Mixing HD and 4K Footage on Timeline

[Alpha Video]

Is it possible to mix HD and 4K footage in Edius? I know the output will have to be HD rather than 4K, but is it possible?

The reason I ask is that I'm just going to purchase a 4K (ready) camera to go alongside my 2 HD cameras, with a view to eventually going 4K only when I have the budget to get 2 x 4K cameras.

[wags]

I'm on EDIUS 8, edit Phantom 3- OSMO 4K-UHD 25p with normal 1920/1080 25p/50p no probs all the time.

I actually shoot in UHD most though as it has a 16.9 footprint.
4K will leave black bars top and bottom.

[Ron Evans]

I mix UHD from my FDR-AX1 60P, XAVC-S HD from AX100 and AX53 both 60P, AVCHD 60P from the NX30U and AVCHD 60i from my NX5U on a 60i 1920x1080 timeline all the time. Works fine for both EDIUS 7.5 with WIN7 and EDIUS 8.2WG with WIN10.

As WAGS says 4K is 4096x2160, what most people call 4K is actually UHD at 3840x2180 which is still 16x9 and is what TV's will be . True 4k is really cinema 4K aspect ratio so when scaled for 3840x2160 will leave black bars somewhere depending on scaling or will crop for a "4K" TV. True cinema 4K is also only 24P on most "4K " cameras whereas UHD has a full range of frame rates.

Ron Evans

[Ron Evans]

In 99% cases when someone says 4K actually means UHD.

Agreed. I have 3 camcorders that say 4K on the side and none of them will shoot 4K !!! They are all UHD only.

Ron Evans

[Khoi Pham]

Heck close enough lol, even 4K tv are all UHD.
But to the original question, yes and you will love to be able to zoom and reframe your shot without loss of quality.

[Ron Evans]

Heck close enough lol, even 4K tv are all UHD.
But to the original question, yes and you will love to be able to zoom and reframe your shot without loss of quality.

I think the issue is more concerning for someone with a camera that will shoot 4K DCI but doesn't understand the differences and shoots 24p 4K but views on a TV rather than a cinema projector. Likely why my consumer "4K " cameras will not shoot 4K DCI but do shoot UHD at 24P if that is what you want.

To the initial question . My use of UHD on the timeline is to crop and pan in a 60i timeline. It is much easier to pan across a set of dancers for example and get everyone in the pan in time with the music. Not easy manually !! So in my case the UHD camera is always fixed with no movement. Also most of the time it is in auto focus as focus in UHD is super critical and I failed pitifully to get it in focus manually compared to auto focus for this application.

Ron Evans

[Liverpool TV]

Hi Jeremy.

If the footage is UHD it will have the same 16:9 aspect ratio as your HD footage. If you work in a 16:9 HD aspect ratio project, which is usual, then Edius will re-scale the UHD footage into the project perfectly.

If however the footage is 4K, and you don't mind losing a tiny bit off the sides. You can use Layouter to auto re-size the 4K footage to your 16:9 HD project's aspect ratio, using fit to height.

With either UHD or 4K, or indeed any resolution above HD. You can even shoot slightly wider and then re-frame the shots in the HD project. This would give you a huge amount of leeway to zoom in and reframe without any loss in output resolution, as long as you don't exceed the resolution of the HD project.

I'm quite sure this is something that Ron can attest to, as he uses many sources and variable resolutions for his productions.

Shooting 4K/UHD for HD productions gives you so many advantages over shooting HD. The obvious advantage is final resolution, but there are many other benefits. It's even possible to get out of trouble fairly easily with wide safety shots. Nothing beats framing properly at the shoot, but it's always a help to have the options you can get from shooting 4K/UHD for HD.

This video was shot UHD and reframed to HD using E8WG.

http://youtu.be/VxN5U5FHOY0

Cheers,
Dave.

[spurfilm]

Just to confuse everyone, the internationally agreed UHD specification is not just for 4K (3840x2160p), it also includes 8K (7680x4320p) too.

So there is UHD 4K and UHD 8K. Both are 1.78:1 (or 16:9) formats designed for television production usage and should be viewed on 16:9 tv sets. Which is why the sets are called UHD.

