Quality loss in Imovie after finalizing
Having read alot about codecs and converting i'm still not able to figure out why there's quality loss after finalizing my project in Imovie. In the original .MTS files I can see, when played with the VLC player there's a little noise in the grey and dark area's but it's more then acceptable. After converting and finalizing it's a horror to watch. The weird thing is that the converted .MTS into .MOV files look better when played in Miro then in Quicktime.
What advice can you give me on reducing the noise and making sure the movie looks best when played from a DVD on flatscreen? I want to do the editing in the higest possible quality because in the future I want to burn to BluRay aswell (I know that full HD is only possible when you burn to BluRay)
Here are the details:
1. I imported the material, filmed in 25P (so I don't have to interlace) directly from my canon HF200 into Imovie. I can choose between 960X540 or original size.
2. I choose original size and receive a warning that this can cause a negative effect on the quality. So maybe the problem is caused by my old and small laptop, see specifications underneath my questions.
3. The converted mov. files in Imovie appear to have more noise then the original and after finalizing to HD 1080p the noise in the grey and black areas is almost unwatchable.
Is there anything I can do besides buy a new laptop?
Thank you for your help!
Specs Mac
Modelnaam: MacBook
Modelaanduiding: MacBook4,1
Processornaam: Intel Core 2 Duo
Processorsnelheid: 2,1 GHz
Aantal processors: 1
Totaal aantal cores: 2
L2-cache: 3 MB
Geheugen: 4 GB
Bussnelheid: 800 MHz
Opstart-ROM-versie: MB41.00C1.B00
SMC-versie (systeem): 1.31f1
Intel GMA X3100:
Chipsetmodel: GMA X3100
Type: GPU
Bus: Ingebouwd
VRAM (totaal): 144 MB
Fabrikant: Intel (0x8086)
Apparaatcode: 0x2a02
Revisiecode: 0x0003
Beeldschermen:
Kleuren-LCD:
Resolutie: 1280 x 800
Pixeldiepte: 32-bits kleur (ARGB8888)
Hoofdbeeldscherm: Ja
Synchrone weergave: Uit
Online: Ja
Ingebouwd: Ja
No worries Still your remark about the external drive is someting to take in to account, i have mine hooked on most of the time.
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Huge quality loss in iMove '11
Hello fellow iMovie users.
Yesterday I upgraded to iLife 11 to get the new iMovie and its "new" audio editing capabilities. I could ofcourse just buy it from Mac App Store, but I am principally against App Store and its strict rules, so I choosed to get it the old way.
Anyway, I liked what i saw. Finally the new iMovie was about as good as the five year old one, and had some neat features like chroma key and cropping.
So I decided to start practicing and create a short video based on some old DV-videos filmed with my Canon MV950 DV-PAL camera.
I imported the footage into iMovie, and noticed some significant quality loss after the import.
And it get worse. After I exported the video, it seems like it is heavily compressed, even if I'm exporting to QuickTime and selects the highest quality possible.
I have some screenshots to show you the differences.
This is the original DV-footage.
The imported video. Notice the higher compression and the choppy edges.
And this is the exported video. Notice the insanely bad quality, especially in dark areas.
Is there any way to fix this, or do I have go back to iMovie HD?
PS. Sorry if my post is a bit unreadable. I'm from Norway.Steve,
While I agree everyone should have owned a HD camera by now, there are a lot of low-end SD cameras that are still being sold today. In this era of our economy, consumers are sensitive to prices; especially low or lower prices.
And unlike the video camcorder boom of the 80s with Sony introducing the Video8 handycam (shoulder mounted camcorder), people today do not video using traditional camcorders. Most either do it through a digital camera, DSLR, iPhone or blogger cameras and are already mostly in an acceptable progressive format. There is nothing wrong with DV style cam. Canon GL-2 and the Panasonic DVX-100 are still commanding such a very high price tag for cameras of older technology and still being repaired goes to show that there are people out there still using it.
If one can convert quality interlaced footage into quality progressive footage, you can use that footage and create good results using iMovie 11. I agree with you and Tom that iMovie 11 captures interlaced footage in full. But what's the use if it can't make a good product in the end that looks like what iMovie 6HD can do and when there are PC software out there including the free Windows Movie Maker that can do this with no problem.
