Graphic image Pixilates in x4

[GregVA]

I recently added another edit system and installed X4. I have been creating a slide show to music and all seems fine until addimg a graphic (Jpeg logo) to the overlay track. I then reduce the size to place it in the lower 1/3. When paused, the preview window shows the graphic as sharp. When playing I can see resolution loss. I doubled the size of the graphic but I still see the resolution drop. It doesn't matter if the graphic is at its original size or smaller when adjusting it in the overlay track. When I output as an MPEG the background video is fine, but the overalay graphic is horrendously pixilated. See attached screen cap.

I played witht he render settings moving quality fromm 70 to 100 and upping the bit rate to the max. For grins I turned off non square pixel rendering, but it made no difference in the poor graphic resolution. I tried exporting as a wmv (hd 720 30f) and the problem was gone. Unfortunately, my end user client ( a programming server) requires MPEG-2 files.

[lata]

Hi

Welcome to the forums

can you tell us the dimensions of the image in Pixels
As a jpeg has it been saved as Progressive or Baseline the later being preferable.

Seems strange that rendering to wmv seems to cure the problem, maybe its an interlacing issue.
Wmv would use frame based, whilst the default fro Mpeg 2 would be interlaced UFF.

[GregVA]

Thanks Trevor.
Pixel dimentions 2509 x 784

Baseline "Standard"

96 dpi

[lata]

Hi Greg

Can you also give the properties and type of the video file.

[GregVA]

If by video file you mean the project video which is recieving the overlay - They are a series of JPG stills
which are large 5184 x 3456
Color Model; YCbCr
Sampling Factors: YUV 4:2:2
They are all Baseline standard

The video properties of the resulting Mpg. are
720 x 480
Data rate: 8000kbps
Total Bit rate: 9536kbps
29 frames/sec

[lata]

Hi Greg
I assume your project is using 4:3 aspect ratio.

The jagged effect is possibility due to resizing the logo image in the overlay track.
If you have to resize then drag the corners to keep the aspect ratio as original.

The main image is 5184 x 3456, this is not 4:3 so should not fit to screen, but have two black bands.
However your post image does not show these. So I guess you have used fit to screen. However It may be the way you cropped the image for the post.
You would be best to crop the images using 4:3 aspect ratio,

I have e-mailed you a sample VSP which looks ok without the jagged effect.

[GregVA]

Trevor,
The 2 VSPs will not open up. Unzipped and opened X4 and then found the file I’d extracted them to…nothing. Project remains as untitled.

I created a new media folder and loaded all the media from the extracted folder. The problem still remains even with the PNG you created. I wish you could see what happens when I hit ‘play” or press the space bar to run the timeline.

The preview window contents “shifts” diagonally a few frame lines (I realize frame lines are not diagonal – just used this for measurement.) This is what I was referring to when I said in “still” or pause the resolution appears fine, but when in “play” the resolution drops. So, with stop and start the shift goes in and then the shift returns. The screen cap on my original post is of a .mpg which the compression exacerbates the problem. It is still noticeable during editing.

The size or aspect ration of the background image doesn't come into play here. When I remove everything but the overlay the same "shift" to poor resolution occurs over black. COuld it be a hardware issue. Belarc couldn't really tell me what video card I am using. This station was bought to be an encoder and it's main purpose is to take input video and audio and spit out an mpeg file, X4 would be used to "finish" the program, adding graphics, trimming, basic editing.

Here are the best specs I can find for the system that X4 is loaded into:
http://www.vela.com/vela/ArgoNavisEncoder_Updated.aspx

[GregVA]

Trevor, the latest VSP you sent show that the problem is greatly reduced, still some resolution loss, but something I am used to from 11. I will experiment from here but I think this is resolved. Thank you for your help.