ProRes playback quality

Hi all
I am capturing HDV through the HDMI on a black magic intensity card using ProRes HQ which captures fine. My problem is when I monitor the playback of the captured clips on a HD TV the playback looks like it has a real problem with jaggies. I have captured the same footage direct to HDV and Uncompressed 8 bit and they both play back on the HD Tv perfect.
Any ideas !

sounddoctor, I think I know what you are experiencing, I think ProRes422HQ playback is pretty demanding, I saw a fastest Mac Pro 8 Core which is not playing the fast panned interlaced video right. Since it is valuable transferring rate, maybe there's some problems that codec can't catch up to playback smoothly. It does have the data, but it seems playing back is issue. I can say this because if you transcode the video to uncompressed, it doesn't have the same playing back issue.

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Playback Quality Even Lower in FCP X?

For better or worse, I am currently using my MacBook Air 1.86GHz 2GB RAM on OSX 10.6.8 with Final Cut Pro X. I am working on a 40-45 minute film project that involves large quantities of AVCHD footage from my Canon HF 10 and I am utilizing a new 1TB Western Digital external hard drive (the model that is powered via the USB without a wall AC adapter).
Due to my set-up, playback in FCP X is choppy and that makes it difficult to work in FCP.
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Second, is the problem unrelated to my settings for playback quality - would acquiring a USB external HDD with an AC adapter allow for better speeds and therefore smoother playback in FCP X?
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I'd rather not have to export a .mov file every time I want to check whether my cuts are being made properly - playback in FCPX is dropping frames like there's no tomorrow.
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Hi Jack,
USB drives are definitely a bottleneck, whether bus powered or plugged into the wall. Editing AVCHD (e.g., h264) footage takes a lot of horsepower as well.
I'd advise you to transcode your footage to Prores (you can do this by selecting 'optimize media' either during import or afterwards in the event browser by choosing "Transcode media"). However, you might end up even having to use proxy media since the USB throughput still might not be enough. Proxy media is a lower resolution version using the prores proxy codec.
Try these out with just one or two short clips and see if that helps performance.
With regards to your second question, if you are using a 3.5" drive, I'd advise using AC power and not the bus. This isn't for performance reasons, it's more for hard drive safety reasons. A 2.5" drive usually doesn't need as much power, and is generally safe to be bus-powered (as long as you aren't using any other bus powered USB devices at the same time).
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CK-200 poor music playback quality

Hi, I've just installed the car kit CK-200 (ISO cable version) into my car and I'm very disappointed by the music playback quality.
I have Nokia C7 with the latest firmware (14.002) and I have also updated the car kit firmware into 3.0.
There's no problem with the phone call quality - I would say it is comparable to the other car kits (for example to CK-7W I've had before), but if I want to use it for playing music, it still plays it in "phone call-like" quality. I have tried different players, but no success - still the same low quality.
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In the product description of this CK-200 they highlight very good sound quality thanks to some DSP technology - I hope there's more than this.
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Hi
The CK-200 is a mono output car kit that is only designed for calls, not music.
If a handset is playing music via the mono Bluetooth channel, this is a fluke, and not part of the design of the handset.
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IS THERE A BETTER WAY?
Please comment and advise.
Vee Kay

I have a Sony HDR-HC9 1080i HDV tape camcorder and I am able to play back HD video to either a Mac computer or to a Panasonic Full HD 1080p TV. Playback quality of unedited HD holiday video footage to TV using HDMI cable and to the computer via Firewire is superb. This excellent playback quality is also preserved in an edited iMovie Project in HDV format 57 minutes long and 48 GB in size which I made from the original 90 minutes holiday video footage.
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How do you fix playback quality for still image video on Adobe Premiere Elements 10?

