one side of the screen to the other side, you'll have to do it frame by frame in a move of 2 pixels by frame, rather then positioning it in one place, make a keyframe, and then go to where the movement should end and place another keyframe.
Hope now my issue is clear.
All the best,
Gal Shemesh

Edit 1080p with QT7 without losing any quality?

I suspect and hope this one's a quick Y/N for someone out there ...
I'm editing my first full HD movie. The footage comes off a Sony DSC-HX9V point & shoot as 1080p at 60fps, AVCHD format (.MTS), which I re-wrap as .MOV using Media Converter w/uncompressed audio (free download) -- I like to use QT Pro 7 for doing fast pre-edits before importing (or not) into a fancier editor.
Just want to make trebly sure I'm not losing any quality:
I set Preferences>Recording to "Device native" which claims it's "best for post processing, Raw and large files." Admittedly this is the first time I've changed that setting as it was always on "Best, H.264" in the past, because I never paid attention to it (was prob fine for simple 640x480 30fps videos) - is this a correct move?
Also, before editing I change the view to half size (960x540) so I can see the QT controls and have been saving the edits that way. NOW, I just noticed that when you do a "get info" on an edit it shows "Dimensions" as half size (960 x 540).
But, when you look at the Properties of the video in QT7 - and expand it to full sized view - it does indeed show 1920x1080. File size appears to be same -
the .MTS file is say, 51.2 Mb, and the converted .MOV file is also 51.1 Mb. Clicking on Movie Inspector on both shows data as 48.76 mb, whatever that discrepancy means.
Thank you for your smarts!

Muchas gracias ...
Moving along a bit (really poor internet connection here in Peru, forgive me)...
- Well, I think I've answered my own concern ... Editing a file with QT Pro seems to reduce it to 24 fps or there abouts. i.e. Media Converter made the .MTS file into a .MOV with no apparent reduction in filesize, and Movie Properties shows the .MOV file to be 60 fps - as long as I don't touch it with QTPro. Correct?
I wasn't planning to use iMovie to make the big edit, but progress to something a little more advanced, i.e. FCPX.
1. Will FCPX retain the the 60fps advantage? If not, what about Adobe Premiere? I'll even consider buying a PC (shock horror) dedicated to editing if it comes down to it.
2. Again, since I trashed the directory structure that comes of the camera for the first 9 days of shooting, can I get by without it without loss of quality?
Appreciate your help as always!

Resizing Motion Jpeg video without applying any transcoding

Hello,
My apology if this is a silly question.
I have Motion Jpeg video clip, which I need only to resize from 1920x1080 to 768x432.
I want to leave codec, output fields and everything else as it is.
What would be the best way to do this?
Thank you so much for your advise.

I would recommend doing the resize through compressor as it should intelligently scale the image. Although downscaling isn't as drastic as going up, it still can cause problems. If your compression settings are kept high you should notice any more compression with most codecs, but I can understand your concern with JPEGs.
The other option is to convert to a codec such as animation which is uncompressed, down scaling within compressor. Then convert the animation back to a Motion JPEG. No quality will be lost.
The final option is to use QuickTime 7. open the file as usual in QT7 (has to be 7), press Command + J to access Movie Properties. Select the video track and choose and enter the scale in the boxes below. This will resize the video, just hit Command + S to save the file. This alters the display size only and the file will retain its 1920x1080 size information, thus the overall file size will not change.
Good luck.
"A snowed in" James.

My Ipod touch wont let me add or take off music. How can i reset my music and everything else without deleting any app data?

It wont let me take any music off and in Itunes it says that I only have 40 songs that are on my cloud. But my Ipod says i have 1400 songs on my ipod and lets me play them all. I dont understand what i should do but i dont want to do a factory reset, that is the last thing i want to do. If you have any suggestions that would be great. Thank you

Connect the iPod to your computer and look at the storage used by the various categories as shown in the colored bargarph in iTunes.
Come back with the results.
An "other" larger than about 1 1/2 GB indicates corrupted files.
What is the Other on my iPhone and How to Remove It
What is "Other" and What Can I Do About It?
Next, usually restoring from backup eliminated the corrupted files. However, sometimes restoring to factory settings/new iPod is required.
To restore from backup see:
iOS: How to back up
To restore to factory settings/new iPod see:
iTunes: Restoring iOS software
Otherwise:
Try:
- Reset the iOS device. Nothing will be lost
Reset iOS device: Hold down the On/Off button and the Home button at the same time for at
least ten seconds, until the Apple logo appears.
- Unsync/delete all music and resync
To delete all music go to Settings>General>Usage>Storage>Music>Tap edit in upper right and then tap the minus sign by All Music
- Reset all settings
Go to Settings > General > Reset and tap Reset All Settings.
All your preferences and settings are reset. Information (such as contacts and calendars) and media (such as songs and videos) aren’t affected.
- Restore from backup. See:
iOS: Back up and restore your iOS device with iCloud or iTunes
- Restore to factory settings/new iOS device.

Rendering white flicker on the program monitor and output video file. How to get rid of this flicker in adobe premiere pro cc 2014?

Hello,
I have been working with long sequences in adobe premiere pro cc 2014. All of sudden, I see white flicker in the program monitor and rendered output too. The flicker does not follow any pattern. It is very random.
How to work around on this?
Regards
Naveen Alle

Concurrently working on the same project it requires a specific implementation in all editing programs like Avid's Unity/ ISIS shared storage. That's what you are simply not considering. none of your issues would be any problem if your projects resided on a commonly accessed server or something like that. Check respective hardware solutions.
Mylenium

How to edit information on website without lose any graphics

Hello
Our company have a volunteer web designer but he was not available to respond at the moment.
I tried to copy the file from the server, make a back up file and edit the dreamweaver page, and change the date of the information.
Then I copy the file and upload to the server - the information was changed but lost all graphics etc... because I save the index.html
Please advise what I did wrong.
How to keep the graphics, etc everything ... all I need to change the dates or edit the text information ?
Thanks

Can't answer without seeing the coding on your website.
There could be any number of reasons such as back-end processes,
server side includes etc
Did you download the page with FTP, or just saved it from the browser?
Please post a link.

Editing and exporting videos from youtube

I downloaded a justin bieber video from Youtube.com.I edited this video using adobe premiere pro cs5. I tried exporting the file and it seems that I am not able to play the exported file. Is there something wrong with my file selection? Adobe Premiere Pro does not allow editing or exporting copyrighted materials? I am not gonna use the video for any commercial purposes. I am just making a video for my niece who would celebrate here birthday next week. Thanks.

Welcome to the forum.
Can you please give us the full details of the YouTube file that you downloaded and edited, plus your Project/Sequence Preset? Then, what Export settings did you choose? What happens, when you Export?
CS5 does not know if the material is ©, but that is an ethical question, that you must address.
Also, starting with YouTube material will never yield good quality, but again, this is something that you must address.
Good luck,
Hunt

Edit and output video without modifying any pixels?

Similar Messages

Maybe you are looking for