Consumers, unlike some of us, only relate to past software used and are usually benign to the fact of progressive vs interlaced. I have dealt with some mis-informed customers that they believed FULL HD only means 1080p at 60fps; anything else is not. I digress.
With Mac users, they don't necessarily follow the same upgrade frequency as PC users either. Macs generally last a lot longer between upgrades compared to a PC because they don't have to run a barage of virus/spam/anti-malware growing definition files which ultimately slow an otherwise healthy PC down. Macs do not have to worry about this. -
Display size query, + quality loss from iMovie originals
Learning to work the iDVD process, but what is the word on a foolproof sizing method, such that the thing will display OK on any TV? I don't see any way to restrict display size in iMovie, and what good is the TV Safe check, if you can't control the display size?? Also is quality loss inevitable? I'm compiling the DVD from separate files, less than 1 gb ea. I used "full quality" Quicktime compressed versions from the original iMovie file (which look fine in QT); then pulled those back in to iMovie, then shared to iDVD. One of the files looks fine encoded, but the other has weird sizzling-oil standing wave artifacts, even on still scenes from jpegs. Looking for help/comment/expressions of sympathy
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Houston TXHi v
Quality of the DVD-disc depends on several things.
• Highes Quality isn't Top - better is Best Performances (up to 60 min movie)
confused naming - in iDVD'08 there is Pro Quality AND I like it.
• Media brand - I use Verbatim
• Type: DVD-R my choise no DVD+R or +/-RW
• I save a Disc-Image and burn this at an as SLOW speed as possibly (eg x1) with Toast™
(Disc Util tool can also do this)
• I DON'T USE the function Share/Export to iDVD from within iMovie - IT IS DESTRUCTIVE !!
Just drop the movie project icon (with a Star on it) into iDVD theme window - then iDVD do the
rendering and so much better. Especially if there is photos in the movie.
• Free space on internal (start-up) hard disc - should be about 25Gb when all material is imported
and structured. This for iDVD to work with - iDVD can't use an extern hard disc as scratch.
(less than 5Gb - result is most probably of no use at all)
This is what come's first to my mind.
Yours Bengt W -
When I import photos into IMovie they instantly loose focus and quality. Is there anything I can do about this?
Lets say you have a 6 megapixel jpeg file.
When you render it in iMovie, it will be downsampled to fit the project.
For a 1920x1080 project, it will be about 2 megapixels.
For a 960x540 project (large), it will me about .5 megapixels.
For a medium project, or anything going to DVD, it will be about .3 megapixels. -
After Effect to Final Cut (Quality Loss)
Does anyone know what's the best codec (besides Animation) and setting in After Effects?
I captured a bunch of footage using Final Cut Pro. I imported them to AE for some special effects and it went very well. Then, I exported them to my macbook and imported them back to Final Cut Pro. The result was kind of bad.
The quality wasn't t as good as the original (quality loss). Is there anything I can do to change this?
I tried to use the plugin from popcornisland (FCP2AE), but it didn't work for me because it brought the whole sequence from Final Cut Pro to After Effects ... while I just needed some certain footage to be edited in After Effects.Joe Biscuit wrote:
Does anyone know what's the best codec (besides Animation) and setting in After Effects?
Animation is "the best." You're asking for our advice on a compromise, not the best. But you haven't told us why you refuse to use Animation. Most such complaints are based on the fact that Animation files are large. Of course they are, they're lossless. when you render them in your timeline, they are converted to your sequence settings and get very compact. But the original file is always available at the best possible rez. This is an excellent and efficient use of space and resources.
I captured a bunch of footage using Final Cut Pro. I imported them to AE for some special effects and it went very well. Then, I exported them to my macbook and imported them back to Final Cut Pro. The result was kind of bad.
You have not bothered to tell us what format you're working in and "bad" is so totally subjective as to be meaningless.
The quality wasn't t as good as the original (quality loss). Is there anything I can do to change this?
Yes.
I tried to use the plugin from popcornisland (FCP2AE), but it didn't work for me because it brought the whole sequence from Final Cut Pro to After Effects ... while I just needed some certain footage to be edited in After Effects.
Never heard of popcorn, thanks for the tip, I'll have to look it up.
If this popcorn thingy of yours only moves entire sequences to AE then just think about how you can make it for you. You can easily make a copy of your sequence, call it :Move tHis to AE,"use the blade to delete all of the the material you do not need to move to AE.
bogiesan -
IMovie HD6: HDV to AIC to HDV... quality loss?