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First, read these...
Photo Scaling for Video http://forums.adobe.com/thread/450798
-Too Large May = Crash http://forums.adobe.com/thread/879967
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I'm sending a ~20 minute (uncompressed, millions of colors) animation in QuickTime out of Final Cut Express HD in a format of HD-1080i and trying to get a very high resolution DVD for television (HD TV). Before taking the QuickTime video to any DVD writing software the aspect ratio (16:9) is correct and resolution is immaculate.
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QUESTION:
How do I get a very complex animation that requires very intense color and clarity to a DVD for playback on a HD TV using my software? In my arsenal is Final Cut Express-HD vers. 3, iLIfe '06 incl. iMovie and iDVD, Toast (if needed).
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HHHMMM….. where to start. First, you can’t possibly
hold yourself to commercial quality unless you have a
commercial budget.
I don't expect commercial quality - just to be able to display the millions of colors and the extreme clarity on any TV and even better still on a HDTV. So far I only can get the quality I seek on a computer display. All my efforts to find a solution for television playback have resulted in a fuzzy and jerky animated feature. Here again I'm not looking for commercial quality - just clear, crisp and smooth.
Hollywood spends millions on
feature films. Compression hardware alone can run
several thousands if not hundreds of thousands of
dollars. Compared to iDVD included in a $79 software
suite? However, even the Hollywood produced DVDs must
rely on the DVD specification and as such, 1080i is
currently lost on them. So your answer to “isn’t iDVD
supposed to write anything I give it” is that if iDVD
takes your QT file (Which BTW, should be in the DV
format) it WILL compress it to a DVD MPEG 2 compliant
file. This means 720x480.
But I don't want any compression other than the final step MPEG2. And after reading this reply today - THANK YOU - THANK YOU - I at least understand now that I can't even use iDVD because it doesn't offer MPEG2 as a compressor.
I have located a mpeg2 encoder program that is shareware and will try to find a formule to use after iMovie HD additions of themes and chapters.
So the first step to take
is to recognize the limitations of equipment and
understand the standards. So now we should examine
the workflow to see if there is anything that can be
done. Other than knowing what Flash is, I don’t know
much about it. Can you select a frame size for doing
your animations? If so, guess what, use the 720x480
frame size. This is what iDVD is going to make it
(again, FCP may offer more options to you but that
isn’t listed in your arsenal).
Final Cut Pro isn't needed for what I'm doing, is it? I have already gotten exquisite playback quality for computers using FCE HD and I'm now trying to get the playback quality on a TV as good as I can get it.
Next, from within FCE,
do not change the settings when exporting via QT. You
want to export it as it is in FCE, you don’t want to
change it. iDVD is expecting a DV file. Any other
file and quality will likely take a hit. Finally, why
DVDs? Flash is typically web based. And computer
monitors have a much higher resolution than a TV.
Flash is generally web based but it can be used to produce a single QuickTime movie if the elements are primarily drawings as my animated feature is. Then on to Final Cut Express all of my imported clips are in QuickTime and thus are already compresssed by QuickTime's excellent compressor. I found that I do not get a good result if I allow any further compression - at least not on computer displays - as long as I export with QT conversion, compression none, millions of colors and specify the size I want it to maintain.
You
could output your Files and serve them up via a data
DVD to be played on a computer. Just curious.
I am already getting excellent playback quality on computers but now I need playback quality on any television because it is not intended only for computers.
Mike
Thanks Mike. You've already been a help in getting me away from iDVD for this project. iMovie may be OK still because its "HD". Got any more suggestions for my situation?

Poor CD playback quality with iTunes 7.2.0.35.

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Why is iTunes CD playback quality so poor?
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http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=93610
"Enable Maximum Audio Hardware Acceleration (Windows XP only)
1. On the Start menu, choose Control Panel.
2. Open Sounds and Audio Devices.
3. Click the Volume tab and then click the Advanced button from the Speaker settings section.
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Changing playback quality to 1/4 does not work for this one clip...

