text:
What is causing these horizontal lines moving vertically up the whiter portions of the video?
The camera model is a Sony, remote control model, I don't have the exact model# with me but can get it if needed.
I'm not sure when it started, but it's very noticeable now, the lines scrolling up the flag in this video: https://drive.google.com/file/d/0Bw1rEMBACTmYU2huY21IU3dFWFE/view?usp=drivesdk
Can anyone tell me what is causing this,  is the camera going bad, or do the settings just require adjistment?
Update
Model: Sony BRC-Z330 (Purchased in 2010)
Settings:
Exposure Mode: Full Auto
Iris Limit: F11
AE Speed: MID
AGC Limit: 18dB
Ex Comp: Off
White Balance: Indoor

The camera model would be helpful, or at least the type of camera and what format you are using. What have you tried to correct the problem? Does it happen on any white object? Is the iris set to auto? What happens if you set it to manual and close iris down?

Is this also present in the source video being shown on the LCD screen ? If so, make sure it's the camera - try viewing the video on a different display. It's normal to sometimes get artifacts like this when filming computer / TV screens - it's due to the way the screens refresh.

I'll get that info soon @MichaelLiebman. Yes it's present in the source, the lines are being shown on every display.

@MichaelLibeman I only operate the cameras, I didn't set them up, so I haven't tried anything other than changing some settings, but my technical skills (and I do have technical skills) are in a different area, so I don't know where to start. I can make any changes suggested, but I'm not familiar enough with cameras to make any educated guesses.

@MichaelLibeman added model and settings information, and yeah it happens on any white object.

@BigHomie, can you tell us more about how things are set up? Which output of the camera are you using?  What equipment is between the camera and the monitor? Any other cameras? Do they also have the problem? Does the camera have external reference (EXT SYNC)?

@MichaelLibeman they're using the rgb outputs, not the SDI. There is a video splitter between the camera and the various monitors/LCDs, there is one other camera and it does not have this issue. I don't think it uses an external sync, but I don't know for sure.,

You seem to have a flickering light source that is out of sync with the camera's rolling shutter.
Traditional lights
You should first verify that you are filming in 60/30/24 fps in regions whose power grid uses a 60 Hz frequency, or in 25/50 fps for 50 Hz.
If that is impossible to achieve, you can also adapt your shutter speed or angle to be a multiple of the utility frequency. Red provides a nice calculator for this.
LED lights
Flickering can be particularly bad if you use low quality LEDs because their flicker index (or depth of modulation) can be worse than conventional light sources.
They might also flicker independently of the utility frequency. This is especially true for RGB lights or when dimming.
If you can, choose good quality high frequency switching or flicker free LED drivers, or ones that are made for video. You shouldn't have any flicker problems with good LEDs. You can also try to disable dimming or setting the highest power output to reduce flicker.

Okay, that makes sense. We've had the same lights in the sanctuary, would these count as flickering lights? https://drive.google.com/file/d/0Bw1rEMBACTmYZGFWVkFMczhrS0U/view?usp=drivesdk

Those bulbs could be LEDs or halogens or even plain old incandescents.

@BigHomie pay particular attention to what Duvrai said wrt changing the shutter speed/angle. Just try a bunch of different variants to see what works. Naturally this means you won't get the 180degree shutter but without making any changes to lighting it should help.

I had this issue come up using my Speedlight in low light situations. I found the lines disappeared below 800 ISO. I've been using this camera for years but this is a new issue and still unclear whats causing it


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Bluray I/O speed
I don't know if this is the correct place to ask this type of question, but here is it.
I wanted to find a ball park size of each blu-ray frame size in bytes. This is my calculation which cannot be correct.
Assuming we have a 2 hour blu-ray movie of size 25GB:
(25 * 1024) / (2 * 3600) = 3.56 MB/s of data
Blu-ray's fps ranges from 25-59 fps:
3.56 MB/s / 25 = 145 KB
That is around 145 KB for each 1910 x 1080 pixel picture?! I don't know what I'm doing wrong here...

What you are missing is that not every frame is stored as a picture.  A large number of frames are stored simply by keeping track of what changed from the previous picture.  If you think about most video, not a whole lot is actually changing since the majority of the scene stays the same or moves in a similar pattern.  By describing only the changes, the amount of space required can be reduced drastically.
This is why the actual data "per frame" can be so low since only a fraction of the frames are actually full frames.

That's part of what variable bit rate (VBR) compression is about.  When there is almost no action, extremely little information is used, during high action sequences with fast cuts, substantially more bit rate is required.  There is also an art in compression to determining how often different types of frames should be included.  The frames can either be full images, differences or differences with corrections.

really? So each frame would be a diff of the previous frame? How does it know when a scene completely changed so it would not use the diff to create the next frame. Does this mean a fast paced action scene of 5 minutes with potentially take more space than the 20 min dialogue scene in hunger?

Do you know the name of this compression algorithm that blueray movies use?

@ArmenB - yes, that is exactly what it means, but it could be even more substantial.  It's entirely possible to see differences in required bitrate that can be 7 or 8 times more/less information.

@ArmenB - H.264 (MPEG-4 derived) or H.262 (MPEG2 derived) mostly.  VC-1 is the other standard that is required to be supported.

@AJHenderson This make a lot more sense than my answer! I am curious to know how the player knows what parts of which frames to combine? Is there info that tells it, or does it just keep adding until a full frame comes along?

@OroangeBox - I'm less sure about that part, particularly since I think it can very by format.  For DVDs for example (if my memory serves), there was a repeating pattern that was setup in the header of I,B and P frames.  Typically the pattern would be about 15 frames in length, but the length and pattern and even number of each type of frame could be altered.  I think it was also able to be pieced together on the fly though if necessary (for example if the header is corrupted) but I'm not sure if that is simply from a guess or if there is an actual deterministic way.

source: Stack Exchange

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/

sort: votes


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Need a video/audio 'time base corrector' with a very large time buffer
We'll be receiving a media stream that will suffer varying time shifts, and we need a solution that will clock the video+audio out at a predictable rate. We can time stamp the input stream (assume SMPTE LTC) to aid in identifying the amount of shift that has occurred.
This is basically what a TBC does, but these delays may be on the order of seconds, so the buffer would have to be quite large. Total delay through the system is not important, as long as the time jitter is ultimately removed.
EDIT: This could also be thought of as a rate corrector. The incoming video will have a long-term average frame rate of (say) 30fps, but the short-term rate could vary +/- 10% from that. The goal is to buffer enough video so that the output rate can be exactly 30 fps.
Something that worked with encoded (say MP4 over RTSP) video would be ideal, but if we need to work in baseband (SDI etc) that's acceptable.
Anyone know of such a device or system?

so essentially you want to go from vfr to cfr on the fly?

Not quite. The input stream is a constant frame rate, but the arrival times may vary because of the path it takes. Think of it as having jitter and drift. This device or software would simply delay some frames more than others. It's a FIFO with separate input and output clocks: the input is clocked by the arrival of new frames, the output is clocked at a fixed rate. The goal is to have a known delay between the original CFR stream and the output CFR stream, that absorbs any path jitter.

You can do this with GStreamer and a plugin called rtpjitterbuffer. There is an example usage on the bottom of that page with the gst-launch tool to do a simple desktop playback of an rtp stream with network errors.
gst-launch-1.0 rtspsrc location=rtsp://192.168.1.133:8554/mpeg1or2AudioVideoTest ! rtpjitterbuffer ! rtpmpvdepay ! mpeg2dec ! xvimagesink

You can customize this to your need and set specific timeouts and also make a new network stream instead of doing desktop playback. You can do pretty much anything with gstreamer, you just have to read a bit into it.
Regarding hardware I don't know of any that does this but I'd guess its pretty expensive like it usually is with very specialized hardware.

(I thought I had commented here but I don't see it. Apologies for any dupe). Thanks, that looks promising. We'll have a chance to test it in the week ahead.

You can also use my library @ https://net7mma.codeplex.com which is both faster and more efficient than gstreamer.

all_licenses: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/


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How to do video streaming with a canon EOS M?
What software is needed to do video capture from a Canon EOS M?
How can I use the Canon EOS M as a Webcam?
Thank you,

There's a couple ways I know of to do this that might work depending on what you need.  The first way would be to use an HDMI capture card like the Blackmagic Intensity.  The second way would be to use the Canon EOS utility over USB.

In the Canon EOS Utility SW from the EOS M there is no way to set the camera as a Webcam. Or at least I haven been able to find how to do it. Thank you for your help.

There should be an option for live video monitoring. This may or may not do what you need.

I hooked up the EOS-M via USB and turned it on.
No, there is no option for video monitoring in the EOS Utility.
I will go buy a $70 webcam to do this.
PS Recording separately as the first poster recommended will record a podcast. It does not allow using the EOS-M as a Webcam.


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Rendered mp3 file is much larger than original
In Sony Vegas Pro 10 I've placed an .mp3 file (about 3MB file size), then I've cut it slightly at the end to shorten the length. I've tried to encode it with following settings:
File - Render As
Save As Type: MP3 Audio
Template: Default Template
Description: Audio: 256 Kbps, 44,100 Hz, 16 Bit, Stereo, MP3

The encoded file is about 6MB and it seems that the resulting file is the same quality as original.
How can I render .mp3 without getting a larger file size than the original?

OK, the output is 256kbps / 44.1K. But what are the sample rate and bit rate for the original file?

@JimMack, how can I check this data, pls?

Use Mediainfo. I don't really know Vegas, but it should have some sort of metadata display as well ...

My guess would be that the original file was not recorded at 256kbps, but something lower like 192 or maybe even 128.

The settings say Stereo. The doubling of file size might indicate that the original file was mono.


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recording to multiple locations
I am not 100% sure if this is on topic or not here but I think its the most relevant place to post this.
Are there any programs out there that record the screen but saves the output to multiple drive locations at once?
To elaborate, lets say I have 3 hard drives: a) b) and c).
When it is saving from memory it will do the following...

save 1/3 of the bytes to drive a)
save 1/3 of the bytes to drive b)
save 1/3 of the bytes to drive c)

But it does this concurrently.
Are there any screen recorders out there that can do this?
PC Specs:

I7 clocked @ 6.5GHz
Radeon HD 6490
32GB DDR5 RAM
2 * 3TH HDD's

What is it that you are trying to accomplish?  I don't think such a thing exists, since if someone wants RAID like functionality, they generally use RAID.  Implementing in in software like you describe would produce a lot of overhead and could possibly even result in slower performance.

