Importing footage with Sony HDR-SR11 camera and my renders. Please help
by Eric Stutt
on
Aug 14, 2009 at 4:54:01 pm
I actually posted this question in the Adobe help forums and since the people there were not being entirely clear in their responses. For example, I would ask follow up questions and some deemed them to be too simple I guess. I think the assumption was that I am an idiot. That may be the case; however, the reason I post questions is because I tried many things that I know of in order to fix it. I know this is long, but I want to let you know what I have done and what the issues are.
I have a Sony HDR Sr 11 camera. If you are not familiar, it is an HD camera that records in Format : HD: MPEG4 AVC/H.264 (The SD is MPEG2 1920 x 1080i and the recording is interlaced.)
Sony give software that comes with it (PMB) that can be used to import the files from the Camera's HD to the Computer etc. This software analyzes and imports, but ultimately the files stay the same in an m2ts format. It does have options to convert, but I find them limiting and they really take down the quality.
Now, I can import and render the m2ts files directly into Sony Vegas Platinum just fine. They turn out great, but Premiere has much better options and I would rather not have to render the files out in Vegas just so I cam import them into Premiere. Cuts down on quality and I know premiere supports AVCHD.
However, I cannot get the files to render out correctly. I have imported the M2TS files from my camera's hard drive and imported those into Premiere. I have copied the entire file structure from my camera to my computer's hard drive and them imported that into premiere. I have imported the files using PMB and then imported that into premiere. I still get some digital noise in my source and program monitors. This, I am not certain of why I am getting it. See the screen shot below. This error, or whatever it is, does not show up in a render.
I first selected the preset ACVHD 1080i30 (60i) So, I thought that something was a wrong with what I chose. When I couldn't quite figure it out, I tried to import the file using every preset that was AVCHD and I even used others that were not. As long as it matched the file size, (1920 by 1090)I tried it. I still had the same issues. I figure there must be something that I a missing.
I then repeated the process trying every sequence preset from 720p on up. The issue remained not matter what preset I use.
Now, when I choose to render the files, I get this error. I removed the audio, but I get this choppy effect. I made sure that I was rendering upper first when I can select it.
I have tried using MPEG2, MPEG2 DVD, H.264, and MPEG Bluray. The blu ray and h.264 seems to work the best, but with the Bluray the output separates the audio and video tracks and I need them together. And the h.264 makes my final output have these wavy lines around the edges of the person in the video. I have seen this happen to other people online so maybe you have seen that too. I do not have a pic to show you of that.
Below is a link to a short sample of the video after it was rendered.
My question is - is there something I do not know about rendering this m2ts file? I am not used to working with AVCHD so I am not certain what should be done. i.e. what formats I should choose or resolution etc. This one is kind of stumping me because I cannot get it to work well.
Re: Importing footage with Sony HDR-SR11 camera and my renders. Please help by david Cabestany on Aug 14, 2009 at 5:33:23 pm
Eric,
I just posted a very similar case in the forum, I hadn't read your post before I did, but we pretty much have the same issue. Check my post: http://forums.creativecow.net/readpost/3/895234
My guess would be that this MTS files just suck. I'm getting them from a Canon camcorder and I also tried the same preset in Premiere when I imported them. Ultimately the only thing that has ended up working for me to avoid interlacings, choppiness, wavy lines (I had them too) was to convert the video twice to the formats mentioned on my post, and even after that the footage is slow to play and it seems to consume a lot of PPro's resources. It is not a solution that I'm entirely satisfied with but at least it allows me to deliver the videos to my client on time.
Unlike you I'm on a mac.
If you ever come up with a better, less time consuming solution better quality solution, please let me know. I really need it.
Re: Importing footage with Sony HDR-SR11 camera and my renders. Please help by Eric Stutt on Aug 14, 2009 at 6:25:34 pm
David,
I can go over things with you. Oddly enough, I called Cannon about their M2ts codecs to see if they could tell me what editing programs support them and the sales rep didn't have an answer so I went with Sony.
I dont have a profile I can click on to email you or message you, but I'd love to go back and forth with you to see if we can work this out unless someone here. I looked at your issue and it seems different than mine, though they could have similar root causes. I am not getting choppiness at all in the time line, just digital noise and the damn file won't render out correctly; however, as I noted Sony Vegas does render them out and use the files just fine. So, the issue is somewhere in between for me. If you have access to another editing program you should try uploading the files into that to see what happens.
I also notice that no one responded to you here as well. I didn't see your thread. You might want to try posting in the Adobe community forums to see what those experts have to say too.