So, I've recently ran into a really annoying problem when editing one of my videos, even though I click the 1/4 playback quality, this one clip still plays in full. My recording setup has not changed, I still and have always been using my iPod Touch and this is the first time I encountered this

It's likely that the resolution of the footage from the iPod Touch is much higher than the rest of your clips. In this case, the other clips will appear to be much more pixelated than the one from the iPod when you turn down the playback resolution.
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Exported iphoto slideshow to itune but playback quality is low

I am using Macbook air Early 2014. OS X 10.10.1
My question is I exported iphoto slideshow to itune but playback quality is low. I used 480P MP4 format. How I can improve this?
Lo

Hello!
My first question is pretty obvious:
- is the quality great when previewing your slideshow in iPhoto?
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delete the bad slideshow from iTunes
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IPad 2 Video playback Quality Issue (Low Contrast and grayish black)

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I'm on the phone with apple support right now. I work at a post production house, and we/our clients keep having this issue - everything looks great on screen and on the ipad 1, and theres a huge gamma shift on the ipad 2. they need to fix this ASAP. like Jls21 already said, a lot of us use ipads for work purposes - unacceptable!
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this is from the tech specs page:
Video formats supported: H.264 video up to 720p, 30 frames per second, Main Profile level 3.1 with AAC-LC audio up to 160 Kbps, 48kHz, stereo audio in .m4v, .mp4, and .mov file formats; MPEG-4 video, up to 2.5 Mbps, 640 by 480 pixels, 30 frames per second, Simple Profile with AAC-LC audio up to 160 Kbps per channel, 48kHz, stereo audio in .m4v, .mp4, and .mov file formats; Motion JPEG (M-JPEG) up to 35 Mbps, 1280 by 720 pixels, 30 frames per second, audio in ulaw, PCM stereo audio in .avi file format
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okay so, i was transferred to a senior technical rep and he looked it up - apparently apple is getting a bunch of complaints about this issue and they've submitted it to their developers. the more people that call and complain, the higher up on the priority list it goes to be fixed in a software update. there is no workaround known, and it's a standard issue across all ipad 2's.

Best playback quality.

hey, i was just wondering how to get the best playback quality
in the playback settings video quality is set to high and art is unlimited(what is rt stand for?) Is there anything i can do to make it look a bit better? Thanks people
syd

Is there anything i can do to make it look a bit better?<<</div>
Yes. View it on a calibrated external TV monitor .. preferably a professional grade monitor.
Keep in mind that FCP's Canvas is only a proxy playback - not full resolution or quality. Increasing the Canvas window size so it can accommodate 100% view will help some, but it's always best to be viewing your work on an external TV monitor.
-DH

Playback Quality on HD LCD TV is same as Canvas - Pixelated.

Hey Guys,
Can anyone help me here - I recently purchased a 19" HD ready TV for full screen playback through FCP 6.
I used a Mini DVI to DVI adaptor from the Mac then a DVI to HDMI to go into the TV.
Everything works fine & is in sync, except the quality of the TV image is exactly that of the Canvas, a poor pixelated proxy version.
Is there anyway I can fix this to get crisp & pristine playback on the TV?
Not color just image quality.
I've tried with both HD & DV and both are the same, I'm banging my head here!
Cheers
Franco

All you are displaying on your little HD tv is the same image as the Canvas.
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x

BH-214 playback quality issue

Yesterday I purchased the Nokia BH-214 stereo headsed to deal with the problems I've had with a similar product from Sony Ericsson. I use it with my Nokia E51 handset with FW rev. 220.34.37.
Generally the device seems to be performing quite well however after a few minutes of use I noticed poor quality of the audio transmission which can be compared quality-wise to playback of mp3s encoded at 96-112 kbps. As it appears usually as soon as the headset is auto-connected to the phone it falls back to an inferior codec or low bitrate transmission. This can often be solved by manually disconnecting and reconnecting the headset via the phone's BT menu after which the transmission quality gets much better and no further sound deterioration of the original mp3 is noticeable; however this solution is obviously unacceptable for everyday use. I have noticed similar behaviour in the past with my SE headset but it only occured whenever the connection between the headset and the phone became weak, never immediately after the connection was established. And since this was one of the primary reasons for purchase of a Nokia brand headset you surely understand my disappointment with its performance..
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Solved!
Go to Solution.

