VSX7 time-lapse video mp4 quality issues

[lata]

Hi

Sorry or the delay in my reply.

Thanks for the larger sample, At 4.2 seconds I assume you mean 4 seconds 2 frames I do not see any problems with the silo, certainly does not disappear.
5.23, yes I see a transparent box, maybe a cluster of pixels around the top of the silo. I must say I am now being very critical in my viewing.

The foreground brown field seems to change texture as though the pixels are breaking up?

Unfortunately I have nothing to compare it with, at 5.23 frames that would be the 173rd image, we do not have those images.
I would imaging the image is ok and not showing the box with the problem being the rendering.

I have run my own timelapse with little or no problems, so is it your program not rendering correctly.
Can you provide all images used in your 7 minute video, that would be 211 jpegs.
We can render them and send back the results for you to compare, the files sizes will be large at 800 Mb.

I have uploaded one of my samples. There are a few birds flying about that may look like pixels, just ignore those. The clouds and reflections in the water should play ok, and a couple of marks on the CCD, must clean that.

Lata Clouds 30 fps_01 at 23 Mb

Anyway see what you think?

[the_hefay]

lata, I downloaded your time-lapse. It is nice and sharp. It's the type of quality I'm looking for. It's going to take a while because of my upload speed but I will get the photos uploaded. I'm going to upload the jpg's I resized to 1920 wide in order to save on size. The quality is more than adequate since it's a 1920 wide video I'm looking for. If you really need the full size files I'm going to have to upload substantially less because they come to over 1GB total. I'll post back when the jpg's are uploaded.


rwernyei, sorry, I misunderstood what you were saying.

[the_hefay]

https://www.dropbox.com/s/ecid7g2xxfslpij/_DSC7513.zip

Here's a zip of the 211 photos.

[lata]

Hi

I have uploaded a video to Dropbox.
For me it looks very similar, a little darker maybe “0.25 of a stop” and possibly more contract making it a little sharper. As I said earlier I am being quite critical.

Do you still have quality issues with other timelapse projects?

When we use images the program displays the image as 1920 x 1080, that’s the video frame size, large images (L) lose a lot of pixels compared to using smaller images (S) which will be nearer the video frame size.
Maybe it’s the reduction in pixels that’s making the difference.
Having said that I haven’t noticed any significant reduction in quality in the tests I have run. Although I do shoot at M or S camera quality.

Have a look at the new video I rendered from your 211 images.

new video 210 images

[the_hefay]

Thanks for working on that. It looks identical to what I created. The quality I see is horrible. So the one you made from your pictures looks great. The one you made from my pictures looks nasty. I have made other time-lapse projects that have much better quality than these.

[the_hefay]

I downloaded the trial of Sony Movie Studio Platinum 13. Using the same images I created a very clear and sharp mp4 file. Does this mp4 look different than the one I made from CVS?

https://www.dropbox.com/s/lkjdghqrcvhkr ... yMSP13.mp4

[Sonic Fields]

I downloaded the trial of Sony Movie Studio Platinum 13. Using the same images I created a very clear and sharp mp4 file. Does this mp4 look different than the one I made from CVS?

https://www.dropbox.com/s/lkjdghqrcvhkr ... yMSP13.mp4

This rendering looks far better than the CVS and even better than the 'new video 210 images' rendered by 'lata', which incidentally was better than your first rendering. But lata's had some block pixelation around the silo at the 5 sec mark and also colour pixelation in the bottom foreground. All this has disappeared in this Sony render, which looks much sharper and clearer. This does however support the point I made earlier - it's dependant upon the data rate, with the Sony being rendered at a higher rate producing a 2MB larger file than lata's.

[the_hefay]

So is there a way to get the bitrates and compression adjusted to the point were VSX7 will render in the same quality as Sony's?

@ Sonic Fields. I reread your other post and it seems to me that you've decided that it can't be done in VSX7. Or did I misunderstand?

[Sonic Fields]

So is there a way to get the bitrates and compression adjusted to the point were VSX7 will render in the same quality as Sony's?

@ Sonic Fields. I reread your other post and it seems to me that you've decided that it can't be done in VSX7. Or did I misunderstand?

