Professional Editor Reviews - Rendering

Rendering

Adobe Premiere Pro

Apple Final Cut Pro Studio

AVID Xpress DV Pro

Pinnacle Liquid Edition Pro

Sony Vegas 6

Rendering Interface

Adobe Media Encoder is a very solid tool for creating a range of files and file types. Precision is generally good, and it adapts reasonably well to the unique issues presented by the varying compression technologies.

Here are the MPEG-2 controls. You click on the categories on the left to see details in the encoding window on the right. Presentation can be a bit overwhelming, but the details are all there and you can punt and just choose a template when in a hurry.

Compressor is the best home grown compression tool of the bunch. You access Compressor by choosing File > Export > Using Compressor (similar to Adobe and the Media Encoder), then choose a template or multiple templates and go.

Avid is slowly expanding its rendering interface to include additional formats, but it ships Sorenson Squeeze with Xpress Pro for serious jobs.

Squeeze 4 is very competent, with extensive format support and very easy to use batch capabilities, and makes a great addition to the program. Still, you have to output an intermediate file from Avid, then input and encode in Squeeze, which adds an administrative step.

Liquid operates very efficiently during editing, but the rendering interface is very, very noncompetitive.

First the good. When you set up a project, you choose the format for the Timeline, whether it's DV, MPEG-2, or even HDV. Anytime you add an asset to the timeline, Encore encodes it (if necessary) and all previews are encoded in the background in the desired output format. When it's time to render, most of the heavy lifting is done, which is why Edition rendered to DV in 49 seconds, compared to 5 minutes or more for most other programs.

To output in a different format, however, Liquid's interface is simply sub-par. Options are no where near as clearly laid out in other programs, and many are simply not available.

If you're producing for DVD, I recommend that you output AVI files and encode in your authoring program (though beyond the scope of this project, we're not fans of Edition's DVD authoring capabilities either). If you're streaming, get a different streaming encoder as well.

Vegas has a straightforward, multi-tab interface that has presets but no batch capabilities, and isn't quite as straightforward to use as either the Adobe Media Encoder or Compressor. Nothing onerous, however.

Batch capabilities:

No

Yes

Sorenson Squeeze

Yes

Yes

DV Encoding

Adobe Premiere Pro

AVID Xpress DV Pro

Pinnacle Liquid Edition Pro

Sony Vegas 6

10:50. 

Doesn't precisely compare with the others, because some of the effects (particularly color correction) were rendered beforehand, but close enough to the others so that rendering performance is not a concern.

:49 (49 seconds)/46 seconds

This is because the timeline was set to DV-AVI, so Edition rendered as we went along. (note that Liquid did not have an image stabilization feature).

This is actually huge, since the primary disadvantage of Vegas in the past has been encoding time, which often was 5 to 10x longer than other technologies. Now it's in the same ballpark.

MPEG-2 Encoding

Adobe Premiere Pro

AVID Xpress DV Pro

Pinnacle Liquid Edition Pro

Sony Vegas 6

Video controls are good, audio controls are lacking no data rate rate for audio, and can only access MPEG compression (DVD Studio now has Dolby, so if you're using DVD Studio, it's not an issue).

1 pass 7 mbps CBR, 720x480 rez, MPEG audio, interlaced, audio MPEG at 224, multiplexed file.

4:52 (note that this was to PCM audio format; all others were MPEG audio).

Note that you only get two encodes into Dolby stereo until your trial license expires, leaving only PCM or MPEG-2. Encore has Dolby encoding, as do most other professional level authoring programs, so this isn't a significant deficit.

MPEG audio only, but DVD Studio has Dolby ..

If burning directly to a DVD, you can access MPEG, Dolby stereo and 5.1 surround. If producing an MPEG file, you can only output PCM.

Windows Media Encoding

Adobe Premiere Pro

AVID Xpress DV Pro

Pinnacle Liquid Edition Pro

Sony Vegas 6

Adobe includes a bunch of HD templates, but no 640x480 templates for desktop viewing or insertion into PowerPoint.  Sure wish they had one.

No Windows Media 9 templates (in Avid, anyway, plenty in Sorenson), which is surprising.

Good

Very good, though a bit hard to find for Windows Media (hiding in the audience section).

All the basics, but lacks exposure to advanced controls (like for deinterlacing).

Very poor. You can choose among several presets, but can't even see the resolution, data rate or other parameters being applied.

2 mbps, 96 kbps audio, CBR, 30 fps, square pixel,

11:12

More confusing than it needs to be, but you can get good results if you know what you're doing.  The short answer is that you need to right click EACH CLIP ON THE TIMELINE, select Field Options, then choose Always De-interlace. 

Then, in the Adobe Media Encoder, you need to make sure your template outputs in progressive mode.

Compressor has an option that you have to choose to de-interlace. Works well.

If you choose a preset that calls for deinterlacing, Edition does a good job deinterlacing.  Choose the wrong preset (without de-interlacing) and quality is awful.

We also had problems producing 640x480 output - Edition kept pushing out 720x480. 

You can control de-interlacing several ways.

Right click and select Reduce Interlace Flicker.

Set the same switch by right clicking and selecting Properties, then clicking Reduce interlace flicker.

Sometimes I've noticed interlacing artifacts even when setting these switches properly. In these cases, I've adjusted the deinterlace method in the Project Properties screen, shown below, and that usually fixes the problem.