I want it to act as a software RAID and when it outputs lets say to 3 different locations it will save byte 1 to first drive byte 2 to 2nd drive byte 3 to 3rd drive byte 4 to 1st drive ect I can't use raid because my computer doesn't support it

You likely are not going to get an advantage from this.  Encoding is a fairly CPU intensive task and taking up your CPU to do the file split is going to probably cause more issues than the extra bandwidth you'd pick up from the multiple file handles.  Are you currently experiencing problems with write performance and are you sure that you are disk I/O limited?

@AJHenderson Yes I am 100% sure that I am limited for disk I/O I wrote a program to do exactly what I wish to do but there is currently a bug within Java that causes the rendering step to cause OutOfMemoryExceptions due to Java's GarbageCollection thread not collecting old garbage from dead threads but the actual encoding and spliting the output to different locations causes so little of an overhead its not noticeable

Could you maybe post your machine specs/OS version? I really doubt that for a simple computer screen recording (that's what you're talking about, right?) a regular HDD lacks the performance. I'm not familiar with software that does what you want, but the specs might help people to answer the question.

@BartArondson ok added main specs

You may find that it is easiest to use file system utilities rather than look for a recording application that writes multiple copies.
You could run mirrored filesystems, which will provide copied volumes, or simply set up scripts to copy individual files to multiple locations.

not exactly what i ment, I need to recorder to work as if im using RAID 0 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RAID_0#RAID_0

If you're OK with the command-line, you could use ffmpeg to record your desktop and then use the tee psuedo-muxer to record copies to multiple locations. I haven't used this to record to separate hard-drives, but I'm not aware of any underlying issues that would prevent it.
A simple (Linux) example would be:
ffmpeg -f x11grab -r 25 -s 1024x768 -i :0.0 -f alsa -ac 2 -i pulse \
-c:v libx264 -crf 22 -preset veryfast -c:a ac3 -b:a 192k \
-f tee "/path/to/output1.mp4|/path/to/output2.mp4|path/to/output3.mp4"

I need to recorder to work as if im using RAID 0 but using software not hardware en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RAID_0#RAID_0

@JordanLeslieTrainor I don't know if that's possible, but you might have better luck asking a more generic 'emulating RAID 0 with software' question over on superuser or one of the other more technically-oriented SE sites


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FFmpeg embed thumbnail Windows
I have seen commands like this online:
ffmpeg -i video.mp4 -i image.png -map 1 -map 0 -c copy \
-disposition:0 attached_pic out.mp4

However these command don't work as advertised with Windows Explorer, while other tools such as AtomicParsley and TagEditor do. What I mean is that, is appears that FFmpeg does add an image stream, but the thumbnail is not visible with Windows Explorer. Does FFmpeg have some command that will work with Windows?

I figured it out. You have to change the video codec, for it to work:
ffmpeg -i audio.opus -i image.jpg -c:a copy -c:v mjpeg \
-disposition:v attached_pic out.mp4

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/


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Is it possible to convert output of TV Channel (set top box 720p) to 1080p?
I have Toshiba 29PB200ZE (just purchased). Now the problem is it displays pixels with very blur effect. Reason is that the Cable operators in India (using Standard Channel Broadcasting) broadcasting 720p resolution output. As I have 1080p HDTV it does not displays output properly. Means that tiering the pixels.
Is there any converter available that converts 720p output from Channel (set top box) to 1080p so that I can view output properly.
If I go for HD Channels then issue will not be arised. But as HD channels have very high price range so could not afford them.
Edit: I am using 3 pin (red, yellow and white) cable which connects Set Top Box (digital signals) and my HDTV Toshiba 29PB200ZE. Is performance can be improved by installing other higher density cable like Coaxial?

Welcome to AVP!  Interesting question.  However, I'm not sure that it is on-topic here at AVP.  We'll see what the community thinks.  Please have a look at the faq concerning what types of questions are on-topic.  Having said that, I'll take a stab at answering :)

@JoshP - personally, while the question is more of a home A/V than professional A/V question.  The formats in question are still used by professionals and the idea of upscaling is relevant as well, so I think it merits keeping.  It also might not be horrible to expand in to consumer A/V since I'm not sure if there is a better forum for that on SE, but that's probably more a question to discuss in Meta.

What you are talking about is upscaling and any current HDTV will do upscaling automatically.  Upscaling doesn't work miracles though, it will only make it so that the lower quality signal can be watched on a higher quality display.  It just multiplies the pixels so that a 720 by 480 (.9 pixel compressed) signal for example doesn't end up only taking up 1/4 of your screen.  It doesn't make the video any higher quality (it in fact will be slightly lower quality than if you were to watch it at the native resolution).
Your problem however is not lack of upscaling.  Your problem is using the wrong signal.  You are currently connecting your cable box to your TV through what is known as a composite cable.  It's an old type of analog connection that includes all the video information on the single yellow pin and sends left and right audio on the white and red pins respectively.  It is only capable of reproducing a standard definition signal so you are not actually using HD signals.
To benefit from 720 or 1080 signals, you will have to either use analog Component video (the red/green/blue connectors) or use an HDMI cable.  It's worth noting that as long as your TV and cable box both have component inputs/outputs, you can actually re-purpose the existing Composite cable to carry a component signal, but there will be no audio (you need a separate white/red pair for the audio, which is the same format as with the composite signal).
Once you fix the cable and hookup issue, you should see better image quality.  Personally, I'd recommend using HDMI if it is available on both your cable box and TV as that is the easiest to setup and will give a nice digital signal.

@Horatio - thanks for the fix, even though I know them in my head, I often type them backwards.  Too many C words.

Thumbs up. Very nice explanation. Sure I will go for HDMI cable. The true fact (after researching and confirm by your explanation) if channels are not HD then I cannot view HD output from HDTV. I have to check after connecting HDMI cable to STB with HDTV.

AJ Henderson, I checked my STB and found that it does not has HDMI port :( So could not checked with HDMI cable. As I told earlier that most of the local channels are with STD and not HD it's really disturbing while watching TV. I wish if it is possible to get any intermediate converter which can convert STD to HD according to HDTV. I also tried to watch in 4:3 aspect ration but not got that much clear picture as the old CRT ones had displayed.

@PHP - unfortunately, that is just the way it is.  An SD signal being up-converted on an HD set is going to look really bad.  As long as it is actually taking up the full screen (or a 4:3 ratio of the screen), then what you are seeing is already being up-converted since it is taking an image with 720 by 640 pixels of information and displaying it on a screen with 1920 by 1080 pixels.  A lot of the difference you see is probably the analog to digital conversion too.  An old SD set works by scanning an electron beam across phosphors. It's effectively an analog process that lacks the precision..

of a digital display.  It gives it a softer feel which is going to tend to look better for low resolution even if the image is technically clearer on the digital display.  You might be able to get a better up-scaler that would try to approximate this feel, but it's not going to make any major improvement.  Did you switch to using component (r,g,b,w,r) cables or are you still using the yellow,white,red?

AJ Henderson:Please tell me about component (r,g,b,w,r) cables. Actually I am not that much technical in this field. So guide me on that. Where can I buy that cable and how they looked like? I tried to upload an image of my STB but as I don't have >=10 reputation so could not. But let me explain the port which I found on my STB. Ports for:
L (white cable)
R (Red cable)
Video Out (Yellow cable)
S/PDIF (not used)
IR In (not used)
TV Out (not used)
Cable In (cable attached). I have only above listed ports on my STB

@Php - I mentioned it in my answer.  They look the same as your current yellow,white, red cable, but you just hook them up to different connectors.  The cables are no different.  It just requires 5 connections instead of 3.

Aj Henderson: Oh yes. I was curious because you asked that "Did you switch...?" That's why I asked curiously. If red,white,yellow cables are ok then I am using the same. Now I have two options (1. Recharge package of HD channels - only 5 to 6 are available channels in HD and 2. Continue with current display whatever distortion it display) Because going to HD channels are very costly and even if I go for it then not all channels are in HD. Please tell me How can I accept this answer so that we can finish here. :) It was a really a nice discussion for me on this topic.

@PHP - There should be a checkbox under the voting options on the answer.  You click that to accept an answer.

FYI, Now my Toshiba LED 29" TV is showing Good quality pictures than the previous one. I think the Channels have started broadcasting pictures in Good quality from their source. So now it's really enjoyable to watch TV in 29" LED.

The cabling is likely your problem.  The composite cables you're using (red, yellow, white) will only move analog signal from the set top box to the TV.  Likewise with RG59 or RG6 (coaxial).
While both varieties of cables there are technically capable of passing digital signals (they don't care... they're just dumb cables), set top boxes typically only output 480i signals on those particular outputs.
They only way you're going to get 720p signal to your TV is by using one of the set top box's outputs capable of transmitting 720p: HDMI, DVI, VGA, or the component RCA outputs (red, green, blue).  Not all set top boxes have all of these.
Incidentally, if you don't have any HD content, the improvement will be marginal.  Standard 480i signals often just don't look that good when displayed on a large flat screen.

VGA is an analog component signal.  DVI can do both the analog signal in the format VGA uses (R/G/B/H/V) or the digital format that HDMI carries, but does so on different pins.  HDMI is pure digital.

VGA is an analog connection, but what is transmitted itself may be at 720p(1280 × 720) or 1080p(1920 x 1080) resolution. Resampling a low-resolution "standard def" image (which is probably what the STB is sending over the composite cable) is a much bigger visual problem than analog/digital signal. If a 720p channel is being downsampled for output over composite and then stretched (resampled) by the tv set to native resolution, you have even more degradation.

@horatio - you're totally right. Picture is being displayed with distortion. Actually channels are not that much capable which can be displayed in 1080p HDTV. This shows that I have to go for HD channels. But all channels (which are) being broadcasted are not HD channels. Only few are there and all local channels are being transmitted with STD. So there is no sense to watch them in HDTV. I realize after purchasing the HDTV (just purchased 3 days before). Currently I found temp solution to view STD channels in Movie Mode. Which dulls the brightness but shows clear picture. Any Suggestion?


