Does anyone here do proxy editing?

[Dougie]

I shoot a lot of HD video, which as anyone knows is resource intensive when editing, so I've been thinking about doing my edits with proxy files. Does anyone here do this, and what is your method when using Videopad?

[ConnorBrendish]

I suppose that you could convert all your HD videos using Prism Video File Converter to files of a lower resolution, and edit with those. When you are finished and want to export back to HD then you can replace the files (right click on a clip in the clip list area of VideoPad, click "Properties" and click the "Change" button next to the file path).

 

If that's what you mean.

[Dougie]

Yea, that's pretty much what I meant. My concern is with maintaining accuracy with cuts, effects, and transitions when I convert back to HD footage. As you alluded to, the idea is to trick the editor into believing it's working with the same footage all along. So I guess paying strict attention to file names and moving around file folders comes into play. When you say; "...in the clip list area of Videopad..." I assume you are referring to the clip bin at the top left...right? So it's a matter of doing all your edits with the proxys, then sneaking the HD files into the clip bin (with the very same file names), then doing the export.

 

For those who don't know what we are talking about, editing true HD footage is very very resource intensive (particularly on the CPU), and often slows down the editing process, especially when mufti-effects are used, and particularly with mid-level or slower computers..This can be very frustrating. Proxy editing is a system that's been in use for some years, in which low resolution smaller size files (or SD clips) are substituted for the true HD footage during editing. Then, just before rendering (exporting) the final movie, the HD footage is substituted back into the editor. If all goes well, all cuts, effects, and so on will now apply to the real HD footage.

 

Come to think of it, this procedure may even speed up Videopad's overall rendering. I think a lot of complaints about this may be from users of HD footage who don't realize how resource intensive it is!

[ConnorBrendish]

Yes, I mean the clip bin area. Actually, you shouldn't even need to use the exact same file names. The "Clip Properties" dialog allows you to change the underlying file of a clip so you could have "myvideo_sd.avi" and "myvideo_hd.avi" in the same directory and swap them over.

 

Do you think it would be useful if VideoPad automatically did this for you? For example when you import a 1080p video into VideoPad it could automatically create an SD version on disk for you, use that while editing so that rendering is quick, and then when you export back to HD it would use the original files again without you needing to do anything?

[Dougie]

Cnr-NCH wrote: "Do you think it would be useful if VideoPad automatically did this for you? For example when you import a 1080p video into VideoPad it could automatically create an SD version on disk for you, use that while editing so that rendering is quick, and then when you export back to HD it would use the original files again without you needing to do anything?"

 

Sort of do the whole conversion mess for me? Actually, in these days of HD footage rising above most other formats, I'm rather surprised not to see such an idea in video editors. Seems such a program addition would be fairly easy to write, and the smaller sized files would certainly help Videopad's performance. I'll put it this way; if it was there, I'd certainly use it!

[Nationalsolo]

Hi

 

Cnr-NCH wrote: "Do you think it would be useful if VideoPad automatically did this for you? For example when you import a 1080p video into VideoPad it could automatically create an SD version on disk for you, use that while editing so that rendering is quick, and then when you export back to HD it would use the original files again without you needing to do anything?"

 

I think that's a great idea!

 

Nat

[Dougie]

Last night I was at a friends house who uses PowerDirector 11 (Cyberlink?). This has a setting in which when you import your HD files,it will make a low rez copy that you can proxy edit with. I think it calls them shadow or ghost files. So I was wrong; there is an editor that does this...maybe! He told me that as long as he's had it, that feature has never worked. A working version of this in Videopad would be great!

[Nationalsolo]

Hi

 

This is fairly easily done with VP....

 

Save the HD large MPEG clips from the camera to a folder called say.."BIG"

Use "Any Video Converter" (or the equivalent NCH program ) to convert them to MPEGs of 320 x 240 pixels (or smaller). and save these in a folder called, say...."SMALL".

Ensure that the clips have the same names in each folder.

 

Open VP and load the clips from the "SMALL" folder

Edit your film

When finished save the project.

 

Put your small clips into a new folder out of the way and replace them with the unused clips from the BIG folder. Now the SMALL folder contains the large MPEG4 clips that have identical names to the small ones you took out.

 

Load your project and it will now be in the larger format.

 

Nat

[Dougie]

Thanks for that Nat. Yea, it's pretty simple. I suppose when you are ready for the BIG files, you could move the SMALL files to an out of the way folder as you mentioned, and then just simply rename the BIG folder as SMALL. Time to try it!

[Dougie]

Well Nat, I tried it just as you mentioned above, but had problems. The camera I am presently using puts out 720p clips as .mov files. I convert them to mpeg files of the same size and bit rate, and they come out as mpeg4 files . When I convert them down to small files (proxy's) they come out as mpeg2 files (which is just the nature of the converter I'm using-probably need a better one). Apparently, on my end anyway, when the project goes to load the BIG files from the (now) SMALL folder, it see's the same names, but says the files are not compatible with the file names in the project (I didn't save the actual error messages). So, apparently it not only looks at the file names, but also the file extensions, see's they are different, and refuses them.

 

So any suggestions on what extensions to use for both the big and small files? Also, I use Freemake Video Converter. Is Any Video Converter a better one?

[Nationalsolo]

Hi

 

For my test of this idea I used MPEG4 1280 x 720 H264 clips downloaded to my PC from my camera. I copied three of these clips into a folder that I called "BIG"

They were called TOSH0001.MP4 TOSH0002.MP4 and TOSH0003.MP4 ... a total of 28 Mb

 

I used "Any video converter" to change them into customised MP4 Movie files (*.mp4) codec H264 with the output size set to 320 x 240. I find Any video converter easy to use and reliable.

 

http://www.any-video...for_video_free/

 

These were saved automatically to a folder called MP4 that I then renamed "SMALL" (a total of 2.4 Mb)

They came over called TOSH0001_x264.mp4.....etc.

 

For each file I removed the "_x264" thereby leaving the files in each folder with the same name. The fact that one set was .mp4 and the other was .MP4 seemed to make no difference.

 

Both folders were on the desktop.

I edited a short film with the files from the folder "SMALL" along with titles dissolves and cuts etc. saved the project and

closed VP

 

I then moved the contents of the "SMALL" folder and replaced them with the contents of the "BIG" folder.

 

Opened VP and loaded the project. The big files were now reloaded in place of the small files.

The film was now full size.

 

For this to work the big and small files must be the same type.

 

Hope this helps.

 

Nat

[Dougie]

Yea, that's what I was thinking. Both the file names and extensions need to be the same. Tried it again and it works pretty well. Actually, I like NCH's own Prism Converter. Seems to do everything he others do.

[Nationalsolo]

 

"Use "Any Video Converter" (or the equivalent NCH program ) to convert them to MPEGs of 320 x 240 pixels (or smaller)."

 

e.g. Prism.....(Forgot the name !)

 

Nat