Canopus DVStorm2 and Matrox RT.X100. Comparison test and analysis document. DV Quality Test Results. Complete Test Results Inside

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1 and Comparison test and analysis document Quality Test Results Original Complete Test Results Inside September 2002 E&OE. All trademarks or registered trademarks are properties of their respective holders.

2 Comparison Storm2 or RTX.100 With some of the new realtime editing solutions being released and the creative marketing efforts behind them, there may be some confusion caused by the way some companies are spinning the definitions of several key terms. This document cuts through the hype to set the record straight. What is Scalable Technology and what does it mean for a product life span? Storm2 Canopus video editing products are built with proprietary Scalable Technology to ensure increased capabilities in the future and a long product life. Five years ago, Canopus realized that our customers prefer to upgrade their computer CPU rather than buy a new video editing card each year. In 1998, Canopus shipped the Rex. Today, Rex and Storm2 are the world s most powerful editing systems, providing unmatched editing capabilities including 5 realtime video tracks (7 with Rex-RT), stackable realtime filters and 30+ realtime motion title and graphics tracks. RT.X100 replaced the RT2000 in Neither product features realtime output or scalable technology. Both of these products have had a very short product life compared to Storm2. RT.X100 claims to be a scalable product however what does this mean: - RT.X100 is limited to only 2 video tracks and 2 title tracks no matter what processor speed is used. - RT.X100 has very poor support for multi-processor systems. - RT.X100 functionality and performance do not increase with additional processor power. Realtime output can be achieved only with a very fast processor. Canopus Storm2 Matrox RT.X100 Technology Chart Proprietary high-quality codec Proprietary high-quality MPEG encoder Scalable technology: enabling increased video, title and graphic tracks as CPU power increases. Complete YUV 4:2:2 colorspace editing. (YUV is the native format and provides more color and video information than RGB colorspace) First released product with realtime output First released product to feature more than 3 realtime video tracks First released product to feature more than 2 realtime title and graphic layers ne to date ne to date p2

3 Quality Test Original Image Quality Tests Here is a simple test procedure that anyone can perform. Select an image Select an image, preferably one with color variation and object complexity. Encode and decode the image a number of times with each product to see if the image quality degrades. 20th Pass - Image quality from the is very high and does not exhibit any of the chroma shifting, blurring or artifacting normally associated with generational video loss of a poorly engineered codec. 20th Pass - The codec suffers severe image quality degradation. p3

4 MPEG Quality Test Original MPEG Quality Tests Low-bitrate MPEG-2 encoding is a good test for comparing MPEG codec quality. In this test, the same source was encoded to a 2 Mbit CBR stream with both the Canopus Storm2 and Encoded using Canopus SoftMPEG p4

5 3D Transition Quality Test 3D Transition Quality Test. In this test, we performed a similar 3D transition with each product to test for rendering quality. The images below show that anti-aliasing on the edges are of much better quality with Storm2. p5

6 Comparison Minimum system requirements & realtime output. Storm2 RT.X100 Processor: Single Pentium III or Athlon processor 700MHz Processor: Single Pentium III 1Ghz, Pentium 4 1.8GHz or AMD Athlon XP RAM: 256MB RAM: 512MB Realtime output: Realtime output: (Matrox recommend a 2.2Ghz Pentium 4 to perform realtime output) OS Support: Windows 2000, Windows XP OS Support: Windows 2000, Windows XP Workflow restrictions to maintain realtime output Restrictions: Storm2 RT.X100 Restrictions: With the RT.X100, you must edit while adhering to a very specific process in order to achieve realtime performance. - This process means you must apply all color corrections to your clips BEFORE applying any chroma/luma key effects - When using RT.X100 one must apply all CPU effects (keying and color correction) before using any hardware accelerated effects (E effects). If one does not follow this rigid workflow, realtime capabilities are impossible, resulting in a render-based editing environment. MPEG Capabilities Storm2 RT.X100 MPEG Capabilities Realtime MPEG-2 Program stream capture MPEG audio export Cut, trim and re-export MPEG clips (program and elementary streams) Create elementary stream from program stream files by splitting audio and video Reconvert High bit-rate MPEG files to lower bitrates at high speed using hardware MPEG encoding View details of all MPEG files within a particular folder p6

