Anyone shooting in HD and downconverting to edit in SD AVI?

[coosbaytv]

Have any of you done any testing in this for the purpose of keeping an SD workflow?

I am looking at the majority of my work being distributed on the Net on my own hosted sites (not youtube or vimeo).

I have seen many examples of stuff online that looks far superior online than previous SD work (as it should).

All I really want to do is increase the quality of the image that I shoot via the HFs 100 as opposed to my Sony VX-2000.

As of right now, I don't want to replace hardware-software other than moving to the HF camera.

Any feedback from those of you who have already entered the HD space and ran into all the associated problems?

Thanks...

[commalot]

It just depends on what options your software allows you. If you can, just output to 720X480 with a 16:9 aspect ratio. That will be SD size.

[coosbaytv]

thanks, I am aware of that.

was looking for some feedback from someone doing this on a regular basis and to find out their workflow.

[ejolson]

thanks, I am aware of that.

was looking for some feedback from someone doing this on a regular basis and to find out their workflow.

Here is a way to convert AVCHD from the HFS100 to DV before editing so you can use the same workflow as you use for the Sony VX2000:

The conversion from AVCHD to DV takes longer than downloading a miniDV tape; however, the advantage is high quality progressive 480p30 and the ability to switch the DV files back for the AVCHD originals and render in high definition using the proxy file trick if your NLE supports it. To create a DV AVI file I use the command

ffmpeg -i 00011.mts -r 30000/1001 -acodec pcm_s16le -vcodec dvvideo -deinterlace -pix_fmt yuv411p -s 720x480 -aspect 16:9 -f avi -y 00011.avi

The resulting file can be edited as if it were downloaded from a DV camcorder.

[coosbaytv]

@ejolson:

Wow...very nice.

Can you share more info as to how to go about the process as I haven't used a command before. Is this something you type in the command line of the DOS prompt? Is there anything else that has to be done to make with work safely?

thanks for the info...this may really help.

[ejolson]

@ejolson:

Wow...very nice.

Can you share more info as to how to go about the process as I haven't used a command before. Is this something you type in the command line of the DOS prompt? Is there anything else that has to be done to make with work safely?

thanks for the info...this may really help.

Yes ffmpeg is for command line at the DOS prompt and it is free. You need a recent version of ffmpeg to decode AVCHD. I use ffmpeg on Linux, but it is available for every operating system. Recent versions of ffmpeg for Windows may be downloaded from

http://ffmpeg.arrozcru.org/autobuilds/

Fetch the static build, unzip it and copy it to somewhere in your PATH. Alternatively, put ffmpeg in the directory with all the AVCHD files. You can convert many files at once with a DOS batch file. Use notepad or edit to create a file mts2dv.bat containing lines like

ffmpeg -i 00011.mts -r 30000/1001 -acodec pcm_s16le -vcodec dvvideo -deinterlace -pix_fmt yuv411p -s 720x480 -aspect 16:9 -f avi -y 00011.avi
ffmpeg -i 00012.mts -r 30000/1001 -acodec pcm_s16le -vcodec dvvideo -deinterlace -pix_fmt yuv411p -s 720x480 -aspect 16:9 -f avi -y 00012.avi
ffmpeg -i 00013.mts -r 30000/1001 -acodec pcm_s16le -vcodec dvvideo -deinterlace -pix_fmt yuv411p -s 720x480 -aspect 16:9 -f avi -y 00013.avi

using copy and paste. Put mts2dv.bat in the directory with the AVCHD files and start the batch by typing mts2dv at the prompt.

Note that AVCHD clips which are longer than 2GB are stored in multiple mts files which need to be concatenated together before converting. Do this with

copy /b 00014.mts + 00015.mts + 00016.mts s14-16.mts

and then convert s14-15.mts to DV using the same commands as above. Don't join files that aren't from the same video clip this way.