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How to add Subtitles to already created video file for .avi format on Windows 8?
Can I create subtitle (.srt) file manually (to add subtitle) for .avi file?
I have created .avi file using Snagit but there is no option to add subtitle as well. So can I create subtitle file manually by myself? Or Do I have to download a specific Software for it?
Does it follows any structure?

I researched on net and found that it's very to add subtitle to any .avi file format. Here is a link for a site called Any Video Converter where an example has been given that How to create .srt file for Subtitles?
For quick view, below I am specifying format for Subtitle file (.srt)
1
00:00:03,000 --> 00:00:07,000
Hi Friends, This is First Track

2
00:00:14,000 --> 00:00:17,000
Second Track goes here

3
00:00:18,000 --> 00:00:22,000
Third Track goes here

So, we have to just follow this format. There should be a new line between each track. That's it.
00:00:18,000 is format of hh:mm:ss:ms. So it's pretty simple.

Any Video Converter violates the FFmpeg license.

This can also be accomplished if you have VirtualDubMod and a TextSub provider installed such as VobSub or VSFilter.
To use VobSub, during installation you must select the Plugins -> TextSub for VirtualDub and Avisynth option.
To use VSFilter, you must locate the VSFilter.dll file in the installation directory and copy it to the plugins folder with the extension changed to .vdf (e.g. VirtualDubMod\plugins\VSFilter.vdf).
Once you've installed one of them:

Open the .avi file in VirtualDubMod
Select Video -> Filters from the menu or press Ctrl + F
Click Add and select TextSub from the filters list and press OK
A file navigator should have appeared, select the .srt file.
Optionally, at this point set up the compression under Video -> Compression. Save the merged file with File -> Save as AVI


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Best video performance with the Nikon 5100?
I have decided to run a "vlog" as of recently, so I decided to test out my Nikon D5100's capabilities. It is consistently refocusing, thus creating a very loud, irritating noise. When I set it to manual, it comes out of focus, and doesn't return. I need both of these issues solved before I use it, or I'm just going to go buy a camcorder of some sort.
I would like to know of any quality microphones I can use, perhaps a different type of lens, tactics, etc.

The focus issue is a side effect of contrast based autofocus.  The camera basically is guessing at what "in focus" means by analyzing the lines in the image and if the overall sharpness is better or worse than it was at the previous focus setting.  This process ends up meaning it will move through the focal point and out of focus again as many as a few times before settling on the best point.  Using manual focus with a narrow aperture to increase depth of field is generally your best bet to get a suitable result, but may require fairly bright lighting.
As for microphones, the best mic to use is going to depend on what kind of look you want.  If you want a handheld mic, the Shure SM58 is a relatively cheap and standard mic.  You can also go with a shotgun mic if you'd prefer something off camera that can pick up clear audio, though it might be harder to use properly without an operator pointing it if you move much in the scene.  The in-between option is a lapel mic which can be worn and remain fairly inconspicuous.  This is the most common approach when a boom operator isn't available and you don't want to be visibly holding a microphone.
There are a wide selection of shotgun and lapel mics available.  Your best bet will probably be to jump on someplace like B&H and start looking for well reviewed mics in your price range.  If you have any more specific questions about what type of mic to choose, we could answer general questions about what features would be best to look for if you have particular concerns or needs.


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Which software gets the fastest rendering times?
I'm sure there are benchmarks out there, but I'm not sure where to find them. Circa 2006 I was holding on to Vegas 6 without letting go because I could see very noticeable differences in its rendering times. (It's super fast!) And I've made fun of people who tough it out with Final Cut or Premiere for its atrociously slow rendering times. I'm just curious if anyone benchmarks this stuff.

I don't think this question works here, as any answer will change as updates are made to render code. Very localised, and you'd be best looking at benchmarking sites, if anyone does them.

If there is a good site that does benchmarking, I don't know what it is. And if someone does know what it is, it will be helpful if they shared the link. It's more of a thought-provoking question. I'd like to keep thinking about it.

Aww. Come on. You guys closed the question on me without providing something constructive? That's weak. You know this question is going to come up again and again. Next time, BE HELPFUL.

I'm not sure that it is necessarily possible to get meaningful benchmarks for video editing render times now.  With the advent of system's using GPU processing for rendering, the already complicated field got even tougher.  There are simply too many variables.  It depends on the performance of particular effects and plugins and what kind of hardware and bandwidth needs there are within the project.  Since the needs of projects differ so greatly, I don't see how a meaningful benchmark could be established unless it was to try benchmarking individual filters within the applications.
In general, the new render engine in Premiere is very fast though.  Even for software only it works quick, but with GPU acceleration, it gets pretty crazy.  Running software only, I can run a full resolution all I frame 1080p 24fps signal with color correction applied through my tower with fairly minimal frame drops.  I'm unfortunately PC only so I can't compare to FCPX.

Nice one AJ Henderson. I have started documenting my render times based on Vegas Pro 10 on a 32 bit Win7, no GPU, but CPU is quad core, with 4 GB of ram. E.g., 2:43 runtime with up to 6 video tracks (some portions only have 2 video tracks running at the same time) and 3 stereo music tracks: 16 minutes for 720p mpeg 2 m2t and about 32 minutes for 1080p mp4 (7.5 Mbps).

Thanks for trying to tackle the question, AJ. Since this discussion board is still in Beta, I thought I'd see how well received a question like this would be because I know how hard it is to answer and thus I've never asked before! Let's keep the conversation going. There are a few obvious things that help: GPU and the newer Premiere. Windows, maybe. I don't know! That's why I'm curious. :)


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How do I edit source material from DVDs in Final Cut Pro?
I'm currently undergoing a project where I have to edit some material only available from DVDs. Basically I need to export a clip or two from the DVDs, and edit them in FCP for use on the net. The material I have are mostly feature films stored on the DVDs in 720x576 MPEG 1/2 Video (mpgv), however strangely FCP claims the frame size is 720x404.
The problem isn't ripping the DVD's. For that I have the right equipment. The problem is finding the right settings in FCP 6.0.6.
The videos are 16:9, so anamorphic seems to be the right choice in FCP as well. However when I set the FCP Sequence to CCIR 601 / DV PAL (5:4) to 16:9, the image is squished… Obviously that can't be right. While Modify > Conform to Sequence worked, it makes me uncertain that there is also a Scale to Sequence... Which one should I use, if any?
What kind of settings would be best to edit this correctly with minimum loss of quality in FCP? Advice about settings in Compressor or Adobe Media Encoder are also welcome.

This is going to depend on how your DVD ripping software works (if it does a trans-code).  If it does not trans-code, then it is going to depend on how the DVD was originally encoded since the exact method of encoding can differ.  I'm unfortunately less familiar with PAL formats as I'm an NTSC market guy.  Do you know what the aspect ratio of the pixels being used is?

Thank you for commenting :) It's 5:4. AFAIK the ripping software does not degrade the DVD video, but simply stitches them together into a larger MPEG file. In any case I have the option to simply "copy" the VOBs. Maybe that is the way to encode it back to DVD too?


text:
How to use cloning effect if the clips are overlapping themselves?
I have tried to combine two video clips, but it feels impossible. In the first clip there's one character running around the screen. In the second clip the character is just standing (still being animated however) and the first clip's character should be running around him. When I tried to use the basic cloning effect by using a mask to the second clip, the first character simply disappeared from the screen when it reached the mask of the second one. How do I combine them so that the first character won't ruin the scene?!
I'm using Sony Vegas Pro 11.

Welcome to AVP!  I'm not a video guy myself, though it seems like an interesting question.  A word of advice however, perhaps edit your question to include the details of what you have tried.  You stated that you "tried this", but the details of that attempt can really help to focus the answers, and hopefully, get you a specific and useful answer.  Cheers :)

If the character runs in front and then behind the other character then either a depth map or a manually adjusted mask is going to be necessary.  I'm unfortunately an After Effects guy, so I don't know how you would do that in Vegas.
If nothing else, you might be able to creatively do it by putting one layer of the character running around on top and another layer of the character running around underneath the character that is standing still and then cutting back and forth between them.
That is of course assuming that the animations have alpha channel support and that Vegas properly interprets the alpha channel.


text:
How to mask an animated layer in After Effects?
After effects noob here. I'm working on an animation where a ball falls through a hole. I created a Shape layer to use as the mask, but I can't get it to mask the ball layer.
I've also tried adding a mask directly to the ball layer, but it moves with the rest of the animation. Is there a way to turn the mask on and off without affecting the rest of the animation?

I found this post helpful: Preventing a Mask From Animating

Create a comp size solid above your text layer.
Apply the mask to the solid.
Set the Track Matte setting of your text layer to Alpha Matte.
The text layer will now adopt the alpha channel of the masked solid.

You can freely animate the text and mask independently.

I did not know the name of what I was trying to do. I needed to convert the mask layer into a Track Matte.

In these cases, I generally precompose the layer and apply the mask to the precomp (the layer is animating inside the precomp)


text:
Deciding on backdrop for making YouTube videos
I am new to recording videos. My room is cluttery and I want to hide all that clutter under a backdrop. I have watched some videos on YouTube but I am still not sure of what I need. From the videos I saw on YouTube I believe the best option is using fabric backdrops. Though, I have realized there are types of fabric backdrops. There is a the muslin backdrops and there is the non-woven backdrops. Also, on amazon I have found seamless fabric. I am not sure what that is. On YouTube people say that non-woven is bad for closeup product shooting. I have realized why after I saw the visible pattern of non-woven cloth in videos. Anyway, here and here are the seamless fabrics I am talking about.
Also, here is the non-woven:
Here are my requirements. I need a green backdrop for replacing it with different colors to have a variety of (realistic) backgrounds. I will be sitting in a chair recording the videos using a webcam placed on the laptop screen right in front of me (on top of it). The distance between my body and the laptop is around 1 meter. The backdrop will be placed 1 meter behind me (I want my video to have a wide angle not closeup angle. I am not sure if I am using the terminology right but to clarify I do not want the camera to be very close to my body). I want the backdrop to cover everything behind me. My room is very wide. I do not want it to be transparent. I have decided to save on buying a backdrop stand (I am on a very tight budget). I will be using two adhesive hooks plus a line between them and I will place the backdrop on the line (if that is problematic please let me know).
What backdrop do I go for? Also, what dimensions should I go for? I have noticed that on some videos people go for small size green backdrop and then hide what is not covered by the backdrop using video editing software like the guy from this video.
I want what is behind me to as realistic as possible. I do not want what is behind me to look as fake as images in the video above. Any background color is fine as long as it is realistic.