I wouldn't wish to compare editing programs, but think it more important to find out at what bitrate you can render in order to produce a good quality video without macroblocking and pixelation being present. The accepted reason for macroblocking, which is quite evident in both your initial render and lata's subsequent render, is due to poor video compression (and/or poor processing in the case of streaming/cable etc), so you can make your own mind up whether or not it is with the CVS rendering process, but given the problems that I have personally experienced in trying to render high quality video, I believe we are coming to a similar conclusion.

As a regular viewer of films/videos ranging from high-compressed videos of dubious quality from the likes of YouTube and high quality professional productions on Vimeo, with no evidence of these artifacts being present in HD formats, I do question the rendering process used in CVS. I would certainly not expect to see such poor quality rendering in any video both produced and displayed on my own machine, given that I don't see it in re-compressed downloaded HD content from the aforementioned sites!

I do find it a touch unbelievable at having to render uncompressed in CVS and then to compress using another program just to avoid macroblocking.

Had you not displayed this problem with jpegs & tiffs, then I would have blamed it in my particular case, on the inability of CVS to handle large MOV files, but that may be another issue as is evidenced by their problems with VS X7 service pack 1.

The visual quality of rendering is dependant upon the type of scene filmed, so on some occasions you may get away with rendering at lower bitrates than for others. Some rendering codecs take advantage of reducing data for similar coloured areas, so often these types of unwanted artifacts tend to be more prominent in similar areas of colour with loss of fine detail, such as was present in your foreground rendered in CVS (but not in Sony) and was present in one of my background hedge lines and area of sky (present in CVS at 20Mbps but not at 40Mbps). Often you will see banding evident as well, which can be countered by forcing the codec to process those areas more - one of the tricks used is to introduce film grain which makes the codec think it is processing lots of different colours!

[lata]

Hi Guys

I have to agree that the Sony sample is much better than created using Video Studio.

I have been concentrating on creating Mpeg4 video.
I have now tried AVC using both H264 and Mpeg2, with a quality setting at 100

MPEG Transport-Stream Files
24 bits, 1920 x 1080, 29.97 fps
Frame-based
(HDMV-NTSC), 16:9
H.264 Video Or MPEG2
Video data rate: Variable (Max. 30000 kbps)
Audio data rate: 256 kbps
Dolby Digital Audio, 48 KHz, 2/0(L,R)

The results do look better but don’t have time scrutinize or upload a sample at the moment.
Can you try rendering to the above properties ? file size approx. 28Mb

[the_hefay]

I just tried the settings you suggested. File size is 22.7 MB. The quality is slightly better but still having issues with the detail completely falling off in a couple of spots, especially in the brown dirt towards the end.

[Sonic Fields]

........................... @ Sonic Fields. I reread your other post and it seems to me that you've decided that it can't be done in VSX7. Or did I misunderstand?

I may have given the impression that VSX7 was unsuitable for high quality rendering, but that is not the case. I am quite happy with this as my video/film editor, which to be honest is often underrated. The problem is that rendering and the subsequent compression for intended use is a complex subject with so many variables. Even the top professional filmmakers have problems with this final part of their workflow and is not dependant necessarily on the editing program used. I discovered by accident, which unbeknown to me at the time is a recognised practice, that one of the best methods is to produce a final 'uncompressed' render in your editing program and then to use a dedicated file compressor/converter to produce a user friendly format suitable for its intended use. In my case I discovered this can be done in VSX7 using the custom/AVI selection for the uncompressed render (which can be archived as a good master copy), followed by an appropriate compression using one of the many relative cheap video converter programs (I use my Prism Video File Converter program).

At present, I'm happy with that arrangement, but perhaps disappointed that CVS doesn't produce good renders straight out of the box; perhaps they're sacrificing quality for speed, but for the price I cannot complain, after all it's offset by its user friendliness and excellent set of plugins which comes with it!

[the_hefay]

Well, I agree with you about ease of use and plug-ins. Perhaps I'll have to resort to a method similar to yours for getting the .mp4 quality I'm looking for.

[lata]

Hi

Have you tried using the 4K templates, they do seem to create a better quality than the standard 1920 Mpeg4
Yep they should be better as the frame size is greater with an increased data rate, I used 40000kbps, and as expected the file size was larger about 3 times at 32 Mb.

I did notice I was only allowed to choose 29.97 fps not 30 as with the 1920 template. Don’t know why that should be.?

Anyway the quality seems better at least in my eyes.

[the_hefay]

I haven't tried that. I'll give it a shot though.