Re: encoding TV-spec H264 files

[David Johnson] "I thoroughly understand that there are no standards"

Wrong, there are standards. The fact that there are standards is the very reason you are having difficulty providing files that will meet a specific standard.. If there were no standards, broadcast video would not exist and my cat's first spot would have aired by now. Like you said though, they vary incredibly between every single station, every single network, every single Digital Delivery provider. I know this because our broadcast facility delivers to Extreme Reach, DG Fastchannel, ESPN, Discovery HD, A&E, PBS, Speed Channel, you name it....everyday..

[David Johnson] "White screen video since QuickTime can't display 4:2:2 video"

No, Quicktime can even display 4:4:4 video. Quicktime doesn't look directly at color space, it looks at the codec in which the video was encoded with. If the codec is one that Quicktime understands, then you have video. Your problem here is that Quicktime will play a white screen playing certain MPEG2 content unless you purchase the MPEG2 plug-in for Quicktime from Apple for $20.

[David Johnson] "There has to be a way to make HD files that meet all DG & ER specs without the ridiculous gotcha of delivering files that one can't visually check"

There is. It's called spending money. Meeting these specs is not easy and it's not cheap. Once you even encode a file correctly for them, the cheapest player to QC what you have is made by Elecard. Around $50.

[David Johnson] "Please don't tell me the only answer is to drop another $1k for Telestream Episode Pro!!"

In all honesty, Episode for $1000 is the cheapest solution you are going to find for what you are trying to achieve. If you can't afford that, you shouldn't expect to be delivering to Extreme Reach and DG for broadcast distribution.

[David Johnson] "it's just transcoding!!"

Transcoding video for simple purposes is easy these days.
To meet the stringent requirements of broadcast, when you start involving VANC data, 608 & 708 closed captioning, field dominance, proprietary resolutions, etc. it's not as easy as one might imagine.

This is why broadcast facilities like ours exist - we have the hardware and accompanied software to provide these services. There is substantial investment in this. There are no OS or NLE provided programs or free downloads that allow you to do "high profile" encoding to meet digital delivery specs.

If we can help you for Digital Delivery, please feel free to contact me.

Chad Brewer
Senior Tape Operator/Engineer
TeleVersions