Thanks Zac,

Can you comment on what containers are allowed and with what streams?

Eg

      File extension    streams inside it

      .MP4              [M4V + PCM]

      .MP4              [M4V only]

      .M4V              RAW Mpeg4 video stream 

      .MTS              Mpeg TS[M2V]

      .M2V              RAW Mpeg2 video stream

For example, I dropped a M2V file into the project that is in a resolution listed below and it still wanted to transcode.

Hi Zak,

I have a couple technical questions about AVCHD, Blu-ray pass-through.

1) The Help files notes that "Encore does not transcode Blu-ray legal AVCHD files. The table of legal frame sizes does not include 1920x1080 30 progressive. Yet, when I use Adobe Dynamic Link in Encore CS5 to import a P Pro CS5 AVCHD 1080 30p sequence, and then convert that to a Timeline, the listing under Blu-ray Transcode Status is "--" and under Blu-ray Transcode Settings is "N/A." Can you or someone on the Encore team explain that?

2) If a P Pro sequence has non-AVCHD items in it (AVI files or still images, for example), how does Encore handle them such that they do not have to be transcoded for Blu-ray?

Simply put – if the source video file is .264 or .m4v (for AVC – I’m not getting into VC-1 or MPEG2) and exactly matches the screen size/frame rate/pixel aspect ratio as required by the blu-ray spec it will skip rendering it and use the source file.

If you use Dynamic Linking from P-Pro there is very little chance that it will get the video stream blu-ray legal. – unless the source footage is blu-ray legal and you have cut-only edits and you are in an editing mode that supports AVC smart rendering. So if the source is images etc then it will need to render aka transcode.

As for why 1080 30p is coming up “--“ I don’t know. Seems like a corner case bug to me.

Rallymax.

Hi Jeff,

First off before I get into the technical…

The reason that Encore won’t accept 1080p30 or 1080p29.97 is because that’s not Blu-ray legal. At 1080p only 24 fps is supported (1080p24).

If you do have 1080p source you have to render it with the interlaced flag set to say that it’s interlaced even though it was really encoded as progressive. – see here for the list of Blu-ray resolutions and frame rates:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blu-ray_Disc#Video

Ok onto your questions…

1) Regarding Dynamic Linking: What is AVC smart rendering? I don't know that that is an option in P Pro or Encore.

Smart Rendering… ok I’ll take a stab at explaining it but I bet there is a good description in the SDK.

IF you have an IMPORTER, PLAYER & EXPORTER (combined known as an EDITING MODE) that all know about each other (because they were developed by the same company and have hooks to talk to each other) it’s possible to skip re-transcoding.

When you register an IMPORTER and EXPORTER you must register a custom FourCC code. If the EXPORTER asks for that code and gets it back from the Render Suite it knows that it can simply COPY a frame from the IMPORTER to the EXPORTER output.

If there is a plugin in the render path (eg a filter or transition) between the IMPORTER and the EXPORTER the request for FourCC  “abcd” will fail because it doesn’t know how to do it for FourCC “abcd”. In that case you have to drop back to using one of the standard PixelFormats – eg YUVA 10bit is called FourCC=“v210”. (http://www.fourcc.org/yuv.php)

For codecs such as DV and HDV which have no user configurable settings like resolution, frame rate, pixel aspect ratio or datarate it’s easy to copy from the IMPORTER to the EXPORTER. BUT… for other more configurable codecs like MPEG2, AVC (aka H.264 aka MPEG-4 part 10) there are TONNES of settings – and more importantly THEY ARE NOT SAVED IN THE SOURCE FILE. Therefore there is no way for the EXPORTER to query the IMPORTER to see if your export settings exactly match the import source so the chance of a COPY instead of a re-transcode is basically nil.

Having said that some implementers might hack around that and give you a SMART RENDERING anyhow that doesn’t check for compatibility and blindly copies the SOURCE in whatever form it is in. Kinda risky in my opinion but it is possible.

In that case, then yes, you get a COPY of the source instead of decode to YUV and then re-encode to (compressed) AVC.

BTW whether you’re in Encore or Premiere Pro or Adobe Media Encoder (AME) it’s all the same thing. You have an IMPORTER feeding to video a Render pipeline that feeds to the EXPORTER. Opening a file in Encore or AME just means that the Render pipeline has no filters or transitions or cuts to process. It’s the same as dropping a file on a P Pro sequence with no edits or filters or transitions and rendering that out.

2) You said using Dynamic Linking means "there is very little chance that Re: Encore: what does it take to get an input legal? will get the video stream blu-ray legal." What workflow does passthrough AVCHD clips to Blu-ray without rendering?

Zac, if you have a Premiere Project Dynamically Linked into an Encore project is Encore going to always decide that it needs transcoding?

If the sequence is configured at Blu-ray legal dimensions AND it can provide the custom FourCC = “AVC “ theoretically it meets the condition check right?

Also, has Encore CS5.5 been upgraded to support Blu-ray 3D with its use of the MVC codec extension to the AVC codec?

If not, when will Encore be able to do Blu-ray 3D?

‘hope that helps,

Rallymax.