TheAX AMV Contest 2009 Finalists are...

[DigitalPanther]

Or soma could beat me to it.
-Michael

[s0matic]

Or soma could beat me to it.
-Michael

Two opinions are better than one And it's kinda funny how we were thinking about the same video (and props to Castor for making such a memorable vid )

[Ryvannis]

I'm curious, Valhalla had a ton of bad frames. Did anyone see them during the judge viewing? I'm surprised no one noticed it really and that it got in. I sent Michael a fixed version, but to see that version at the con. Was it expected? I was really worried about the bad frames, that's the last time I trust you Adobe. <_<
Also s0ma were you a judge? I'm assuming so from the comments that you made so far about my entries, and I'm also assuming that you were the final push for Monsoon.

God I'm so under-confident these days.

[Scintilla]

My video exported from my editing program is at 16:9, square pixels, 848x480. I sent 2 versions to AX. With both my MPEG and HUffYUV I resized with this:

Code: Select all

AviSource("pathfilename.avi")
Lanczos4Resize(720,352)
AddBorders(0,64,0,64)

[snip]
From there, I encoded the MPEG and flagged the MPEG to play back correctly at a 4:3 aspect ratio. For the HuffYUV though, I left it letterboxed at 720x480 knowing it would look wrong being played back on a computer.

Ehh? I'm confused now. Your AVIsynth script indicates the MPEG and HuffYUV were encoded as 720x480 letterboxed, yet I don't know what you mean in the bolded sentence above. Did you de-letterbox your MPEG, making it 720x352? If so, that's wrong. They should both be the same resolution. 720x480 letterbox.

Doesn't she just mean that a HuffYUV AVI at 720x480 letterboxed will look wrong on a computer because you can't give it the 4:3 aspect ratio flag that comes standard with MPEGs? You'd want square pixels for AVI, or 640x480 letterboxed (or 640x352 if you wanted to remove the letterboxing).

[s0matic]

Also s0ma were you a judge? I'm assuming so from the comments that you made so far about my entries, and I'm also assuming that you were the final push for Monsoon.

Nope, not a judge . Just a regular editor~

I've actually just been keeping up with the videos you've been making and posting on the .org. And I can't speak for the judges (since I'm not one ) but since you've made it this far, I'm sure some of the judges have seen some of the things that I've been echoing about your video. Too much confidence can be a bad thing, but a little faith in your work can't hurt

[milkmandan]

I was really worried about the bad frames, that's the last time I trust you Adobe. <_<

We're both using Adobe CS4, i really doubt bad frames is caused by adobe. :\

[Melichan923]

From there, I encoded the MPEG and flagged the MPEG to play back correctly at a 4:3 aspect ratio. For the HuffYUV though, I left it letterboxed at 720x480 knowing it would look wrong being played back on a computer.

Ehh? I'm confused now. Your AVIsynth script indicates the MPEG and HuffYUV were encoded as 720x480 letterboxed, yet I don't know what you mean in the bolded sentence above. Did you de-letterbox your MPEG, making it 720x352? If so, that's wrong. They should both be the same resolution. 720x480 letterbox.

I kinda want to examine that MPEG file now...

Scintilla has answered it for me. "Doesn't she just mean that a HuffYUV AVI at 720x480 letterboxed will look wrong on a computer because you can't give it the 4:3 aspect ratio flag that comes standard with MPEGs?" The only problem is, with the avi container I don't know how I'd make it appear correct on a computer at 720x480 and be set for the contest when there is no 4:3 ratio flag option. That is where I could have went wrong. I know the mpeg's AR was correct though. I'm still trying to learn the technical side of AMVs and I always seem to get stuck on aspect ratios. XD

Since I'm not that great with explaining things sometimes. I'll give you some picture examples from my converted videos:

Spoiler :

Lossless, exported from my Editing program at a proper aspect ratio of 16:9 (square pixels):


MPEG at 720x480 flagged to play back correctly at a 4:3 Aspect Ratio:


HuffYUV at 720x480 with no 4:3 flag, (see how it looks stretched out?):

^ That is where I get confused.

I hope that helps you understand what I meant.

As for the MPEG, I still have the exact MPEG file I sent to AX still, should that be the one I give you? Converting to XviD is giving me troubles ATM anyway.

As for playback equipment, the videos were played from Michael's PC hooked up via VGA connection to a 46" Samsung LCD screen and piped into a Bose sound system. Michael anonymously played each AMV directly from a creator's submitted file; no transcoding or re-rendering was done. I don't recall the program he used for video playback though, but it wasn't VLC or any other program I was familiar with. There were one or two submissions where some of us wondered whether the creator bothered to do any sort of quality check though.

That's good. That sounds like the easiest way to do it. I doubted that all the videos would be re-encoded for the judging since that would be a lot of extra work.

The AX AMV thread is pretty much the only place on these forums that I ever post in. I'm still here and I'm here to help, so it's obviously no bother. Just wish I wasn't the only judge here.

I spent many hours looking up new avisynth filters and reading about them, trying to get my quality as top notch as possible (as good as a [somewhat] newby can try to get it anyway, lol). Looks like I somehow missed an important yucky area that stood out after the conversion for AX or even possibly even before, and I may have even messed up the AR for Expo, but at least all this is going to help me improve for future videos!
Part of me hopes it was just my conversion for Expo and I didn't miss something so blatantly obvious! If so I'll have to get my eyes checked or invest in a new monitor, haha. I'll find out what it was once I get that file to you and stop typing like a mad woman. I tend to write too much when it comes to these things - just look at my Ouran High School Never Ends Descript...novel.