I see this as equally applicable to still & video. In either case the quality of the camera is going to partly drive the decision.
You decide on the size you need by checking the field of view in your camera. You need something larger than the camera can see.
If you have the green screen properly lit & far enough behind you that it's out of focus, it won't matter what material it's made from. If you can't get it out of focus then you need one that manages to maintain a good solid colour. The main problem I can see with using a webcam is it's likely to be a wide lens with a narrow aperture on a small sensor - each of which is going to make it harder to get the backdrop out of focus, so your lighting will need to be good & even.
"Real" green-screen is a kind of fuzzy material, like the 'loops' side of a piece of velcro - & in fact velcro 'hook' pieces are used to add markers in significant line-up zones, so it serves two purposes. It looks very flat and even, making it very easy to light.  It also doesn't crease nearly as badly as regular woven or non-woven fabrics.
See https://www.eufabrics.com/display-fabrics/529-green-screen-fabric-for-background-photography.html for an example retailer.
After that, it's down to how good your chroma-key software is at separating the image from the background & killing any green spill onto the subject. Of course, the better your initial setup, the easier that task becomes.

Thanks for feedback.

I agree with all of @Tetsujin’s answer.
In addition: the key to getting a good green screen keys is the lightning. If you can separate your foreground from your background with enough distance and you have soft lighting- large diffuse light boxes, not small spotlights, you will get radically better keys than if you use mixed colour temperature lighting and have hard shadows and green spilling onto your subjects.
Also highly recommend taking a look at After Effects - its Advanced Spill Suppressor and Keylight plugins are great if you have access to AE.
Addition: the key to great realism on a green screen is to examine the video background you  plan to use, and mimic the lighting on your subject as much as possible. Then colour correct your subject after keying to improve the match even more.
This is a pretty good tutorial showing how to plan and match the lighting:

Thanks for the feedback.

The main problem is that the green screen will be so close that you will get green spill light onto you, contaminating your skin tone and potentially making the edges appear part of the background. I think you should consider a neutral-color backdrop and forget about green-screen.

Thanks for the feedback.

all_licenses: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/


text:
How can I rename a footage .ai file for AE without breaking the references?
I've got a composition in After Effects CS 6 on Windows that contains several .ai files. One of them has over 30 layers, which I imported and animated in AE. Unfortunately, I gave the .ai file the not so clever name foo.ai because it started out as a test but worked, and I'd like to go ahead with it. When I rename the file to something more sensible, like Scene 1 - Spaceship.ai, AE complains about a missing footage file. Now it wants me to give it the new path, which I do. I have to select the layer from the .ai as well. And it looks like it wants me to do it for every layer from the same file.
I've already tried making a copy of the AE project file, opening it with a text editor and replacing all occurrences of foo.ai with Scene 1 - Spaceship.ai. After that, AE told me it tried to read after the end of file. Looks like there's a file length in there. Damn.
So how can I do this without having to change the source file and resellecting the layer for each individual layer in AE?


text:
Looking for Radio Automation Software
I am currently planning to run a podcast or a radio show as you prefer, where I intend to broadcast some Skype talking and play some music, live through Mixlr. I've been looking for some software that can help me to do this. Something where I can create a playlist that I can set up easily, control mic, have some embedded notes, etc.
I am especially looking for free software, but if I get myself into something that fits my needs, then I am willing to spend a few bucks.
I ran into a couple paid solutions:
ProppFrexx OnAir, which seems the most complete solution, with tons of options, most of them not really understood by me... Looks very recent, and the free version lets you play for 3 hours, with a random 2kHZ sound playing occasionally.
SAM Broadcaster, which seems to be used by most of the people. Looks like a very simple solution (the free version, at least)
There are other free options, but most of them do not work rather well or are hard to understand and get used to.
My question is then, if there are good free solutions that fit my needs (for Windows and/or eventually Ubuntu) and which. Or paid ones, that are quite simple and easy to manage. Out of curiosity, I would also ask if you know which software big radio stations use.
Thank you.

Not sure about Windows, but for Ubuntu, you could always check out Rivendell.
http://www.rivendellaudio.org/

Can't help with freeware, but i can shed some light on the professional side of things.
At urgent.fm we use Zenon because most commercial stations in Belgium use it, and our station is one of the starting places for people interested into getting into radio work professionally in our region.
That way someone who was trained at our station feels right at home in most commercial settings.
It consists of several soft- and hardware devices that can be tailored to suit to specific needs.

@AJ Henderson, thanks for correcting my spelling. Is linking to the radio station not allowed because it is seen as a form of advertising? If so i will keep it in mind for the future.

I don't think it is strictly against policy, though we do get a lot of spam.  I removed it since you were a new user and could have been link spam and didn't seem to add anything to the answer.  (Link farming is something spammers sometimes do to raise the search results of a page.  They make hyperlinks on high rank sites to boost a page in Google.)  Since you mentioned your affiliation, if you were an established user, I wouldn't have even thought anything of the link though.

I can see what you mean, thank you for taking time to explain.


text:
Converting an MPG data file burned to disc to a burned "video disc" for set-top DVD players
I've inherited some (12) DVD recordings of events for our organization that were burned to disc as data, instead of as a video disc.
I'm looking to take a 16:9 MPG video from these DVDs and burn it back to DVD in video format. Unfortunately I'm having problems with it. It seems to be losing its 16:9 dimension/ratio whenever I do a conversion from the very little amount of knowledge that I have with the applications at my disposal. I'm not too knowledgeable about video production software.
I have Windows Live Movie Maker, Windows Live DVD Maker, and Adobe Premiere Pro and Encore CS5 (part of CS5 Master Collection).
When I tried Encore, it converted (or read as?) the video to 728x480 (3:2) on import even though the settings seem to show "Don't Transcode" and DVD Maker seemed to add a black border around the video regardless of what settings I had attempted (widescreen/fullscreen). Live Movie Maker was made to make the creation process easy, so its settings are rather lacking, and I understand that - it just happened to be what I had on hand. I unfortunately don't have a lot of experience with video products.
Does anyone have any suggestions on solutions to run the conversion? Points for fewer steps and ease-of-use, but with "decent" quality conversion.
I have no additional budget for this task.

Encore should work fine for your purposes.  When you look at the original source, what is the resolution?  Is it still 728 by 480?  Most likely the original image is using oblong pixels to make a 16:9 image with a non 16:9 resolution.  This is fairly typical and is called Anamorphic Widescreen.  The 16:9 image is compressed to a 4:3 size (720 by 480 is a typical .9 pixel compressed NTSC 4:3 image.)
When recording it to a DVD, you want to make sure that it is encoding it as an Anamorphic wide screen so that the DVD player that plays it back knows that it should scale it out to 16:9.  Your other option is to letterbox the original to a 4:3 size with black bars on the top and bottom.
I don't have Encore in front of me at the moment, but if you can't find the setting for anamorphic widescreen, I can look it up when I get home and let you know.

I had never known about the anamorphic widescreen effect. That's pretty cool! Confusing, but cool. I just checked the original source video and it is indeed 728x480. After some quick, specific web searches I found how to choose the proper setting for anamorphic widescreen (and even further reading). Thank you!
On an aside, it seems that the first DVD that I rendered via Windows Movie Maker had some issues with it. The 2nd source video that I created rendered without the black border and looked exactly like the original. But now I'm more well-versed in Encore if need arises - thanks again!!

DVD video is actually MPEG video, packed in VOB format (with audio and subtitles). So you don't have to reencode your footage. Adobe Premiere Pro and Encore are high-end software programs, not for beginners. I recommend you to find more user-friendly software (like ConvertXtoDVD or similar).

Unfortunately since I already have software that is capable (albeit a bit more technical in nature) I have no additional budget since I do have everything needed. The trial is either time-sensitive or leave a watermark and this may be an on-going project, so I unfortunately can't use that particular software suggestion. I have used VirtualDub before, but at times I know that can get quite technical too.


text:
Blacking out specific pixels in MP4 without re-encoding
Basically is it possible to set the value of specific areas of pixels to black without re-encoding an MP4 video completely in an editor or application (Premiere, Ffmpeg, etc).
I'm wondering if such a capability exist to work directly on the compressed data as opposed to having to decode and re-encode.

No, it is not possible.  Mpeg-4 compression is based around storing information about patterns found within the video.  It doesn't deal with particular pixels.  Blacking out certain pixels alters the pattern and thus alters the way the video would compressed, potentially significantly.

Aha, so pixel precision is not possible. Any way to do this on a block basis maybe? On the I-Frames e.g. ? :(

@meewoK - there might be a way to do it while only re-encoding the block, but I honestly don't know enough about the format.  Either way, it would likely require a special implementation of an encoder to do it as you would have to encode your change at a minimum.  I doubt you will find any existing solutions to do it.


text:
How do I resize a video layer (not the compossition) in After Effects?
I created a footage of 1920x1080p, then I added a video of 1280x720p in a layer, now I would like to resize the video of this layer to fit the size of my compossition. Is this possible to do without using an external program to reconvert the original video at the desired size?.
Please, take into account in your explanations that I'm very novice using AE, I don't have more than 2 days using it.

Assuming you meant the composition is 1920x1080, and you wish to resize a layer to match the composition size, do one of the following:
Right-click on the layer name. In the menu that comes up, click on Transform --> Fit to comp.
Another method is, in the controls for Scale, under the Transform drilldown, right-click on one of the values. Click on Edit Value.  Change units to % of composition. Alter the value of the larger dimension, out of Width and Height, to 100%.

Thankyou. You mentioned two different ways to acchieve it, I just have one little question about it, is there a quality loss difference between those two ways?.

No difference .

And because there's always  two  another way of doing things in After Effects:

hit shiftalt/optionctrl/⌘h to Scale and reposition selected layers to fit composition width, preserving image aspect ratio for each layer
hit shiftalt/optionctrl/⌘g to Scale and reposition selected layers to fit composition height, preserving image aspect ratio for each layer.

