Final Cut Converting Problem

[jrm1561]

I using Final Cut Express4 and I'm still learning all the in's and out's of the program. After test clips I've been having trouble with converting the clips. I can never get the clips to look like the original after using Final Cut and VisualHub converter. I was thinking that maybe I needed to play with the settings for Final Cut and it had little to no difference. At this point I don't know what to do, I would very much appreciate any help. And I'm running on a 4 year old iMac.

So everyone knows I'm taking about a 8 sec clip, rendering it and exporting to a QuickTime moive on Final Cut.

[jt_x]

I can never get the clips to look like the original after using Final Cut and VisualHub converter.

I am not using this program, BUT first if i was you i would make sure not to use any lossy coded input, if thats the case than i would try to clean the output clip (which should normally be lossless, final encode is done with a h.264/xvid converter like virtualdub / x264) with avisynth scripts. if you already did this, then im out of clues, if it helps you may want to look at this neat tut for avisynth and lossy/lossless codec n stuff : http://www.animemusicvideos.org/guides/avtechbeta/

[LivingFlame]

^ Nothing in the AMVapp will work on a Mac. Though he is right that working with lossy codecs (DivX, XviD, MPEG, etc.) can screw with NLEs.

I really don't work with Final Cut that much, but you could try exporting your video uncompressed first. If the quality is fine in that file, then try running it through something like AviDemux or FFMpegX.


On a side note, does the quality of your video look good inside of Final Cut?

[jrm1561]

^ Nothing in the AMVapp will work on a Mac. Though he is right that working with lossy codecs (DivX, XviD, MPEG, etc.) can screw with NLEs.

I really don't work with Final Cut that much, but you could try exporting your video uncompressed first. If the quality is fine in that file, then try running it through something like AviDemux or FFMpegX.


On a side note, does the quality of your video look good inside of Final Cut?

I am lossing quality in final cut and I'm using raws that are straight downloads. So I'll check out more about FFMPpeg and AviDemux

[LivingFlame]

Well that's your problem. Downloaded footage, by nature of being made for distribution and not editing, does not play well with editors. If you must use the downloaded footage, I suggest using FFMpegX to convert your files to DV format for editing (or another format that will work well in an editor). I say DV now because if you're having to convert everything you use in a project to an editable format, uncompressed is going to wreak havoc on your disk space.

[Qyot27]

^ Nothing in the AMVapp will work on a Mac.

Not if you use Wine (or CrossOver, if you want more focus on Office apps and games). Then again, when I tried to put Wine on my parents' Intel iMac it failed - I'm assuming that the OP's comment about their comp being 4 years old means it's a PPC. Unfortunately, development of Darwine for PPC seems to have stopped (or slowed significantly), and as far as the info at WineHQ is concerned, it can't even run Windows binaries yet. The Intel version, on the other hand, is up to version parity with the main Wine project (again taken straight from the WineHQ site).

[jrm1561]

Well that's your problem. Downloaded footage, by nature of being made for distribution and not editing, does not play well with editors. If you must use the downloaded footage, I suggest using FFMpegX to convert your files to DV format for editing (or another format that will work well in an editor). I say DV now because if you're having to convert everything you use in a project to an editable format, uncompressed is going to wreak havoc on your disk space.

Your right about changing the raws into DV format, I finally got the quality that I was looks for.