Anyway, you're doing fine and it sounds like you may simply have ran afoul of a rendering hiccup.

Thank you, it is great to hear that I didn't mess up too much! I'll get the file link to you ASAP.

[XStylus]

Scintilla has answered it for me. "Doesn't she just mean that a HuffYUV AVI at 720x480 letterboxed will look wrong on a computer because you can't give it the 4:3 aspect ratio flag that comes standard with MPEGs?" The only problem is, with the avi container I don't know how I'd make it appear correct on a computer at 720x480 and be set for the contest when there is no 4:3 ratio flag option. That is where I could have went wrong. I know the mpeg's AR was correct though. I'm still trying to learn the technical side of AMVs and I always seem to get stuck on aspect ratios. XD

HuffYUV at 720x480 with no 4:3 flag, (see how it looks stretched out?):
^ That is where I get confused.

Scintilla is right. I feel like an idiot because I had completely forgotten about the square pixel vs rectangular pixel thang too.

As for the MPEG, I still have the exact MPEG file I sent to AX still, should that be the one I give you? Converting to XviD is giving me troubles ATM anyway.

Yeah, send me the MPEG. If we're dealing with a possible encode issue, then it'd be counter productive to screen a video that has different encoding than what was screened. If Michael gets some free time I might ask him if he'd be so kind as to let me re-screen the huffy.

I can give you an FTP to upload the MPEG to. I'll PM you.

[milkmandan]

Since I'm not that great with explaining things sometimes. I'll give you some picture examples from my converted videos:

Spoiler :

Lossless, exported from my Editing program at a proper aspect ratio of 16:9 (square pixels):
Quoted Image converted to link:
http://i88.photobucket.com/albums/k172/ ... s/a001.png

MPEG at 720x480 flagged to play back correctly at a 4:3 Aspect Ratio:
Quoted Image converted to link:
http://i88.photobucket.com/albums/k172/ ... s/a002.png

HuffYUV at 720x480 with no 4:3 flag, (see how it looks stretched out?):
Quoted Image converted to link:
http://i88.photobucket.com/albums/k172/ ... s/a003.png
^ That is where I get confused.

Oh boy, here i go!~
I will explain for you.
Before anything you need to realize a couple things.
- Computer monitors have very definitive SQUARE pixels. If you draw a square in photoshop, 200px by 200px, you WILL see a square on your screen. If your LCD monitor has a stuck pixel, it looks like a small square. All images displayed from a computer are square pixels.
- Your first picture is 848x480 (sPAR)
- Your second picture is 640x480
- Your third picture is 720x480

Your first picture is correct, how it looks and how you handled it, it looks is correct. This is in Square Pixel Aspect Ratio, (sPAR)

Your second picture, is correct as well, but in reality it is NOT 720x480. it is actually 640x480 sPAR. With 4:3 flag, it forces your Pixel Aspect Ratio to (0.9). Which is why it seems correct.

Your third image is truly 720x480 sPAR. But since you have no 4:3 flag, the number of pixels you added addBorders() is incorrect for 720x480 non-4:3 flagged video.

[Melichan923]

Yeah, send me the MPEG. If we're dealing with a possible encode issue, then it'd be counter productive to screen a video that has different encoding than what was screened. If Michael gets some free time I might ask him if he'd be so kind as to let me re-screen the huffy.

I can give you an FTP to upload the MPEG to. I'll PM you.

Great! I will start uploading now.

Since I'm not that great with explaining things sometimes. I'll give you some picture examples from my converted videos:

Spoiler :

Lossless, exported from my Editing program at a proper aspect ratio of 16:9 (square pixels):
Quoted Image converted to link:
http://i88.photobucket.com/albums/k172/ ... s/a001.png

MPEG at 720x480 flagged to play back correctly at a 4:3 Aspect Ratio:
Quoted Image converted to link:
http://i88.photobucket.com/albums/k172/ ... s/a002.png

HuffYUV at 720x480 with no 4:3 flag, (see how it looks stretched out?):
Quoted Image converted to link:
http://i88.photobucket.com/albums/k172/ ... s/a003.png
^ That is where I get confused.

Oh boy, here i go!~
I will explain for you.
Before anything you need to realize a couple things.
- Computer monitors have very definitive SQUARE pixels. If you draw a square in photoshop, 200px by 200px, you WILL see a square on your screen. If your LCD monitor has a stuck pixel, it looks like a small square. All images displayed from a computer are square pixels.
- Your first picture is 848x480 (sPAR)
- Your second picture is 640x480
- Your third picture is 720x480

Your first picture is correct, how it looks and how you handled it, it looks is correct. This is in Square Pixel Aspect Ratio, (sPAR)

Your second picture, is correct as well, but in reality it is NOT 720x480. it is actually 640x480 sPAR. With 4:3 flag, it forces your Pixel Aspect Ratio to (0.9). Which is why it seems correct.

Your third image is truly 720x480 sPAR. But since you have no 4:3 flag, the number of pixels you added addBorders() is incorrect for 720x480 non-4:3 flagged video.

Oh, thanks very much for your explanation! I knew some of it already, but that helps clear a few things up. What I don't understand though is if the requirement for a con is to resize anamorphic footage to 720x480 and I want to send a Huffy that looks correct, how would I handle that? And what would the script look like if it wasn't anamorphic? Anyone know? I've read about PAR, DAR and aspect ratios etc. before but my mind goes klghjkhgkdfghjkdfgh when I try to comprehend it all at once, lol.

(Sorry all, I should start asking all this on the Avisynth forum soon instead of crowding this thread. I have a feeling I'll be going there soon. )