If the layer is the same aspect ratio as the comp both will have the same effect. Note that this will also centre the layer to the comp.
Keyboard shortcuts are the key to working efficiently in AE. Even though that's a complicated chord it's hella useful.


text:
Separate all layers every "X" interval of time in After Effects
I dropped +100 images in After Effects, I would like to make a simple slideshow, and for this I have to separate/slice each layer sequentially every 5 seconds (that is the duration I want for each image/transition).
Please see the image below to understand better what I mean:

So, I wonder if exists a simple technique to do this programatically with all the layers, instead of manually dragging one per one. Maybe a simple hotkey combination to move the start of the layer to the current position in the timeline, or better a built-in feature like "Expressions" or maybe a external script or plugin for AE?.
UPDATE:
I found a expression example that I think it could be helpful for what I want, however, I can't find the way to adapt it for the simple task that I require. (my After Effects knowledges are very basics)

Expression example: Create a trail of images

No scripting or expressions are needed, it's built-in to After Effects:

Drop all your frames into a comp…
go to the 5 second mark…
with all layers selected, hit alt] or option] to trim the end of the layer to the current time…
still with all the layers selected either right-click or go to the top menu and choose Animation>Keyframe Assitant>Sequence Layers…
in the dialog that comes up you can choose to overlap the layers and to add dissolves. Usually for a slideshow you will choose to dissolve the top layer only. Dissolving top and bottom layers mean that the background shows through in the middle of the dissolve.


text:
How do I resize the canvas of a image layer in After Effects?
I'm using After Effects CC 2017. I've imported a PNG image with transparency, then I added a simple CC Light Wipe effect:

The problem is that the range of the lights produced by this effect are limited to the image size, so it produces an annonying thingy. Is there a way to resize the canvas of the layer of the image or another way to solve this (avoiding the need to resize the image canvas using external programs like Photoshop)?.
I really tried to find out the answer researching in Google before asking here but I only found questions about resizing the entire compossition in the compossition settings...

May I suggest that you spend a few hours going through some introductory video tutorials: http://aefreemart.com/the-mega-list-adobe-after-effects-tutorials-for-beginners/

Add an adjustment layer on top (right-click in empty area of the layer names. Go to New menu) Apply the effect to that.

And because there's always two ways of doing anything in After Effects:

precompose the layer to which you want to apply the effect.
In the pre-compose dialogue choose "leave all attributes…".
Resize the new composition to the size you need.
Then in the original composition apply the effect to the pre-comp.


text:
Advice on Weatherproof HD Camera for Streaming Video / Audio
I am looking to invest in a weatherproof outdoor camera with audio, if possible, to LIVE (or at least within the past hour) stream some wildlife. I am looking for advice on what type of camera would be a good buy for rugged use. Night vision would be a great addition.
Edit: more info...
This will be a permanent install, or at least 6 to 8 months out of the year. 100 degrees F to -20 degrees F temp swings throughout the year. Will be exposed to wind and snow, but not too much rain. Power will come from hardwire or solar. The camera will be wired to the power and computer about 100' away. I'd also like a 120 degree view or so... something that could show a lot within 5 to 8 feet of something.
EDIT::: I got a $30 cam off Amazon and am running it though a 100' cable with power. It runs into my computer with a KWorld usb connector. It is ok... I haven't found a great source for the streaming yet... iSpy was ok, but wasn't always working. I have it up on UStream now, but quality is not up to the 720 setting. http://www.ustream.tv/channel/chicken-run-cam
I'll keep at it.

There isn't enough information included with the post.  Are you looking for something that you can permanently deploy outside and stream back to you or something that you can bring with you outside and use for streaming to other people?  This is important as many weatherproofing options don't include an ability to plug in power.

@AJHenderson Updated the post. Anything else to add there?

I've been looking for something similar but haven't found the perfect solution yet.  If you can live without it streaming in real time, I've heard good things about the Bushnell Trophy Cam series.
http://bushnell.com/all-products/trail-cameras/trophy-cam

thanks for the comment. I'd like to do live, or close to live, streaming... those are nice trail cams though!

WOW! I just had an idea that might work with that though... they make the WiFi SD Cards?! http://www.transcend-info.com/products/Catlist.asp?FldNo=24

...hmmm... however, you'd run out of space sooner than later... cool idea for an overnight thing :)


text:
After Effects CS6 : Template Compositions
I'm trying to put together a library of 'clips' and/or 'effects' to use in some upcoming training videos I am developing. Is there a 'best practices' that includes making each effect into a composition? Or are 'best practices' usually individually developed and there really isn't any such thing for After Effects.
My effects are things like:

templated layouts

Specific lower thirds fonts and colors
outlines that draw themselves
text blocks that swoop in and settle that can have their text updated per video

color palettes or swatches
intro videos
etc.

I am trying to reduce repetition. I could create these effects each video, but I would like to create an effect ( i.e., text block swooping in at angle x and changing color at arrival ) and then replace JUST the text each video so that the effect becomes something the viewer recognizes as part of my training series.

There are a few different ways you can do this depending on your scenario.  Normally, for things like lower thirds, I make one composition in which I enter just the lower third text and plate.  I then use that composition as an asset in another composition to do the actual animations.  I can then simply turn on or off any particular text I need to in the static composition and render the final composition to get the needed output.
Similarly, for a video at the beginning of a clip, you can have a wrapper composition that has the lead-in and then you can replace the contents of the composition that is shown after the lead-in plays.
Alternately, you could probably do a fair bit of it using expressions too, but I've yet to have any tasks that were complex enough to have bothering to setup something with expressions.

I'm planning on doing tutorial videos on iPhone apps and settings. I will be re-doing multiple drop-ins and overlays and I would like to find the most intelligent way of doing that. It sounds like I was dead on based on your answer. I can just create one composition, create all of my effects that I expect to use, then reference that composition in each video and edit per video. I just want to have a good templating system in place that is the most efficient. THANKS!

And expressions just scare me!

Yeah, it sounds like you have a pretty good idea what to do.  What I described is actually how I do lower thirds for conference work.  I built out the graphics so that I just have to put in the speaker's name and hit render.

Thank you. I love design work of all kinds, this is my first big project where it's both something I am capable of doing and something I love doing... now I just have to find the time and DO IT!


text:
How can we use Ffmpeg to apply blur, overlay a logo and waveform, and add a border around a video, step by step?
We're looking to enhance a video using Ffmpeg by implementing several effects sequentially. First, we aim to apply a blur effect to the entire video. Then, we want to overlay a logo and a waveform onto the blurred video. Finally, we need to add a border around the entire composition. This step-by-step process requires precise commands and careful consideration of parameters to achieve the desired result effectively.
I utilized Ffmpeg commands to sequentially apply blur, overlay the logo and waveform, and add a border to the video. I expected each effect to be applied in the specified order, resulting in a visually enhanced video with all desired elements. However, I encountered challenges in properly configuring the parameters for each effect, leading to unexpected results such as misaligned overlays or improper blur intensity.
@echo off
setlocal enabledelayedexpansion

rem Set paths and directories
set "ffmpeg_path=C:\ffmpeg\bin\ffmpeg.exe"
set "input_dir=_input"
set "output_dir=_output"

rem Ensure input and output directories exist
if not exist "%input_dir%" (
    echo Error: Input directory "%input_dir%" not found.
    exit /b 1
)

if not exist "%output_dir%" (
    mkdir "%output_dir%"
)

rem Loop through input directory
for %%t in ("%input_dir%\*.*") DO (

    rem Process each file with ffmpeg
    "%ffmpeg_path%" -y -i "%%t" -i logo.png -filter_complex "\
        [0:v]eq=brightness=0.2:saturation=2.0:contrast=1.2, crop=iw/1.2:ih/1.2, \
        boxblur=1:2 [blurred_bg]; \
        [blurred_bg][1:v]overlay=(main_w-overlay_w)/2:(main_h-overlay_h-10)[bg_with_logo]; \
        [0:a]showwaves=s=1080x100:mode=line:colors=white [waveform]; \
        [bg_with_logo][waveform]overlay=10:H-h-10, \
        format=yuv420p[v]; \
        [v]pad=iw+20:ih+20:x=10:y=10:color=white[final_output]" \
        -map "[final_output]" -map 0:a -c:v h264 -c:a aac -b:a 128k -ar 44100 "%output_dir%\temp.mp4"

    rem Check if output file exists
    if exist "%output_dir%\temp.mp4" (
        rem Calculate new MD5 hash
        certutil -hashfile "%output_dir%\temp.mp4" MD5 > "%output_dir%\temp_md5.txt"

        rem Remove ID3 tag metadata
        "%ffmpeg_path%" -i "%output_dir%\temp.mp4" -map_metadata -1 -c:v copy -c:a copy "%output_dir%\%%~nt.mp4"

        rem Clean up temporary files
        del "%output_dir%\temp.mp4"
        del "%output_dir%\temp_md5.txt"
    ) else (
        echo Error: Failed to create output file for "%%~nt"
    )
)

pause


text:
Optimal brightness for multiple screens
I am currently editing a video, and I have three screen I'm testing the video with. One new and one older connected to my PC, and a larger 42" LCD. The new has a good brightness and color reproduction, and the older one is slightly darker, but is good I think. But the video is slightly too dark on my 42" LCD.
So my question is: what are the industry standards? Should I optimize for my PC screens (better and more correct result) or for my 42" LCD (probably best for most users as a lot of people uses laptops and older darker screens)?