Whereas 4K (4096x2160) is a digital cinema format, with an aspect ratio of 1.9:1, designed to be viewed on the big cinema screen.

[spurfilm]

It all depends on your distribution format. For me it's a no-brainer.

Option 1 - Cinematic Quality

If you want to shoot 17:9 cinematic movies or cinema advertising commercials, then you should go down the 4096x2160 (4K) or 8192×4320 (8K) routes.

Option 2 - Ultra High Definition Quality

If you work in 16:9 broadcast television or aim to produce blu-ray video for screening on a 16:9 tv, then obviously for 99% of your work 3840x2160 (UHD 4K), and eventually 7680x4320 (UHD 8K), would be the way forward. Unless you want your tv show to look cinematic by having black bars top and bottom, in which case shoot for 17:9 in Option 1. Option 2 might also include production of 16:9 HD tv shows for delivery as 1920x1080 where UHD camera original material would help avoid the concatenation of compression artifacts in post-production.

[Liverpool TV]

Most cinematic content uses a different aspect ratio than either 4K or UHD. So there is always a certain amount of blanking/cropping and reframing anyway, even when using anamorphic. Usually somewhere between 2.35:1 to 2.4:1Wether it's height or width that's the determining factor for the final production, this will be acounted for at acquisition.

For instance. If you choose to use a wide aspect ratio, as in my example which is 2.4:1 You would have to reframe or blank/crop your source footage regardless of its original aspect ratio, 4K or UHD, unless you framed and shot the exact ratio at source, which is very unlikely.

Again for TV or 16:9 the same would apply. I've never seen a reframed full frame 4K aspect ratio inside a 16:9 frame. 16:9 TV is usually full frame for non cinema content, so again the source aspect ratio is less relevant if it where 4K as it would be reframed to the full 16:9 picture area. Cinema movies with a wide aspect will usually be fit to the width of a 16:9 frame, giving the inevitable black bars top and bottom, letterboxing. Aside from compromises like centre pan scan or 14:9 for old formats, including DVD, the above is true for most modern HD outputs, such as TV or Blu-ray etc.

You've then got purely file based deliveries, which don't necessarily adhere to a fixed standard for SAR output. Formats such as MP4 for computers etc. With these, there could be any number of SARs for the file. Which means that you don't have to centre the video inside any particular SAR such as 16:9, which you have to for broadcast or Blu-ray for instance. The file would simply centre to the screen that it is playing on. As a for instance. My example was edited 1920x800 which is roughly 2.4:1, and not in 1920x1080 with a mask to emulate 2.4:1 The upload to YouTube was a YUY2 file at 1920x800 and my MP4 files the same. If I needed a Blu-ray or any other standard that requires a specific SAR, I would simply import my master HQX file into a 16:9 project, fit it to width, which Edius would do as standard anyway, then export to 16:9 This would also produce a pixel for pixel output of the source 1920x800 master HQX file.

As for artifacts associated with re-sizing or reframing. As long as you are doing this inside a project that is optically a smaller resolution than the source footage, it won't be an issue as long as your post chain is good. For instance, Edius is excellent at this, it produces artifact free outputs on everything progressive that I resize down. To be honest, even stuff that exceeds the optical limit through a resize, Edius does this amazingly well, even when up scaling as long as you don't go mad.

BTW, with all this talk of 8K/UHD, does Edius even do this at present, and is anyone here shooting at those resolutions?

Getting back to the original question.

Jeremy, fill your boots mate with a high resolution camera, regardless of it being 4K or UHD. It won't matter if you want to edit native at the cameras' resolution, or want to match into a HD project with the HD cameras that you have until you go all high resolution cameras. Edius will do exactly what you need, with no fuss whatsoever, and in realtime depending on your processing and CPU. If you need any help or tips on using Edius with these mixed formats, or reframing/blanking etc., not that you will if you use UHD and HD sources in a HD project, give me a shout on the forum and I would be glad to help.