Hi All,
I'm curious, when I use my normal workflow (HDV to AIC (imovie 6) to HDV), does it lose quality?
If so:
* Is there a way to avoid this?
* How much quality is lost? Is there a visual comparison available?
Thanks for any input!Dear catspaw,
Here are my thoughts, based on my experiences, and what I think I understand of all this..
1. Standard-definition DV (those little tapes, or the larger 'broadcast' tapes) is pretty much compression-free ..we-ell, strictly speaking there's some, but relatively little, compression used in DV. It looks perfect, although it is slightly compressed. The material recorded onto tape - and imported into iMovie - contains every frame which the camcorder optics see. So editing it is simple: all the frames get copied into iMovie, and you can chop out, or insert, anything you want. Using iMovie HD 6, or earlier, you can then copy the edited material back to a DV camcorder ..all the frames get shuffled out of the computer and back onto tape again. (You can't do that with iMovie '08, as it has no option to Export to Camcorder.) What you see in iMovie - after importing from a DV camcorder - isn't exactly the same as what you've imported, because iMovie runs on a computer, and uses a computer display, and that generally shows complete "progressive" frames of video, whereas a TV ..or TVs with cathode ray tubes; precursors to the latest LCD or DLP or plasma TVs.. will generally show interlaced 'half-frames' one after the other, each comprising half the TV picture, but shown in such rapid succession that they blur into each other, and our brains see a succession of complete frames.
(..Here's a good visual representation from one of Adam Wilt's pages:
..There are two 'fields' of video, each made of half the entire number of lines down the screen, superimposed on each other, and blending into a full frame of video comprised of all the lines. That's what happens on a TV screen when the interlaced 'fields' of video blend together..)
So standard-def DV is really plain and simple, and there should be no quality loss after shooting, importing, editing, exporting.
2. Hi-def. A can of worms. There are several different varieties of "hi-def". What we're working with in our 'amateur' movie program, iMovie, is generally the HDV version of hi-def, or the AVCHD version. (And a few people may be working with JVC's version of 'progressive' frames, but with a lower total number of lines down the screen: 720p, instead of 1080i. 720p has 720 pixels down the screen, and records and presents an entire 'progressive' ..one-line-after-the-other.. frame of video at a time, whereas 1080i shows 1080 pixels down the screen, consisting of half that number, 540; all the 'odd-numbered' lines.. at a time, immediately followed by the other half ..the even-numbered lines.. slotting in-between the previous lot. That repeating pair of 540 'interleaved' lines gives a total of 1080 interlaced lines in every frame. Movement appears smoother using 1080i (..after all, the picture is refreshed twice as often as with single-complete-frame 'progessive' video..) but may not look as super-sharp as progressive video, because at any moment there's only half the total information of a frame onscreen. 'Interlaced' video is smoother, and any action flows more "creamily", whereas 'progressive' may be considered 'sharper' (..it is if you freeze a frame..) but more jerky.)
So our 'amateur' hi-def movies may be recorded as HDV, AVCHD or some other similar format. 'Professional', or broadcast-intended, hi-def may consist of several other non-amateur formats, some of which are completely uncompressed and require extremely fast links between the cameras and recording equipment, and massive-capacity hard discs to capture and edit the huge quantity of data which such cameras..
..deliver ..for $150,000. Or here's a remote-control broadcast hi-def camera for (only) $7,995..
(..Tell me if I'm boring you..)
The hi-def cameras which we're more likely to be using..
..record compressed video in MPEG-2 format, or H.264, or some similar codec. The idea behind HDV was that the companies which make 'consumer-grade' (amateur) camcorders wanted a method to record hi-def - with about 4x the data of standard-def - onto the little miniDV tapes which we were all familiar with. So a method was found to squeeze 4x the data onto a tape which normally records standard-def DV data at 25 megabits per second. The method decided upon was MPEG-2 ..the same codec which is used to squeeze a two-hour Hollywood film onto a little 4.7GB capacity DVD. (Bollywood movies, as distinct from Hollywood movies, tend to be three hours long!)