Generally, you want to mix color for ideal conditions, not the common situation.  It is up to people to do the best they can to adjust their systems to support a vivid and clear image.  If you mix to try to make it look the best on some "average", not only will it look bad on any good displays, but it will also look bad on any well adjusted average displays.
The reason for this is because of gamut.  The gamut of a display is the range of colors which it can produce.  A good display has a wide color gamut and can make use of more colors.  A display with a smaller gamut will have to make adjustments to bring colors within gamut or else colors will clip out and appear as the furthest color it can render (relative chromatic  vs perceptual correction).
You want to mix to the widest gamut that will be used so that adjustments don't need to be applied on that display because different lower quality displays will not all have the same gamut.  Some will display more on the blue side, some more on the red, etc.  If you have mixed for a gamut that includes both, both of these lesser displays can make full use of their gamuts.  If you instead mixed for some average in the middle, not only will they lose the colors they don't do from the average, but they will also lose some of the colors they are capable of displaying, further limiting an already limited display.
Video is crap in, crap out.  You want to build the best possible input and then leave it up to the player to adjust.  The only exception to this is if you know the exact target conditions and want to customize for those conditions specifically.  You can always try to adjust visual information you can't display to look ok on your display, but you can't invent information that isn't there.
Also, one important caveat to remember.  Just because one display is brighter doesn't necessarily mean it has better color reproduction, or even a wider color gamut.  Newer consumer displays use localized brightness adjustments to allow for higher contrast ratios and thus can go brighter overall, but this is dependent on the idea that bright areas tend to be bright everywhere.  The local contrast ratio may actually be very low, which means that while the screen may produced bright colors, it does not necessarily do well with sharp contrast or accurate color reproduction (such displays are also a major pita to calibrate for accurate color due to the display fighting you with its localized brightness adjustments.)
Ideally you want something like an S-IPS or S-PVA panel with low color distortion from viewing angle changes and a high static contrast ratio with little or no dynamic contrast adjustment (unless it does it at a per-pixel level).  For best results, you also want to make sure that you have accurate color response curves for the display.  To do this, you need either a colorometer (such as a Spyder or Colormunchi) or spectrometer that can analyze the actual output of your monitor and fine tune the output of your monitor for most accurate color.

Monitor calibration devices are also probably worth mentioning.  They can help tune your monitor to spec and also tell you how (in)accurate your monitor is.  Also, research "blue gun" feature on broadcast monitors.  Probably won't help for OP's setup, but interesting nonetheless.

@JasonConrad - I suppose it doesn't hurt to mention, though jumping in to an entire ICC controlled workflow is likely more complicated than this guy was hoping to get if he was asking this kind of entry level color question.  Maybe you are right that I should briefly mention them though.


text:
how to add video title without re-encoding the video
How can I add a video title, in the start of a video, without re-encoding the actual video and losing the quality? is it possible in iMovie or Adobe Premiere Pro ? or even any Windows software?
is it even possible theoretically?
Update:
What I want is this. When I start the video file, first of all a title appears on the blank screen for 2 seconds, then the actual video starts.
What if I create an empty Title video, with the same codec, container and the resolution, comprising only the title. Then using 'ffmepg' join this newly created video at the start of the existing video ( for which I am creating this title).

AJ responded as though you asked for a superimposed title, which I didn't get from your question. Is that what you meant? Or are you asking how to add a separate title section of video ahead of what's already there?

What I want is this. When I start the video file, first of all a title appears on the blank screen for 2 seconds, then the actual video starts.

It depends a bit on your file format. But it is possible; if you create a title as a separate video you can concatenate (join) the title and the original video usng tools such as ffmpeg. Generally this will work best if they are the same codec with the same settings. For concatenation using ffmpeg see the FAQ.
Some formats, like MPEG2 program streams (like you get on DVDs) can actually be concatenated by simply adding the second file to the end of the first, eg. by using cat file1.mpg file2.mpg > newfile.mpg on the command line.

Unfortunately, because of the fact that most modern video compression algorithms don't work on single pixels, but rather groups of pixels (often called blocks), it will not be possible to change the values of select pixels (such as by adding a title) without re-encoding the video or using a format that supports an overlay.
For simply re-encoding, if size is not an issue, you can re-encode at a much higher quality level (or even losslessly) to reduce or remove any additional generations of loss, but you will be stuck with a much larger file.
Alternately, you could possibly use a playback system that is capable of overlays and use that to apply the title to the video.  It might be possible through a format or play back engine with advanced sub-titling capability, just as an example, but that would also depend on the format that your video is currently in and if it could be moved to a container or player that supports overlays.

I really don't see what the problem is?
In adobe premiere pro, I had done a rough cut of my niece having tea. I added the title screen after, so I just shifted the clips along the timeline to give some extra space at the beginning of the video. The source clips were all .mts file formats, no need to re-encode.
You can see the result here.

You do realise that when you export from Premiere you're re-encoding, don't you?


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how to convert container format for a video file without re-encoding
After some study and research, now I know that AVI and MP4 are video 'container' formats. They are also called 'video file formats'. The actual video data format for the video data in these formats can be encoded in any related format for example H.264 or MPEG-4.
I was trying to copy a AVI video file (H.264 encoded) from my computer to my tablet and the iTunes gave me error that this specific video cannot be played on this iPad. Then I tried copying another video file, this time a MP4 file, and it was copied correctly.
I searched on Apple website and came to know that IPad Air supports the below three videos and their formats.

H.264 video up to 1080p, 60 frames per second, High Profile level 4.2    with AAC-LC audio up to 160 Kbps, 48kHz, stereo audio in .m4v, .mp4,    and .mov file formats;
MPEG-4 video up to 2.5 Mbps, 640 by 480    pixels, 30 frames per second, Simple Profile with AAC-LC audio up to    160 Kbps per
  channel, 48kHz, stereo audio in .m4v, .mp4, and .mov    file formats;
Motion JPEG (M-JPEG) up to 35 Mbps, 1280 by 720 pixels, 30 frames per    second, audio in ulaw, PCM stereo audio in .avi file format;

Now I want to convert the existing video AVI file to MP4 format and try to copy again. I do not want to re-encode the video again in H.264 format to avoid quality loss. Is there any solution for my problem. I have access to both, Mac OS X and Windows machines so I am open to any solution. Please help.

I want to make the text between two horizontal lines, italic but the i symbol in editor is not working. how to do that.

I found an answer on the SuperUser site:
http://superuser.com/questions/472420/handbrake-settings-to-convert-mkv-to-mp4-while-retaining-the-original-quality

Why am I getting this message: "just now
Trivial answer converted to comment"

@stib, i see that you edited my answer. I wanted to achieve the same thing initially that you did. Please guide me how to do that.

when you write a post have a look at the toolbar above the text area. You can add formatting like bullet points and block quotes using it.

I achieved this using ffmpeg, a free and open source command line tool. This question guided me towards the exact command.


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Recommendations for HD camcorder for all-day static recording?
I am working on a computer vision project where I will setup a camcorder in a room at around 6am and record people as they walk around and interact with things. The recording ends at 11pm. The room itself is huge (~50 ft tall) and I need to mount the camera either on the ceiling or on one of the rafters, so I'd prefer not to have to fetch an SD card at the end of each day if at all avoidable. The people are not moving super fast, but I will be doing motion analysis based on an image of the empty room, so it's important that the video be uncompressed (compression changes pixels and messes up the before/after diff for the motion tracking). Also, the people will be interested in viewing their actions later, so it needs to be in color and preferably HD. There is likely to be minor vibrations, so it also needs to be able to stabilize the video, though I imagine that is standard nowadays.
Given those requirements, does anyone have any recommendations for a camcorder? I'm looking in the sub-$400 range if at all possible.
Edit: Compressed video is fine after all. I was misunderstanding what kind of video my test data was using, but it seems to be compressed, so I can handle that. Also, if possible I'd like the camera to be able to just stream the video to a server on a local network so I can store it offline without having to retrieve the SD card.
Edit 2: After some more looking, it does seem like there are 30M (~64ft) active USB extension cables. So it's possible that I could run a cable to a laptop on the ground and not need to worry about power or SD storage. As a result, I'm currently leaning towards an HD webcam like AJ suggested.

Hahahahaha!!!!!!

Ok, so now that I got that comment out of my system, let me start by saying your expectation is 100% completely, totally and insanely unrealistic.  HD + uncompressed = a data rate measured in gigabytes (11.2 gigabytes to be specific) per minute (16.1 terabytes per 24 hour day) and is only available on very high end cameras (>$3000, without optics) price range.  Additionally, to not have to get the card every 30 minutes, let alone every day, you would need to have it wired in to a recorder elsewhere which means getting a record deck alone that will be over $600.  There is simply no possible way to accomplish all of your goals within an order of magnitude of your stated target cost.
For $6,000 or so, I could probably recommend a setup that would work nicely for capture and then you'd need another $4,000 or so just for the disk drives that could store it, but unless you can bear a reasonable level of compression, then it isn't going to be any cheaper.  Even SD would have problems running fully uncompressed for lengths of time without a dedicated professional deck, though SD might possibly drop the cost in to the 1 to 2k range.
While off topic for AVP, I would suggest that what you need to do is update your analysis to support compression.  Add a buffer that will recognize pixels that are close in color as the same and adjust as necessary until compression artifacts aren't recognized.  Unless people are all the same color as the floor, it should probably still be able to track pretty well.
You'll need this anyway as from frame to frame, there are going to be variations in what hits the sensor even if you have a fully uncompressed signal.  Noise happens in the real world.  You have to deal with it.  The noise in the signal is going to be at least as much of a problem as most good compression, probably much more.

Okay, fair enough. I do in fact do thresholding in my algorithm, which I've already tested on some test videos from a friend's camera. Those were around 140MB/min, so I figured maybe I could find a setup that would give me ~18 hours of video, but I assumed that was uncompressed video; if it's not, great! Also, by not wanting to get the SD card, I meant I was hoping the camcorder could have a wireless card and stream the video to a server that could store it offline. Any hope for me given that updated info?

@WesleyTansey Have you considered just using an HD webcam with a laptop?  It's probably the best bet if you have a way to secure the laptop and provide it with power.

Or raspberry pi

@AJHenderson Do webcams provide video stabilization or will I need to start doing phase correlation and such on my own?

@WesleyTansey - I'm not aware of any, but it also brings up a question of why you expect there to be enough vibration to need it.  If you are mounting it to the building, I wouldn't expect much vibration.  If it is a concern, I would suggest shock mounting it.  That should dampen vibration.

Julian's suggestion about a GoPro isn't bad either, though it would have the need to run power to it.  They make mounts that would allow decent shock mounting.  I had forgotten about the wifi option on the newest models.

Well, people will be banging on the walls quite a bit. It's a very active demonstration :) ... I suppose if I hang it on the rafters it will work better, though that will be tough in some spots. Thanks!

