D7000 and PRE 10

[Ciaran33]

Hi guys, I'm new around here and pretty new to video too, though I've been using Photoshop and Lightroom for quite a while. My computer is a Dell laptop with Win 7, 4gigs ram, core 2 duo, and 256 ram Invidia video card. Camera is a Nikon D7000.

So anyway, I have clips recorded at PAL 720p 25fps,
bring them into a new project and PRE automatically decides they are AVCHD 720p 25fps.
I edit them to taste with levels and such,
Share at MPEG HD 720p 25 fps,
And the resulting file viewed in VLC or Win Media Player are lacking in contrast.
(It's not terrible, but quite noticeable.)
If I re-import to PRE and apply extra brightness/contrast so they look over-done in PRE,
the new shared clip looks closer to what I want when viewed in other players.
I have tried other share settings with the same result.

Any clues would be gratefully received, thanks in advance.

[Steve Grisetti]

It's not terribly likely that Premiere Elements is reducing the contrast in your video. It could be the way your video players are playing the video. You can't always trust what you see and hear on your computer.

Try creating a sample output at these specs and posting them to YouTube, Vimeo or, best of all, our Muvipix gallery. Even better if you post a sample taken directly from your camcorder too so we can do a before and after comparison.

If you do add contrast to your video based on what you're seeing in the VLC Player, you may end up over-contrasting it.

I don't know what you eventual plan is for your video -- burning it to BluRay or DVD, posting it online, porting it to an iPad or smartphone player -- but you should output a finalized sample to your eventual delivery device before you start tweaking it based on what you're seeing on your media player.

[Ciaran33]

Thanks for the reply, I will post a small sample of straight from cam and also adjusted on this site when I get a chance. My immediate need is something I can show by hooking my laptop to a projector, and as I have 3 different versions, I will choose the one that projects best. In general I would like a master file that allows me to later convert to any format I like, DVD, Vimeo or what have you. I'll be in touch. If anyone else has suggestions in the meantime, I'm all ears (or eyes).

[Chuck Engels]

You might want to try selecting the DSLR project preset option instead.
If Premiere Elements says the the preset is wrong and asks to change it just say NO.
Give that a shot and see if it makes a difference. Video from the D7000 should look pretty awesome, I work with it quite a bit. Also, as Steve says, make sure your monitor is calibrated properly. But if you are working with photos often then I would think you would have noticed a problem with the contrast before now. I always use an external monitor with my laptop.

[Steve Grisetti]

If you're going to be projecting from your laptop, I recommend using these output settings:

From the Share tab, choose Computer and then QuickTime/MOV. Choose the DV preset and then click the Advanced button. On the settings window, do the following:

Video Tab
*Video Codec: H.264
*Quality: 100
*Frame Wdith: 1280
*Frame Height: 720
*Frame Rate: 29.97
*Field Type: Progressive
*Pixel Aspect Ratio: square
*Set Bitrate: checked
*Bitrate: 8000 kbps

Audio Tab
*Audio Code: AAC
*Output Channels: Stereo
*Frequency: 44kHz

For best results, I recommend you play this with the Quicktime Player, avaialable from Apple.com.

This output will also produce a terrific video on a site like YouTube or Vimeo (or Muvipix, of course).

But if you think you're going to eventually use the video to create a DVD, I recommend you output an additonal version using Share/Computer/AVI using the DV preset.

[Chuck Engels]

I generally export using the AVCHD 720p preset with the H.264 codec and set the bitrate to a min bitrate of 1mbps and a max of 3mbps, the results are really good. That will produce a MP4 file that can be played with Quicktime, VLC or Media Player Classic. Everyone probably has different settings that they use, those are mine.

One of the companies that I edit wedding videos for only uses Nikon DSLRs for all of their video, so I edit and export a lot of it. The video from those cameras is simply amazing.

[Bob]

FYI, the Nikon D7000 uses H.264/MPEG-4 AVC with PCM audio in a .MOV container.

Unless some sort of adjustment or effect was applied in editing, the contrast/brightness of the video shouldn't have changed. Usually, changes like that are the result of an uncalibrated monitor. But, I'd like to see those before/after samples using my calibrated monitor before saying that's the case.

[Ciaran33]

Thanks for the suggestions, I'll try them as soon as I can.
Re: DSLR project preset options, there doesn't seem to be 720p 25 fps, only 720p 24 and 720p 50fps. It has a preset for 1080p 25fps alright, but I choose to shoot at 720 25.

[Bob]

Your video codec is H.264/MPEG-4 AVC. The AVCHD preset you used should be fine.

[Chuck Engels]

Bob is right, the AVCHD preset should work fine. If you can get us some samples it will help. Sure would like to see what you are seeing. I always work with 50fps, you might want to do a test and see if the quality issues go away if you use the faster frame setting.

[Ciaran33]

Well, I've tried more of the suggested output settings all with the same result. I took a new clip, imported to PRE, exported without edit to HD 720p and the new file showed the contrast reduction. When I tried to both upload to here, Muvipix tells me I can't upload my straight from cam .MOV file. Dang and drat. Many thanks for the input so far.

[Steve Grisetti]

I know of no reason you wouldn't be able to upload an MOV file to our Gallery, Ciara.

Is this where you tried to upload the file to?
http://muvipix.com/cpg/

[Chuck Engels]

There is a size limit, the file must be under 50mb I believe.
Be sure to create an album to put the file into and when you create the album make sure it is public and not private
You can't upload anything to the gallery without an Album to place the file(s) in.

Just checked to verify and .MOV is an allowed file type in the Gallery.
You have an account but you have not created any albums.

[Ciaran33]

Ah, I was trying to load files to this page. (Doh!).
Ok, I have created "Ciaran's Album".
One file is straight from cam, the other was imported into PRE10, no editing done and shared at HD720p 25fps.
http://muvipix.com/cpg/thumbnails.php?album=426

[Bob]

Ok, I downloaded the two video samples did some tests. It appears to be an issue with the video player. Using Windows Media Player and VLC, the mov did appear to have slightly more contrast than the mpeg. But, the Quicktime player played back the mov file with considerably less contrast than the same mov file played in Windows Media Player.

compare1.jpg

To see if there was an issue with the contents of the video file, I created a new project in Premiere and imported both the mov file and the mpeg file. When I set it up to display the mpeg on the right and the mov on the left, the two were identical. Same brightness, contrast, everything. Both files decoded the same.

compare2.jpg