If MPEG-2 was good enough for the latest cinema releases, in nice, sharp, sharper-than Super-VHS form, then it was thought to be good enough for 'domestic' hi-def recordings. The only awkward thing about that - from an editing point of view.. (..but which of the camcorder manufacturers are seriously interested in editing..? ..they primarily want to sell 'product' which - according to their advertising - is terrific at simply recording and playing-back video. Like car advertising shows you how wonderful cars are to sit in and for travelling to places, but the adverts don't tell you about how tricky it may be to get into the rear sidelights and replace a blown bulb..) ..is that in HDV there's only one 'real' frame for every 15 frames recorded on the tape. The other 14 are just indications of what's different between the various frames. Therefore, for editing, the 'missing' frames must be rebuilt during import into iMovie.
Steve Jobs heralded 2005 - at MacWorld, you may remember - as the "Year of HD!" ..It became possible to import and edit hi-def in iMovie ..that is, the HDV version of hi-def, not the uncompressed 'professional' broadcast version of hi-def, of course.. but ONLY with a fast enough computer ..and many weren't fast enough to import and convert HDV to editable-format in real-time (..no mention of it being the year you would import at half, or a quarter, or an eighth, real-time ..ugh-ugh).
So HDV gets converted to AIC to make it editable ..and then what d'you do with it? ..Few (none of them?) HDV camcorders let you import HDV back to tape from iMovie. No Macs had/have Blu-Ray burners ..although you can burn about 20 mins of hi-def onto normal DVDs with a Mac's normal inbuilt SuperDrive DVD burner with the appropriate software ..DVD Studio Pro, or Toast, etc.
(..Once again, there was some omission from the hoopla ..yes; you can import HDV! ..yes; you can edit HDV! ..er, no, sorry; no mention that you can't burn a 1 hour hi-def home video onto a hi-def DVD with a Mac ..iDVD would/will only burn in standard-def, and there are no Blu-Ray burners built into Macs..)
Then came AVCHD (Advanced Video Codec; High Definition). This compresses video even more than HDV (whose compression is pretty much invisible, and is in regular use for broadcast material) by using a different method. And along came progressive hi-def recording, trying to supersede HDV's generally 'interlaced' 1080i hi-def.
But the problem with progressive, non-interlaced AVCHD is that if there's rapid movement in a scene - if you move the camera, or something rapidly crosses the picture - instead of the "creamy flow" of interlaced video, there's a jerky lurch from one frame to the next. And with the added extra compression of AVCHD this jerkiness can be (..to my mind..) even more horribly evident.
Anyway, unscrambling ..and then re-assembling.. hi-def interlaced MPEG-2 HDV is pretty much invisible - to me, anyway. The video looks sharp, moves smoothly, looks 'true-to-life' and doesn't have terrible artifacts and jerks.
Unscrambling ..and then re-assembling.. hi-def interlaced or progressive AVCHD (..which is sometimes described as MPEG-4 or H.264..) - I know that you know this, but I'm also writing for others here - isn't quite as simple as doing the same for tape-based MPEG-2 hi-def HDV. Here's all the gobbledegook about what AVCHD can consist of.. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MPEG-4_AVC
..Oh, and here's a bit about the "usability" of AVCHD: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AVCHD
There are many more 'varieties' of encoding in AVCHD than in 'simpler' hi-def, such as HDV. There's less data sent in an AVCHD data stream than HDV (..AVCHD has jumped from 17MBits/sec to 24MBits/sec ..just below HDV's 25MBits/sec..) so the video is more compressed than HDV. And there are all sorts of video formats (interlaced, progressive, HD, 'Full' HD) which are recorded by different cameras under the all-embracing 'AVCHD' label. iMovie - or a Mac - has to work much harder to unscramble and convert the more-compressed AVCHD format(s) than uncompressing HDV. And has to work harder to compress the output of iMovie to H.264 (an AVCHD codec) than when re-compressing to MPEG-2 (the codec for standard-def DVDs and hi-def HDV).
To - finally! - come back to your question "..is there therefore no advantage in using DV tape-based vidcams for editing purposes.." I'd say that there ARE advantages in using tape-based vidcams for editing purposes ..using your two categories:
1. Non-hi-def tape-based DV is ..to all intents and purposes.. lossless. And the material can be imported in real-time, and be output - with no loss - in real-time, too, using any Mac from an old G3 onwards. Importing non-tape material into iMovie ..e.g; miniDVDs, or chip-based, more compressed video.. is more long-winded, and generally has to go through various external bits of software (..e.g; MPEG Streamclip or somesuch..) to put it into a format that's editable in iMovie. AVCHD can, theoretically - as 'AVC', without the 'HD' - be used for recording in standard-def, but there are currently few AVCHD camcorders which are built to record standard-def video as well ..there is the Sony HDR-SR12. But only iMovie running on an Intel-powered Mac will decode AVCHD, apart from separate standalone Mac software such as 'Voltaic'.