I would recommend looking into the GoPro 3 Black Edition.
Benefits:
-US$ 400 retail price
-Wide angle lens, can cover the area you need
-4k recording, very high resolution, lets you reframe afterwards if need be.
-WiFi capabilities. I guess you could store the video signal on your laptop. I do not know what quality/compression you get out of WiFi though...
-very small and lightweight, you could basically tape it anywhere, or grip clip it.
If you need a higher quality image and less compression, I would rent a RedOne MX. With cheap optics you could get a week rental (depending on where you are) for about US$600. Then SDI the signal to a Black Magic deck (US$150 a week? maybe).
Benefits:
-"RAW" recording. It actually means the signal is compressed but not debayered in camera. If you are not familiar with the term wikipedia has a good article on it, but basically you get color information from each pixel, and not a calculated average. Dont know if you can get a white paper that describes the file structure of the RAW file so you can use it directly in your code though...
-4.5k frame size, even bigger.
-you can choose your lens, higher quality and more precise framing.
-you could tweak the frame rate. Maybe you do not need 24 fps. I would guess 8 fps is fine, if people are far away and nothing moves quickly through the frame. Some old cameraman say that to get full clarity in movement, at 24fps, an object can traverse the full horizontal frame in 7 seconds. Which means you could shoot 8fps if the fastest someone moves from one end of the frame to the other is 21 seconds.
It is a heavier camera though, a little more complicated to rig. If you can spend a little more money get the Red Scarlet X, it is much lighter, and can do up to 3:1 compression, instead of the 8:1 that the RedOne MX outputs.
Anyway, you also need to think of powering these things up, so if you can get an AC cable to the camera, you can get a USB, SDI, etc, you dont really need the WiFi capabilities...

I hadn't thought about running a long USB cable, but that may work well with AJ's suggestion of an HD webcam. Unfortunately, this is a long term project, so renting equipment for a week isn't an option. I definitely need 24 fps, given that my current algorithm relies heavily on a steady framerate. The GoPro looks like it may be overkill, given its price (compared to an HD webcam) which seems to be mostly for features that are less applicable to my project.

Along these lines google key words "HD network camera". Some get pricey but there a few under $400 that have 720p but not sure about 24 fps, you should look. Streaming is the way to go, and mounting it right will make it steady.


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Animating shapes vs masks in After Effects
Can anyone tell me how I'm going to get the best performance out of AE - I have a number of circles I need to animate expanding which are essentially stroked lines.  Just made some paths with very thick strokes and it seems to be chugging a bit.  I'm wondering if I would be better off with a Solid, with a circular mask on it, if that's faster to render - more over, I'm looking for a document that explains how Shape layers are rendered vs Masks.
Is there any reading anywhere on performance for this kind of thing? Have any of you come across this?
Edit
I'm running a iMac, 27-inch, Mid 2011
Processor  3.4 GHz Intel Core i7
Memory  8 GB 1333 MHz DDR3
Graphics  AMD Radeon HD 6970M 2048 MB
Software  Mac OS X Lion 10.7.5 (11G63b)

I don't think this question is answerable without a description of the hardware you're running AE on now.

Rendering a series of expanding circles (say less that 20) should not be a particularly slow task.
Check this page about how to improve performance in AE. http://helpx.adobe.com/after-effects/using/improve-performance.html
AE doesn't render the same way as non-linear editors like Final Cut or Premiere, so rendering can take longer (but users are usually working on shorter sequences than in FCP).
When you are preparing your work, try to work at lower quality settings, ie at 25% zoom, or quarter resolution, only zooming to 100% to check specific frames - get the motion working correctly at a lower res - this will save you a lot of time.
I don't think animating paths rather than masks will make a particular difference to the speed.

The performance should not take the decision for you which tool you are better off with in your case, since there won't be a huge difference, as tomh has stated correctly.
Rather let the style / type of animation be a reason for a specific tool. For example, an adjustment layer or a solid with an animated mask to which you apply a stroke effect gives you nice possibilities if you want to animate the line appearing on the screen as if it was drawed. However, with shape layers you can use a repeater or other path operations to create nice algorithmic animations.
AE's performance when rendering shapes is less significant here than your performance when playing around with options. When your animation of multiple circles can be done quickly with a shape and a repeater, you'd better not use masks.


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Downsampling 4K footage for an increase in chroma sub-sampling
We have a Lumix GH-4 camera, which can shoot in 4K with 4:2:2 color space.
I'd like to be able to convert the footage to 1080p 4:4:4 color space.
I've read that there some ways of doing this:
http://www.dvxuser.com/V6/showthread.php?330608-GH4-Downsample-4K-to-1080p-10-bit-4-4-4
https://forums.adobe.com/thread/1483696
But I can't find a definitive step by step way of doing this.
I have the following tools:
Adobe CS6 After Effects & Premiere.
Final Cut X or 7.
Davinci Resolve v10

Brilliant question.  I'm going to guess that the answer is no, but I'd love to be proven wrong.

Just a note: 4:4:4 isn't higher depth but just higher resolution. Your dynamic range will be the same, but the colours won't be sub-sampled.

Good point - updated the title

Doing this makes sense if you don't need 3840x2160 luma resolution, but you don't want to downscale the chroma as much.  (i.e. downscale chroma from 1920x2160 to 1920x1080, instead of to 960x1080).  This only increases the chroma resolution relative to luma.  In absolute terms, you're still downscaling both luma and chroma.  (If your source was 4k 4:2:0, downscaling to 1920x1080 4:4:4 would be able to leave the chroma plane unchanged.)

As I understand it, ffmpeg creates a raw image buffer with the input files it is given, then applies effects such as scaling and then encodes. So if you use ffmpeg to do the scaling and encoding to a 4:4:4 codec it should do what you want:
ffmpeg -i "my_gh4_422_4k.mov" -vf scale=1920:1080 -c:v prores -profile:v 4 -c:a copy "my_prores_444_1080.mov"

It would be interesting to test this, but I don't have any 4:2:2 4k footage on hand. I believe ffmpeg also does dnxhd 444, but I can't find any documentation on how to specify it.

Hmm, tried that, but got an error...
"Error while opening encoder for output stream #0:0 - maybe incorrect parameters such as bit_rate, rate, width or height"
Think I installed ffmpeg correctly using Homebrew etc..

hmm, you might have to specify a pixel format. Try adding -pix_fmt yuv444p10 before the output file path

ok will try - also saw this error "[prores @ 0x7f9f520a8a00] unknown profile 4, use [0 - apco, 1 - apcs, 2 - apcn (default), 3 - apch]
[prores @ 0x7f9f53000c00] ff_frame_thread_encoder_init failed"

maybe install ffmbc and see if you have any more luck with it (same command just with ffmbc instead of ffmpeg)…

This gives an additional error "[NULL @ 0x7fb3c4055c00] Unable to find a suitable output format for 'yuv444p10'
yuv444p10: Invalid argument"

That error usually means you've missed the name of the option, and it's reading the parameters as if they were he output file. Check your typing. eg instead of -pix_fmt yuv444p10 you might have just typed yuv444p10

Let us continue this discussion in chat.

This seemed to work:
ffmbc -i "inputfile.MOV" -vf scale=1920:1080 -vcodec prores -profile hq -pix_fmt yuv444p10 -acodec pcm_s24le  "my_prores_444_1080.mov"

probably -acodec copy would make more sense, unless you WANT the audio stored as raw PCM.  And yeah, that should get ffmpeg to downscale the luma plane horizontally and vertically, and downscale the chroma only in the direction it's not already subsampled.  (i.e. not upsampling to 4:4:4 4k before downscaling.)  You might want -sws_flags lanczos+print_info for higher quality downscaling than the default bilinear (and to enable printing a line in the output about swscale's chosen options).


text:
Timelapse on after effects
I have got 90 pictures of a building site (one per work day), and I would like to get about 10 seconds of video.
So, I would like to know how to generate image between my images on after effects (CS6) to get a smoother time lapse video ?
Thx in advance !

The most-recommended way to do this is with Twixtor, a pricey plugin for AE and other platforms. They offer a watermarked free trial. There are some free alternatives out there but I haven't used them so I can't say for sure they'll suit your need. One is SloMoVideo and if you google that you'll see videos from people who've tried it.

Here's the math(s):
90 images to make a 10 second video at a frame rate of 25 frames per second (fps) (in the UK) =
25 fps * 10 seconds = 250 frames
250 frames / 90 images = 2.778 frames per image
So each frame would need to be onscreen for just under three frames, which wouldn't look particularly smooth - for smooth motion you'd ideally have 25 images per second:
90 images / 25 frames per second = would only give you a total duration of 3.6 seconds of video, but it would be smooth.
This would look a lot smoother, but give you a shorter video.
Twixtor would attempt to interpolate between the frames, but works best on higher framerates than this - I suspect the results would look a bit unnatural (objects morphing out of nowhere).
The frame blending suggestion would probably look more natural, as it is just crossfading between each frame.
Hope this helps.

There's something off in your math. If you have to cover 250 frames of time with 90 frames of video, each frame is displayed about 3 times. If each of 90 frames were displayed for three seconds each, you'd get 270 seconds of video.

amended the post to make more sense - should have said 2.778 frames per image, not 2.778 seconds per image

Another thing to try before shelling out for Twixtor is the default frame interpolation built-in to AE.
You'll see the frame-blending checkbox in the timeline window, click it once and you get the the frame mix mode, where one frame is dissolved into the next to create the interpolated frames. this is fast-n-easy, but it probably won't produce great results for you.

Click it twice to get the "pixel motion" mode which does some sort of motion analysis, and basically morphs one frame to the next. This can work really well, but it can sometimes also create weird artefacts, depending on your footage.

To see the frame blending in action in the comp window turn it on in the switch at the top of the timeline panel. You'll have to check that frame blending is on in your render settings too (in Best Quality it defaults to "On for checked layers" which is generally what you want).


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Is reencoding a YUV 4:2:0 video in a 4:2:0 colour space lossless?
I have a video that is stored in the YUV 4:2:0 colour space. Assuming I used a lossless video codec but set the output colour space to YUV 4:2:0, would this still be a lossless encode or would I have to use a 4:4:4 colour space to make the encode lossless?

Would it help as a test to do the re-encode, then compare the file sizes from the original to the new? If there's no change, then is it probably lossless?

@Tomh - not necessarily, lossless compression algorithms have different levels of efficiency.  The file size could go up and not be lossless and it could go down and still be lossless.