Just one thing to bear in mind if you do go 4K or UHD. Neither of them do interlaced. Which will make it very difficult, if not impossible, to match back against HD interlaced footage, if you shoot interlaced at present. It may also be worth mentioning that while Edius is the best NLE ever, it's not so good at de-interlacing, but then most NLEs aren't. The compromise could be to shoot 50P high resolution to match back to HD interlaced. Although this isn't particularly advisable if you need bang on continuity between it and HD interlaced. Someone like Ron would be a better person to advise on this, as I don't have much experience doing it.

If you prefer the motion characteristics of 25FPS interlaced (50i) as opposed to 25FPS progressive, or indeed shoot 50i anyway for typical client delivery for things such as DVD. Then 50P high resolution would probably be the way to go in the future. This would mean that you could deliver 50P high resolution files, or any new standard that excepts it, while being able to produce 50i from the 50P master relatively easily for things such as DVD, Blu-ray or TV. Again, Ron may be your go to guy for advise on this.

In any event, and if you shoot progressive or plan to go 50P, you will not be disappointed going high resolution.

Cheers,
Dave.

[Ron Evans]

The other thing to note is frame rate. 4K DCI is 24P, OK for going to Bluray but DVD creates more of a problem in pulldown somewhere in the chain and to me destroys the motion of film that displays very differently in the cinema to on a TV. As most of you know I am not a fan of slow frame rates. Although I have an AX100 and AX53 I do not shoot UHD with them as they are only 30P. By choice I would like all UHD 60P cameras and would shoot that way all the time. With 50P or 60P one has almost all the choices one may need. Actually 50/60P, 25/30P if that is the motion characteristics you want and easy editing in an interlaced project to go to DVD or Bluray. There is not much choice at 50/60P UHD at the moment. The FDR-AX1 that I have, PXW-Z100, Panasonic XC1000 and DVX200 then it starts to get really expensive to FS7 and Black Magic cameras etc. I am waiting to see what the Panasonic AG-UX180 looks like in the fall as it appears to be exactly what I am looking for to replace my aging NX5U and/or the FDR-AX1.

Ron Evans

[spurfilm]

I am waiting to see what the Panasonic AG-UX180 looks like in the fall

Absolutely. It sounds promising. Could be ideal for me too.

[Liverpool TV]

I am waiting to see what the Panasonic AG-UX180 looks like

Ron Evans

Hi Ron.

That looks like it could fit in with many workflows and satisfy many needs. With a bit of luck they may have sorted out the low light performance that seems to be a complaint of their last video camera. Although I'm a Sony fan, I've used Panasonic in the past and would jump ship if its on paper spec translates into real world performance. Do you have any idea of the price? What bit depth does it record at internally and codec? I can't seem to find this on the preliminary spec sheet. http://pro-av.panasonic.net/en/sales...ux180_ux90.pdf

Cheers,
Dave.

[Ron Evans]

That is all the information there is at the moment. There are a few YouTube videos at NAB, so for more info we will have to wait a month. I expect performance to be much like the other 1" sensor camcorders like the AX100 etc though it may have a bigger faster lens. Would not be surprised if it uses the same Sony sensor !!! Almost certainly 8bit like all the other products at this price point with maybe 10bit from SDI and/or HDMI. Price is quoted as less than $4000 so maybe closer to $3500 by the time it is actually selling. This will be a real competitor for the Sony PXW-150 since it will have a longer zoom and 60P UHD recording. It may not have built in streaming but lots of the Panasonic have the ability for a USB dongle. Not something I am interested in though. It hits all my buttons for zoom range, 60P UHD and likely things like touch focus just like the XC1000 and the DVX200. As you can see I am a Sony man but this camera may cause the change. I had hoped Sony would make an update to my FDR-AX1 with better sensor and some more features or a new model to replace my NX5U neither is forthcoming so far. The AG-UX180 could be a replacement for both.

Ron Evans

[Rusty]

To add to the confusion, with a recent firmware update, my FS7 now records true 24p 4K DCI XAVC as well as 23.98.
No client has asked for that yet.

Interesting, but (as always) leaves the recording format to be dictated by where the viewer is.