2. Hi-def tape-based recording IS an advantage on anything that's less than the fastest, or highest-powered, of Macs, because it needs less "horsepower" to "unpack" the compressed data and to get it into an editable format through recovering, or rebuilding, the necessary individual frames. I think it's an advantage in every case, as not only can tape-based hi-def be edited on older, slower Macs (including pre-Intel Macs) but also:
(a) HDV data's less compressed, and so motion is generally expressed - currently - more "fluidly" than with the more compressed hard-disc or chip-stored AVCHD,
(b) HDV original material is "self-archived" onto its tapes ..you don't have to "empty" a camcorder's hard disc or memory chips onto something else - such as a separate hard drive - in order to re-use, or continue using, the camcorder: you just drop in another cheap 1-hour tape,
(c) Tape-containing camcorders tend to be heavier, less lightweight, than fewer-moving-parts chip-based AVCHD camcorders. They're therefore inherently less "wobbly" and don't tremble so much in your hand ..that gives smoother, less "jiggled-about" recordings ..even taking into account the stabilisation built into most camcorders,
(d) Tape-based camcorders are less likely to lose an entire 'shoot' by being dropped or mis-treated. Material already recorded onto a tape will not be damaged if you drop the camera and its tape-heads thereby become misaligned. The data can be recovered by simply ejecting the tape and popping it into another camcorder. If a hard-disc camcorder is dropped, subsequent head misalignment may mean that all data already on the hard disc is irrecoverable. If a memory chip becomes corrupted, all data may similarly become irrecoverable. If a tape becomes damaged, it's usually only a few seconds' worth which be lost. (..I dropped a tape-based camcorder in the sea when I was trying to get shots of waves coming in onto the beach from an offshore viewpoint, and a wave washed right over me and knocked me down. The camcorder was a write-off, but I managed to prise the tape out, and recover the 30 minutes of movie I'd already recorded. I don't really want to test it, but I have doubts about whether I'd have been able to recover my video from a similarly-drowned hard-disc based camcorder ..maybe, in the interests of factual objectivity I'll try it some day with an old, no-longer-used 2.5" hard disc..)
(e) AVCHD camcorders - unless you're looking at 'semi-pro' or professional 'cost-a-plenty' record-to-chip camcorders, or that Sony HD12..
..are generally built for "point-and-shoot" amateurs. This means that AVCHD camcorders generally do not have the assortment of manual controls which you find on most tape-based HDV camcorders (..because the camcorder makers also aim, or aimed, HDV at low-cost broadcast users, too). There's usually far greater flexibility and more shooting options (shutter speeds, exposure, audio handling) on tape-based HDV camcorders than can be found on AVCHD camcorders. If you're just pointing and shooting, that doesn't matter ..but if you want to shoot good-looking video, there are generally - and it is a generalisation - more adjustment options to be found on a tape-based camcorder than on a chip-based or hard-disc AVCHD camcorder. In my experience - yours may be different - people tempted by AVCHD camcorders tend to buy (..and manufacturers tend to publicise..) high pixel counts (like "Full HD 1920x1080") and that magic word "progressive" (perhaps because it has the flavour, in English, of "futuristic" or "more advanced") rather than their being concerned with choices of apertures or shutter speeds and the clearest representation of what the camcorder's pointing at.
In summary ..at last!.. "..is there therefore no advantage in using DV tape-based vidcams for editing purposes.." Yes; the advantages, I believe, are that HDV converts fast into AIC for editing; my perception is that HDV delivers smoother action (onscreen movement) than AVCHD; and with a suitable deck..
..HDV can be returned back to tape, whereas it's more long-winded and needs more subterfuge to export AVCHD back to a chip, or a camcorder's hard disc, for in-camera replay ..and thence out to an HDTV.
As always, these are simply my opinions ..others may disagree. -
Serious quality loss with MTS files and iMovie '11
Hello,
I have some issues with my brand new Panasonic HDC SD700 (a full HD camera)
I experience serious quality loss when I use iMovie to create a movie.
