Highlander 2 - 35mm Scan

[HippieDalek]

Something else to keep in mind is that the extra detail may just be more of the 2K detail being preserved due to the higher bitrate.

I did wonder that. The 4K render doesn't look proper 4K, but it does look sharper. That goes for both dirt and actual picture detail.

The Grindhouse encode you did smoothes out most of the grain etc. and I suspect it's because you used the internal H264 encoder of Resolve, which is awful (all integrated H264 encoders are pretty much, including Adobe too). I'd recommend doing your 2K vs 4K comparison in a format like DNxHD to account for that variable, or to do proper x264 encodes of DNxHD renders with good settings, otherwise the comparison isn't necessarily conclusive.

Even before encoding the raw frames don't look that grainy, which was a surprise to me. I've heard a lot of bad things about Resolve's x264 encoder. The DNG files have been captured with a Blackmagic camera using a Blackmagic colour space, and require using Resolve at some point to get the correct colours. But like I said my plan was to export to TIFF files, so should be able to bypass Resolve for the final x264 encode.

I've not used DNxHD before, I'll have a read into it and try rendering the scene using it.

[deleted user]

Just a few clarifications, hope it's not too nitpicky, but maybe you might wanna know:

There's a difference between H264 and x264. H264 is the general codec standard, x264 is a particular (good) encoder implementation (a program that actually encodes something to the H264 codec). Also those files aren't from a Blackmagic camera, they just require to be set to the Blackmagic color space because their internal metadata is a little messed up. This is the fault of the developers of the software the scanner uses, but it's okay since the workaround works. Gets more difficult with Adobe.

Yeah going the TIFF route is not a bad idea but may complicate things for you more than necessary. The DNxHD route is what the scanner uses for his own previews afaik.

[HippieDalek]

Thanks for the clarifications. While I've done a fair bit of editing I've always found the actual encoding step the most difficult and confusing, despite it being a crucial.

I will try out DNxHD soon and report back.

[deleted user]

It's not really that difficult once you're past a little bit of learning curve, heh. Unless you're striving for perfection, then you can lose a lot of sleep over it haha. But for just baseline decent results, you just gotta know to avoid the internal encoders for the most part, they suck in pretty much every program, and to set up some decent x264 settings (there are threads on this forum for that).

[HippieDalek]

I'm rendering a 2K test just now. I've gone for:

AVID AFF
Format: MXF OP-Atom
Codec: DNxHR
Type: DNxHR 444 12-bit (12bit seems a bit over kill but thought I'd stick with the defaults)

I also set the video levels to Full as I'd read that Resolve defaults for Video for DNxHR which washes out the colours.

Once the render is done I'll set off an identical one for 4K, then compare both renders with the older ones.

This is giving me a .mxf file, in an ideal production flow would I use this to feed into a decent H264 encoder for the final product?

Thanks for taking the time to correct me and point me in the right direction. I appreciate the help

[deleted user]

12 bit is fine, the scanning data you're getting is 12 bits as well. Granted, after the gamma curve etc. it might be less to compress, but it can never hurt, heh.

About Video vs Full levels, it really just needs to match at the encoding and decoding stage. For example all H264, or most of it, is video level (Limited). Your own Grindhouse encode and all Blu Rays are limited/video. Imo it's a silly convention, but it's usually not a problem if the decoder knows it. The problem arises when you encode in limited and the decoder assumes full, then it becomes washed out. Likewise if you encode in Full and decode limited, you will have too much contrast.

Hope it works out for you. Another container you can try is Quicktime (.mov).

Yep, you feed that output into a decent H264 encoder, imo just use x264, I don't know of any better one and it's free. There's GUIs for it too if you don't like command line. Just remember to use good settings. x264 with bad settings won't be that much better than the Resolve output.

Another workflow (that doesn't exist yet for Resolve I think) is to get an x264 encoder plugin. For Adobe there is "voukoder" which allows export of x264 straight out of Premiere or After Effects. However for 2-pass that might slow things down further if the timeline is itself slow to render (probably not that much in your case, but just saying).

No problem at all, you're welcome.

[HippieDalek]

The first 2K render finished and it does seem more detailed (though I haven't done much comparison yet), however I think I mucked up setting the Full video level as the picture does now indeed look too contrasty. I know how to handle full/limited when it comes to home cinema set up, but still learning when it comes to encoding.

Rendering the 2K test again with the default "auto" level set. If all's good with that then I'll set the 4K one off.

[deleted user]

Probably not your fault. You would just need to communicate to the x264 encoder that the input is full range.

[HippieDalek]

I haven't got as far as x264 yet, I was just playing the mxf in VLC.

[deleted user]

Ah gotcha