Export as what for best quality.....

[Stephen Perera]

Hi there...

......what I'm editing into a final piece will be placed into a drive and connected to a TV screen for display - seeing as size of file created is thus not an issue whats the best quality setting to export to from within DaVinci resolve for something on 16mm film......I will do separate copy for social media and use Vimeo settings etc......

 

I'm confused as there's a lot of options for Format/Codec export combination

[Stephen Perera]

....the clips came in as DPX files from the Arriscan....

[Phil Rhodes]

Depends what you're going to play it back from.

 

If it's a huge workstation with lots of fast storage, put it back to DPX!

 

P

[Phil Connolly]

If you using the built in media player on the TV. That would limit the codec you could use - e.g its unlikely your typical TV would cope with ProRes. I've found different TV's cope with different codec's and data rates differently - so its always worth testing on the screen your using. Particularly if you need it to loop for an installation, not all built in players have built in loop settings

 

H.264 is probably a safe bet, at a nice high bit rate - 50 mbps would be more then plenty for a 1080p file.

[Stephen Perera]

thanks for the advice

[Igor Trajkovski]

For playing back on TV via USB stick, H.264 as MP4 or MKV should work.

 

I would suggest you try out a test render of a

test chart image with all the luma values to see

how the codec renders and how it will playback on the TV.

 

I've tested 8bit source material with luma values 0-255 rendered on
different mp4 codecs and Xvid in Sony Vegas.

The Mainconcept AVC codec clipped the values: 0-16 became 16, 235-255 was 235.
Sony AVC was full - keeping 0-255.

Say your codec renders full values, playing that test file back on the TV can

show you how the TV deals with the values - maybe it's player makes

everything below 16 black, and from 235 white.

 

A safe bet would be to apply a final master levels effect to make your black be 16 and whitest white 235.
Render in any H.264 codec (AVC, MP4).

The worst thing could happen is your footage can look

more contrasty with some crushed blacks and whites.

...

Test chart files HERE

 

 

 

[Stephen Perera]

thanks for all the advice....very kind of everyone

[Webster Colcord]

What is your final project resolution? I have been searching for the best codec for 2k or 4K export.

 

h264 and Avid DNXHD are great but in my experience (exporting from After Effects) they're limited to HD.

 

For 2K and 4K I have had luck exporting a MP4-encoded quicktime, tweaking for a smaller file size by adjusting the data rate limit.

 

I'm on a PC so I can't export ProRez and my online searches say that h265 is the thing, but a legit standardized version of that codec does not seem to be out yet.

Edited May 30, 2018 by Webster C

[Stephen Perera]

Hi Webster......look for HEVC as thats another name for H265...thats how it appears on DaVinci resolve for example.....would love to hear your recommendation at the end of ur research as Ive been doing Codec combo tests and so far its either going to be ProRes or HEVC export for me.....my film has been scanned at 2K as you know......'full gate' standard 16mm