I did some tests, but still puzzled int this world of codecs and formats.
Maybe some of you can help.
I have made a short shot of 450 sec with highest mode (1080p 24fps)
It show is finder as a .MTS file size 99MB, I'm very happy with the quality when I play this with VLC.
iMovie turns this file into a .mov file with 635MB size, in Apple Intermediate Codec, Linear PCM, Timecode. This quality is already poor compared to original MTS file.
No wonder that the output file (select 1080p H.264 codecs) results also in unacceptable quality.
I'm running latest imOvie version with all updates etc.
I have no idea were to look to solve this issue. It is quite annoying since I have invested in a top Cam recorder. Not sure is Final cut express will sure the issue either.....I have made a short shot of 450 sec with highest mode (1080p 24fps)
Have you tried shooting at the PAL standard of 25fps? I checked the specs for your Panasonic but didn't see any mention of a 24fps mode, but most reviews seem to miss mentioning the shooting modes. If you did indeed shoot at 24fps, did you choose this frame rate when importing to iMovie '11?
I export as 1080p (same as original. My output is a bit blurry and colors are a bit pale.
Did you use the 1080p preset under Share to Media Browser, or Export using QuickTime? If the latter, be sure to select an appropriate data rate - if set too low this may result in poor quality output.
And yes you are right I'm using IMovie '11, quite confusing that '11 means version 9.0
Yes - very confusing! In the forums, iMovie versions are generally referred to by their year number, not version number. It's a pity that we have version 9.0 (iMovie '11) and iMovie '09.
Glad you liked the video - it looked very clear on YouTube at 1080p Full Screen, at least to my ageing eyes!
John -
Quality of my pictures after I burned a DVD out of imovie 11
I have created a new imovie project for our High School for their Basketball dinner and I just "shared" the project and created a DVD with idvd. The quality of my pictures is terrible..... I can't present this at the dinner. How can I get a better quality dvd???? HELP. The dinner is this weekend.
Hi
The quality of my pictures is terrible.....
There are minimum two major reasons to this.
A. DVD is as standard Low eg as old CRT-TV - No DVD encoding program can do better than this.
B. iMovie'08 or 09 or 11 - Makes things even worse by discarding every second line resulting in a quality loss of 50%
C. Rendering can also make things worse especially when using "Share/Export to iDVD"
and using transitions in the SlideShow project.
• iM'08 to 11 - Publish to Media Browser - in iDVD import from this
• iM up to HD6 - just close it and let iDVD import the movie icon (with a Star on it)
High Quality (suggestions)
• Make a Blu-Ray disk - with Roxio Toast™ incl BD-component, BD-burner + BD-disks
• Use Camera and show photos from this
Just some thoughts from Bengt W -
Quality loss after exporting 1280 x 960 30fps footage
Hello everyone,
Everytime I edit and export footage shot with my GoPro camera (1280x960p, 30fps) the quality gets a little less. Very frustrating as I am clueless after a long time of looking for what I'm doing wrong..
I use Premiere Pro Version 4.2.1
Sequence presets:
General
Editing mode: Desktop
Timebase: 29,97fps
Video Settings
Frame size: 1280h 960v (1,0000)
Frame rate: 29,97 frames/second
Pixel Aspect Ratio: Square Pixels (1.0)
Fields: No Fields (Progressive Scan)
Export settings:
Format: H.264
Preset: Custom
TV Standard: NTSC
Frame Width: 1280
Frame Height: 960
Frame Rate (fps) 29.97
Field Order: None (Progressive)
Pixel Aspect Ratio: Square Pixels.
Has anybody got an idea what could help here?Thanks for the replies guys, but unfortunately the problem isn't really solved yet..
I tried checking the maximum render quality, but that only resulted in my laptop not being able to smoothly play the exported video.
Filming with the 1280 x 720 setting is possible, but then the footage just doesn't look that sharp.. (as I can't film in 60fps, I got the first GoPro 960).
I installed Cineform and converted a little test video to AVI. This resulted in an export video without quality loss, but the conversion with Cineform took way too long for it to be a practical solution cause I edit a lot.
At last, Abhishek Kapoor, I couldn't find the video setting you're talking about to increase the maximum bitrate.
Any other ideas that might work? -
HELP! iPhoto 08 Quality loss after edits
HELP! iPhoto 08 Quality loss after edit!