A lossless codec that can read/write yuv 4:2:0 samples is logically like zip for the bytes of video data.  You get literally identical (same md5 hash, byte-for-byte identical) output back after decompressing.  That is the definition of lossless.
See my answer to https://superuser.com/questions/347433/how-to-create-an-uncompressed-avi-from-a-series-of-1000s-of-png-images-using-ff/864520#864520 for an example of compressing and then verifying losslessness with ffmpeg.
We all know converting between RGB and YUV is lossy, but even upsampling the chroma and then downsampling again is not necessarily lossless.  Here's a post in a discussion about the lossyness of storing 4:2:0 video by upsampling to 4:2:2 for huffyuv.  Depending on the upsampling algorithm, downsampling again might round differently in the last bit.  (jagabo on that forum knows what he's talking about, not everyone else does.)
So use libx264 -qp 0 -preset ultrafast, or utvideo for lossless tmp files, if you don't have a raid array of scratch space for uncompressed temporary files.  They both support all relevant pixel formats (rgb, 444, 422, and 420), and are fast.  IDK about higher bit-depth support in utvideo, but x264 does support it.

Probably no loss, but there is more to it than just YUV420. You can need to make sure the same ITU-R Recommendation is used (BT.601, BT.708 or maybe even 2020) In addition make sure the same color ranges is used (0-255 vs 16-235)

Some people could be more in depth about this, but my understanding is that it depends on how the color is compressed. Going to 4:4:4 would certainly be lossless, but not necessarily worth it.

Converting to 4:4:4 and back to 4:2:0 could actually introduce rounding errors.


text:
Can you see vimeo upload progress in Premiere CC?
I'm trying to use Adobe Premiere CC's built-in Vimeo uploader.
I saw a progress bar as the h264 file was being encoded... I can't see any way of telling how long the upload is going to take... Am I missing something?

No. There's no such thing. Vimeo will show you a gauge as soon as it starts processing your video.


text:
Why won't After Effects import an uncompressed avi file?
I just recorded a demo from cod4 with 2000FPS.
I used Vdub to make an uncompressed video from the Screenshots.
After saving as an avi, the file looks good. (Apart from the lack while playing in windows media player which is probably caused by the large Framerate)
When I try to import to after effects or encoder, I get the error that it can't be imported.
But why?

Please, add an error message, which you are facing. Also, you can make video from screenshots inside AE, and you will not face that error.

@Shultc yeah but when i import a sequence, it will also be interpreted as a 25fps footage. But I recorded with avidemo at 2000fps

It should not do like that. Check your composition settings.

In any case, the max composition frame rate in AE is 99 fps, unless you use a particular trick - see https://www.reddit.com/r/AfterEffects/comments/379wsd/importing_footage_over_99fps/.

@Mulvya yh, nice fix, but I cant even get my footage into after effects

Why not try to import the screenshots as image sequence?

@yes I already tried it and it works, I can than tell ae how to treat the footage, with how many fps and stuff. Problem is, the Sequence consists of, well as I mentioned before, 2000 .tga images. Something I can't really work with. But I will import the sequence to ae, and make it a 60fps footage, render as compresse video and than work with that in the project. I can than time warp the footage too it's original speed and If I have to, I can slow down and have super awesome slowmotion

@SlimMarten wasn't notified. It's good practice use a proxy sequence to work with. Import your tga's and render it as compressed jpg's, work with it and **replace the footage when you're done.

What's the video codec? AVI is a container, it's possible that the AVI contains a codec that Premiere doesn't know about. You can check the codec in VLC.

After effects should take in the image sequence just fine. No reason to run it through Vdub first. Let me know how it works out for you, it sounds like a very interesting project.

Given that the frame rate is extremely high, I'm assuming you want to slow it down later?  Nothing you ever watch on TV or in the Cinema is played back at that speed - the most you'd ever need is 50fps playback.  Usually 25fps in Europe, or 29.97 / 30 fps in the US.
You don't say what COD4 is - I'm assuming it's Call of Duty - the computer game?  Your video card probably runs at a max of 60fps, so 2000fps is probably massively high.
Either way, I would try converting the individual frames into image files first, using VirtualDub.
Then once you have them as an image sequence, you can import them into AE at any playback frame rate you want.  (I suspect you might want to throw away some unnecessary frames).

How can you say what framerate he needs? the human eye can detect differences in very high framerates--if the display device supports it.

I didn't say what frame rate he needs. I pointed out what normal broadcasting frame rates are. When you're trying to learn to use a piece of software with lots of variables, it's helpful to have a sense of what the normal ranges are.

GPUs often render much more than the 60 frames most displays show. I'm not sure however, if it's possible to "get" those frames if they*re never sent to the display. I'd be very interested to hear from OP what effective refresh rate he gets on average.


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Video codec for simple animation?
I am generating an animation in Matlab, composed of simple diagrams. The images are characterized by fine structures, strong contrasts and mostly discrete colors, e.g. there are few-pixels wide black lines, dots or small patches of uniform color, few-pixels high antialiased text, etc. Here's a screen shot of a typical frame:

What changes from frame to frame are the colored patches on the left, the time ("t = "), and the position of the black dot in the right panel.
Using a standard video codec on this which was designed for full-frame moving photographic imagery generates strong artefacts even with weak compression. Without compression however, the video file becomes unmanageably huge.
My question: Is there a video codec that is optimized for this kind of material? If possible, it would be optimal if an encoder is included in ffmpeg, and if there is a decoder (codec implementation) available for Windows.

Will need some details: what ffmpeg command did you use to generate the bad looking video? What is the target bitrate or file size you're aiming for? Do you need a codec whose decoder can be freely distributed or is a commercial solution Ok?

@Mulvya, thanks for your comment. bad looking video: I tried H.264/mp4, and increasing the bitrate only helped when the compressed video got almost as large as the original file. file size: my uncompressed video has a size of 25 GB, which cannot e.g. conveniently transferred via internet. As size below 500 MB would be nice. Decoder: Optimally it would be something that can be freely distributed, e.g. something that VLC supports. – Apart from the problem I'm facing right now, I'd be interested in some general pointers in how to deal with this kind of material.

I made some progress myself and will post a tentative answer soon. I'd be very interested in comments on how to improve upon that.

I read up a bit and made some experiments with lossless codecs, getting decent results. I'd be interested in comments on this, especially if there are lossless or lossy alternatives that I overlooked.
I tried the following codecs / formats in ffmpeg:

Lossless Motion JPEG2000 / AVI
ffmpeg -i test.avi -vcodec jpeg2000 -strict -2 -pred 1 test_jpeg2000.avi
compression ratio 19.59%

Lossless VP9 / WebM
ffmpeg -i test.avi -vcodec vp9 -lossless 1 test_vp9.webm
compression ratio 0.52%

HuffYUV / AVI
ffmpeg -i test.avi -vcodec huffyuv test_huffyuv.avi
compression ratio 37.42%

Lossless H.264 / MP4
ffmpeg -i test.avi -vcodec h264 -qp 0 -preset veryslow test_h264.mp4
compression ratio 0.53%

Since HuffYUV did not perform well, I excluded it from further tests.
I then tested playback support on Linux and Windows, trying mplayer, xine, vlc, chrome, and firefox on Linux (Debian testing) and vlc, windows media player, chrome, and firefox on Windows (8.1). I included browsers because WebM is specifically designed for web video. Results:

Lossless Motion JPEG2000 / AVI
plays on Linux with mplayer

Lossless VP9 / WebM
plays on Linux with vlc and chrome and on Windows with chrome and firefox

Lossless H.264 / MP4
plays on Linux with mplayer, vlc, and chrome, and on Windows with vlc and chrome

That a video "plays" means it is supported by the player out of the box, and playback is correct. I found several cases where the video was "supported" but playback was buggy.
Though Lossless VP9 has the best compression ratio (by a tiny margin), for the time being I decided to use Lossless H.264 because it has better playback support.

Have you looked into H.265 (aka x265)?  I've never encoded with it, but the results look very promising.  Animated video compresses about 50% more than H.264 (results will vary of course).  The quality is sill phenomenal.  Playback support will probably be worse, since its a newer codec.

I am having good results with .flv and codec On2 VP6 in Adobe Media Encoder. Roughly 200 Mb for 40 minutes of 640x480 1fs slideshow

Probably not relevant anymore but what about the PNG-based formats APNG and MNG? And what about WebP?

I haven't really looked into any more it since then. If I remember correctly, I considered MNG, but it never really got off the ground. I hadn't heard about APNG. And I didn't know that WebP supports lossless animation.

@Christian, this http://littlesvr.ca/apng/gif_apng_webp5.html might interest you. If you happen to look into this further, I'd welcome an alternative answer!

If you're OK with formats requiring proprietary encoders, I suggest you check out RealVideo. I haven't been using this format for a while, but I remember 10 years ago I could compress DVD cartoons into < 500 MB RMVB files with very little quality loss, while XviD files of similar bitrate were extremely blocky.
Another codec which sounds suitable at least theoretically is QuickTime RLE.
Surprisingly, although there appears to be modern research on cartoon-like video codecs, none of the efforts got past the "proof of concept" stage.
I suppose your MATLAB animation will be similar to cartoons: few colors used, sharp borders between colors, only a small part of the frame actively changing, etc.


text:
Tracking in After Effects
After tracking camera and clicking on one of the tracker points, I added "null and camera" then I attached a picture to it.
So I want the picture to be steady in a place when I move my recording camera, but the picture shakes in every frame.The film itself doesn't have any shake but the picture is not steady. I think the problem is with the tracker but what is it?
Help me.

Welcome sa_std :) Please add an image or re-phrase your question in order to get a solid answer. At the moment it's only guessing for such complex topic. Anyway, enjoy video.SE!

A few things to try:
Make sure your camera footage is at the same frames per second as your comp.
Instead of selecting a single track point, try drawing a lassoo around several points.  You'll get a target plane instead.  Make sure it's facing the right way (if it's not - redraw your lassoo around some different points).
Open the Advanced triangle in the camera tracker's effects settings, and check the box marked "Detailed Analysis".
Make sure you do your tracking at 100% zoom level in the display.  (This definitely used to cause issues - maybe they've fixed it now).
If there's something weird in your footage that will damage the tracking quality, try masking it out and precomping the footage before you start tracking.
Hope it helps.