It seems that FW update ver. 400.34.011 solved the problem.

Optimizing dvd playback quality (macroblocking problems)- HELP!

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I feel sure others must have some idea what I'm talking about, and yet I haven't found a thread on this forum or any other that addresses what is really the root cause here. As I figure it, there are a number of factors (variables) at work:
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3. the hardware used to burn the disc (in my case the MATSHITA DVD-R UJ-815 superdrive in my powerbook)
4. the DVD player used for playback
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What gives!? Are there some DVD-R media that are way better than others? Or do I need to invest in a better drive to burn them? Or is this just the growing pains of emerging technology? Is there some other thread anywhere in cyberspace that addresses this issue?

Hi John
So you're saying that your mpegs are clean and clear of any macro blocking, and this is only introducted once you burn to DVD, and then only on some players, but also a disc that played fine one day on a deck, plays back bad the next day on the same deck.
Man, you've got some serious gremlins at work in your office. Before you pull your system apart, chack you mpegs again. If you're using Compressor 2 with any of the VBR presets you're going to get macro blocking because C2's VBR is not very good - I've not had one successful mpeg out of it. If your project is under 1hr try CBR at 7.5Mbps, that's been working fine for me.
Now, are you encoding your audio to .ac3, or .aiff. If you're using .aiff you might be hitting wall with your bitrate. Your .aiff will have a bitrate of 1.5Mbps, and if your using using a high max bitrate on your vision and you get a bitrate spike which Compressor is also known for then you could be blowing your bit budget (max of 9.8Mbps for vision and audio together), which could result in stuttered playback and freezes.
Next, are you burning out of DVDSP or are you using Toast. Some users report problems burning at higher than 2x speed (personally I burn at the limit of the media and haven't had a problem). As you can't control the burn speed out of DVDSP you might want to try just building in DVDSP and burning in toast at a low speed.
If you're burning from data on an external FW drive try moving it to the HD and try it again.
Try a few different brands of media. Keep it clean and out of the sun.
That's about all I can tell you at the moment - these are all the obvious things , maybe somone else can chime in with some more obscure causes.
Cheers
B

Does the low bitrate of x-fi 5.1 pro affect playback quality of higher bitrates?

I needed a 5.1 sound card for my laptop, and this was the only one I could afford used -- so far Im pretty satisfied, it works for cheap.
but I need to know if its important to save up for a better one right away --
I was concerned that since it only supports 44.8 and 96kbps that higher encoded audio like 128kbps and greater may not play back at the same quality they were recorded -- this is important because I ONLY use digital audio -- I have no analog -- videos are blu-ray rips, audio is FLAC or high encoded MP3, no cds, dvds, physical blu-rays.
so the encoding is often 128kbps or higher. sometimes even 196.
right now im keeping it until I can afford better regardless -- but is playback of these higher bitrates lower quality since it is being output at only 44.8 or 96?
just wondering, been finding it hard to get a straight simple answer to this. lots of people insist I never have audio play back at higher than 44.8 or 96, but I find that impossible since LOTS of my audio is encoded either lossless or at a higher rate.

So are you only getting sound out of the front center channel? I have this issue only from certain audio sources, such as YouTube videos, where all front right and left channel audio is put out through the center channel only. Are you not getting sounds from the front channels when using any type of media (mp3, games, DVDs)?
The only other reasons I was having issues like this were as follows: I hadn't checked the mixer settings yet in the windows and creative control panels to ensure volume levels were set correctly for all channels; I hadn't yet set my speakers to 5. sound (although this only affected the rear channels).
Let me know what you find. Also, have you tried the utility in the Creative control panel that lets you click each speaker to test it yet?

ProRes playback quality

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