Any edited version, no matter how minor, causes the file size to be cut in half!
Original 3872 x 2592 is 3.1mb at 300dpi .
Edit version 3870x2590 becomes 1.5Mb at 72dpi.
B&W conversion 3872x2592 becomes 1.6mb at 72dpi.
Seems like a major degradation! iPhoto 6 wasn't this bad.
DPI change is not a problem but the file size change sure is!
PLEASE! any ideas before I upgrade all my files to 08. Please - don't say Aperture, it's still too slow and cumbersome. Trying to avoid Lightroom and stay within Apple sphere.It really isn't a big degradation. There is a jpg compression when you make any edit but you might be hard pressed to see the reduction unless you're enlarging/printing the file to very large sizes. The most critical part of an image file is the number of pixels in it.
The reduction in size depends on the image content of the photos. If there's a lot of the same color, i.e. like lots of blue sky or a same color wall, that type of image will see much more compression than a very intricate photo. Also when removing the color information for a B/W conversion reduces the file size considerably. Do a Google search for jpeg compression and you'll find some very informative descriptions on how the compression is performed and what part image detail plays in the resulting file size.
You would have to compress the file a number of additional times time before you'd see the change. And with iPhoto's Revert to Original capability, you can start a new edit fresh with the untouched digital negative.
Do you Twango?
TIP: For insurance against the iPhoto database corruption that many users have experienced I recommend making a backup copy of the Library6.iPhoto database file and keep it current. If problems crop up where iPhoto suddenly can't see any photos or thinks there are no photos in the library, replacing the working Library6.iPhoto file with the backup will often get the library back. By keeping it current I mean backup after each import and/or any serious editing or work on books, slideshows, calendars, cards, etc. That insures that if a problem pops up and you do need to replace the database file, you'll retain all those efforts. It doesn't take long to make the backup and it's good insurance.
I've written an Automator workflow application (requires Tiger), iPhoto dB File Backup, that will copy the selected Library6.iPhoto file from your iPhoto Library folder to the Pictures folder, replacing any previous version of it. It's compatible with iPhoto 08 libraries. You can download it at Toad's Cellar. Be sure to read the Read Me pdf file. -
After finally downloading my MiniDV tapes to iMovie 10.0.6 (Yosemite), I see that there is no iDVD (why did I buy a new Superdrive for my new MacMini). So, can I buy an old iLife 9 and expect it to load to the new machine. This is NOT progress!! HELP
Hello!
They're still being sold in some places: http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss_1?url=search-alias%3Dsoftware&field-keywo rds=ilife+09&sprefix=iLife+09%2Caps%2C194&rh=n%3A229534%2Ck%3Ailife+09
However, do you absolutely NEED iDVD? There are alternatives, like Burn (free): http://burn-osx.sourceforge.net/
I suggest you try it out since it's free. Maybe it'll be enough. -
Another quality loss issue: exporting
I see a lot of people have problems with quality loss.
I am importing an movie of an animated screengrab (using Snapzpro). This movie looks great - nice and sharp when viewed in QT. After importing into iMovie it's slightly blurred, notr a big deal just looks a bit "warm".
However when I export it looks bad, diagonal lines are very jagged. I've tried export at Full quality, I've tried expert settings with DV-PAL and many other codecs.
It's just about OK if I use "none", and then import into QT Pro and export with DV-PAL - what I don't understand is why I can't just use DV-PAL direct from iMovie.
Is this something I just have to put up with? Would it better with Final Cut Express?Actually I discovered since posting the question, that the dimension is something to due with it, but too small rather than too large. I was capturing at 640 x 480 and I discovered that capturing 768 x 576.
I also think that the nature of the image is crucial. This is large scale musical notation - lots of diagonal black and white straight lines so any jaggedness becomes very obvious.
What I still don't understand is why the export from iMovie using DV PAL is not as good as the export from QT using DV PAL - I have to export from iMovie with no compression, then re export from QT Pro.
Although I,m totally ready to accept this is a human operator error, I've also seen lots of people say iMovie does degrade on importing which is why I wonder if I need final Cut Express or Pro -
Significant quality loss and jagged diagonal lines when exporting from FCP
I've been working on this problem for several days and I'm going insane! Every time I export my movie from Final Cut, there is a significant quality loss. It is most noticeable in two ways: diagonal lines become very jagged (looking somewhat like diagonal lines in an older video game -- more a diagonal sequence of blocks); also, in some areas such as faces, the colors get a little blurry and there seems to some "pooling" of colors around the edges of the face.
