DVDA Pro 5.2: What a disappointment!--NOT!

[Bob]

Production Premium CS5.5 is now shipping. You can upgrade from Photoshop CS5. Photoshop hasn't changed from CS5 to CS5.5, but Premiere Pro and After Effects do have improvements. The version of Photoshop that ships with the suite is the extended edition, I'm guessing you have the standard edition. Regardless, you will need to install the version in the suite. The suite is considered a single product with a single key. You need to have the resourse authorizations match to use dynamic link. If you go the upgrade from Photoshop path, you can deactivate and uninstall the existing copy. During the install, it will tell you it can't find the qualifying product and ask for the product key. Enter the key for the old Photoshop CS5 and continue with the install. You will then be able to use dynamic link. The hack to use your existing NVIDIA card is a simple edit of a Premiere Pro text file. I don't see how it would void your warrenty. Of course, if you decide to not use the suite and use PrE 7 you won't be taking advantage of either the 64-bit Premiere Pro executable or the cuda gpu acceleration so you won't need the hack.

Just to clear up a misperception, when you set up your project to burn a Blu-ray with Encore and then change the project parameters to burn a SD DVD, even if your source material is Blu-ray compliant and can be burned to Blu-ray without reencoding, you will need to transcode for the DVD. The frame sizes for the two discs types are different, the file structure and naming conventions are different, the bit rates are different, and the encoded files are different.

[George Tyndall]

If you go the upgrade from Photoshop path, you can deactivate and uninstall the existing copy. During the install, it will tell you it can't find the qualifying product and ask for the product key. Enter the key for the old Photoshop CS5 and continue with the install. You will then be able to use dynamic link.

So, conversely, if I do not go the upgrade path, then the procedure would be to deactivate and uninstall the existing copy and then install the suite like anyone else who had purchased the suite at full price?

[Bob]

That's correct.

Normally, you can leave the previous version installed since different versions install in their own directory. But, whether you get Production Premium CS5 or CS5.5, both contain Photoshop CS5 Extended and will install it in the same directory as your current Photoshop CS5 installation. The suite will overwrite the existing standalone installation, but it's a good idea to deactivate and uninstall the standalone copy first to avoid potential problems with conflicting license authorizations and activations.

[George Tyndall]

Just to clear up a misperception, when you set up your project to burn a Blu-ray with Encore and then change the project parameters to burn a SD DVD, even if your source material is Blu-ray compliant and can be burned to Blu-ray without reencoding, you will need to transcode for the DVD. The frame sizes for the two discs types are different, the file structure and naming conventions are different, the bit rates are different, and the encoded files are different.

Bob, after comparing the quality of a SD DVD that I can produce by 1) burning my HD timeline to folder (4.7GB) and then 2) burning that folder to a SD disc with 3) the quality that I get when I burn the SD disc from an MPEG NTSC DVD Widescreen file that I have shared/outputted with the settings VBR, 2 pass and Quality 5; 4) I could not detect any difference in quality, for either the video or the audio. In other words, Adobe seems to have the highest quality settings built into the Disc>Burn to Folder option.

Therefore, I'm burning both my SD and HD discs from one and the same PRE7 HD timeline--there is no need to start 2 separate projects, one for SD and one for Blu-ray, as is the case with DVD AS5 and DVDA Pro5.

Question: If I make the move to CS5.5 Production Premium for the specific reason of taking advantage of Encore's increased capability to customize discs, will I still be able to create both SD and Blu-ray discs from one and the same PRE7 HD timeline?

Related question: If one wishes to burn multiple copies of a SD disc, which is preferable: 1) burning from a folder or 2) burning from an image of a SD disc? (CyberLike can both create a *p2i file and burn an disc from that file.)

[Bob]

Question: If I make the move to CS5.5 Production Premium for the specific reason of taking advantage of Encore's increased capability to customize discs, will I still be able to create both SD and Blu-ray discs from one and the same PRE7 HD timeline?

Yes. Encore will allow you to create your HD project and burn to Blu-Ray and then, using the same Encore project, change the project parameters to burn a SD DVD.

Related question: If one wishes to burn multiple copies of a SD disc, which is preferable: 1) burning from a folder or 2) burning from an image of a SD disc?

The end product will have the same quality. It comes down to personal preference and the software you have. An ISO file is a image of a DVD disc. If your DVD authoring software can output to an ISO, like Encore, the ISO can be burned to a DVD by virtually every DVD burning package. If your DVD authoring software can't write to an ISO but can write to folder, like Premiere Elements, you can still burn the DVD from the folder but there are fewer DVD burning packages that have that capability. Free burning products like Imgburn that can do either make that a non-issue. Imgburn can even create an ISO from a folder. ISO files may be a tad more efficient, but I believe your workflow includes a verification step of playing from the folder. Of course, Encore can also burn to folder.

[George Tyndall]

Question: If I make the move to CS5.5 Production Premium for the specific reason of taking advantage of Encore's increased capability to customize discs, will I still be able to create both SD and Blu-ray discs from one and the same PRE7 HD timeline?

Yes. Encore will allow you to create your HD project and burn to Blu-Ray and then, using the same Encore project, change the project parameters to burn a SD DVD.

Now we're talkin'!

Here's one last FU question: DVDA likes--sees as "native" (no recompression required)--videos that have been created with the MPEG2 H.264 1920x1080i 30 codec. Does Encore also have a preference?


BTW, thanks for the detailed info re the installation procedure, given that I already have PSCS5 Extended installed on my machine.

And also for the info on how to make my current GPU function with PPCS5.

[Bob]

I don't know that Encore has a preference per se. Encore supports all the specification legal formats for the selected media (DVD or Blu-Ray) and will not transcode or reencode them unless you force them either explicitly by specifying a specific format or implicitly by changing bitrate or some other action that would require reencoding. If it does require transcoding, you have a great deal of control over how it is to be transcoded.

See this: http://help.adobe.com/en_US/encore/cs/using/WSbaf9cd7d26a2eabfe807401038582db29-7fcfa.html

[Bill Hunt]

Back up to the questions at the bottom of the post:

Encore can Transcode a BD-compliant file on an En Timeline, regardless of which NLE was used to create it.

Encore can work with both DD AC3 Audio, both stereo and DD 5.1 SS, but note: Encore will ONLY handle the DD AC3 5.1 SS in pass-through mode, i.e. you cannot monitor the 5.1 in Encore, but it will write the 6-channel files to disc. PrE cannot Export DD 5.1 SS, and only stereo. It can Import DD 5.1 SS, but will mix-down. PrPro can Export DD 5.1 SS, but ONLY with the optional Minnetonka SurCode DD Encoder plug-in.

As of now, only a limited sub-set of AC3, stereo and DD 5.1 SS are supported by BD. Other formats, like DTS, can only be used as supplemental Audio streams, and the disc MUST have either a PCM/WAV, or DD AC3 Audio stream must be the primary stream. DVD is the same. DD 7.1 might one day become part of the BD spec., but not yet.

Encore can burn to ISO nicely.

Hope that helps,

Hunt