I'm pretty sure the problem's not in capture: the Quicktime clips that I captured from the camera are all pristine. When I play them in Quicktime, I can blow them up several times their original size, and they maintain their sharp lines. (I also Reverse Telecined them all with Cinema Tools, if that's relevant.) I also know the problem's not just my computer monitor; when I play these movies on my external monitor and TV, they look bad too. The clips look bad after I bring them into Final Cut, and while I'm editing, but at first I figured that was because Final Cut sometimes doesn't show full resolution in the timeline. Still, when I export, the quality of the original captures just isn't there.
Some details:
Captured from 24A progressive, Sony HVR V1U HDV.
Using Final Cut 6.0.1, Compressor 3.0.1, Quicktime 7.2.0, OS 10.4.10 (all the most recent versions I believe).
I've exported in many different ways: using Compressor (and have tried a number of different settings: the DVD Best Quality 90 Minutes default Setting, as well as using a variety of bit rates from 3.0-8.0, One pass CBR, Two pass CBR, Two pass VBR, Two pass VBR best; Video Formats NTSC, HD 1440x1080...I have tried many combinations. Regardless of the size of the m2v created, the files seem to have the same problem over and over. I've also tried exporting from Final Cut as a Quicktime Movie and with Quicktime Conversion. Same result. I also tried using different compressors with my Final Cut sequence: Apple Intermediate Codec (which I used when capturing -- you have to with the Sony HVR), HDV 1080p24, HDV 1080i60, Apple Pro Res 422, H.264...
What's happening? Why is Final Cut turning my nice pristine captures into jagged foulness? What can I try that I haven't yet?Welcome to the forums!
Unfortunately, you seem to have tried everything I can think of, and I don't have the latest versions of FCP to know if it is a bug. However, in the off chance that you haven't given this a shot:
Take a problematic 10 second section of your timeline (set in and out points) and the Export -> Quicktime (not QT Conversion) and make sure that you have it on Quality settings that you captured, and select the "Make Self Contained" box.
Look at that in Quicktime and see if it's bad. If it's not problematic, use that video file in Compressor for your render.
Hope that helps!
~Luke -
hi
i have i movie hd, and final cut express2. i have not been able to find a way to capture in final cut, but is it possible to capture in imovie, compress it to a quicktime file through "share" in the file menu, then edit it in final cut?Yes, it is.
But you must be careful about some points:
- this approach has 2 disadvantages: 1st you lose the timecodes (FCE does record them, iMovie does not); 2nd you have to render audio in FCE, because FCE file format is different from iMovie exported files.
Either or both points may be relevant or not to you, depending on your editing style and project requirements.
- from iMovie you must export to QuickTime Full Quality, and NOT compress the movie, to avoid quality losses.
I suggest you to read this thread about: Capturing in iMovie vs FCE
Then: why are not able to capture in FCE: missing instructions, or errors of some kind ? This is the best way to go, if you can make it work.
Piero -
I am importing video from a DVD using "Mac the Ripper", then converting the VOB files using "Video converter for mac 3.2.6".
Making up the my movie in Imovie 06 sending it to Idvd 08, and then burning a disc image using the best performance setting.
This all works fine except the quality from the original DVD is much better than the final result, being digital I thought there would not be much quality loss.
Is there a better way to achieve this without losing video quality. Or should I use different settings in any of the programs, (I have not changed settings from default setting in "Mac the Ripper" or "Video Converter".
Any advice appreciated, I am new to this process, but apart from quality loss I am having success.Noted Bazmond, but we have to be careful!
You need to convert the VOB files back to DV which iMovie is designed to handle. For that you need mpegStreamclip:
http://www.apple.com/downloads/macosx/video/mpegstreamclip.html
which is free, but you must also have the Apple mpeg2 plugin :
http://www.apple.com/quicktime/mpeg2/
which is a mere $20.
Another possibility is to use DVDxDV:
http://www.dvdxdv.com/NewFolderLookSite/Products/DVDxDV.overview.htm
which costs $25.
Obviously the foregoing only applies to DVDs you have made yourself, or other home-made DVDs that have been given to you. It will NOT work on copy-protected commercial DVDs, which in any case would be illegal.
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