7 Comparison vs Comparison Storm2 RT.X100 Specifications Realtime output CPU requirement Quick reboot switching from PAL to NTSC Max simultaneous realtime graphic layers Max simultaneous realtime video tracks Max simultaneous realtime video effects (transitions/filters) Max realtime video tracks with transparency Max realtime graphic layers with transparency Audio input Synchronized analog capture of audio and video minimum requirement 30+ (Unlimited) (Unlimited) limitations on the type, number or order of filters and graphics tracks (Unlimited) Storm2 captures both audio and video. This assures audio / video synchronization and high quality audio. Pentium GHz Athlon XP (requires software re-installation each time) 2 2 (16 specific combination below) - 2 layers of video with transparency - 2 layers of graphics with transparency - 2 channels of smooth slow/fast motion control on video - 2 channels of color balance on video - 2 channels of input/output level control on video - 2 channels of proc amp control on video - 2 channels of keyframable 3D transform and perspective with soft borders - 2 channels of keyframable cropping 2 2 RT.X100 has no audio input and requires a 3 rd -party sound card to capture audio. / video synchronization cannot be guaranteed during capture. Page 81 of the RT.X100 manual under the heading Running the Audio Capture Drift Detection test discusses a 5-minute set up test which ensures audio and video synchronization between your sound card. p7

8 Comparison vs (Comparison Continued) Realtime video filters Filters Storm2 RT.X100 Realtime video filters / Video filter tools Old Movie Reverse speed control Vectorscope Waveform monitor Emboss Pencil Sketch Mosaic Motion Blur Sharp Soft Focus Chrominance Antiflicker Matrix Deinterlace Mirror Raster Scroll Tunnel Vision Loop Slide Strobe White Balance / Black Balance filter p8

9 Test Comparison The test system CPU RAM MotherBoard Hard Disk System Hard Disk Video Operating System VGA Display Intel Pentium GHz 1GB (RDRAM) Intel D850MD 1 x 20GB IDE 7200rpm HD 2 x 40GB IDE 7200rpm HD Microsoft Windows XP Professional nvidia GeForce4 mx 64MB Video Editing Software Adobe Premiere V6.01 Software Driver: V1.05 Software Driver: V1.5 Software Driver: V3.1b Software Driver: 1.0 General Observations found during testing and notes: a) In some cases when the color correction requires rendering combined with other filters, it can take longer than Premiere s native color correction. b) The uses native YUV color correction whilst the / RT.X100 and only use RGB color correction. c) In all cases when rendering was required for color correction, the amount of color correction did not effect render times, However, we did our best to achieve equal percentage of color correction for each product. d) Motion titles on the / RT.X100 were applied via the Matrox 2D-3D E filter, Pro-One via Pinnacle title motion, via Canopus title motion. p9

10 Test Test: One-minute timeline duration 1 1 Video Track Color Correction 10% Sharpen 0 min, 0 sec Realtime 0 min, 0 sec 12 min, 20 sec 12 min, 20 sec 12 min, 4 sec 12 min, 4 sec 13 min, 8 sec 13 min, 8 sec Render Time (minutes) One video track was placed on the timeline and then color correction and a 10% sharpen filter was applied to it. For the, we used its Realtime Sharpen filter. For the and the / RT.X100, we used Premiere s Sharpen filter as neither of these products had its own realtime sharpen filter. p10

11 Test Test: One-minute timeline duration 2 1 Video Track Color Correction 10% Sharpen 1 Moving Title (Slide Motion) 0 min, 0 sec Realtime 0 min, 0 sec 14 min, 21 sec 14 min, 21 sec 15 min, 44 sec 15 min, 44 sec 15 min, 32 sec 15 min, 32 sec Render Time (minutes) One video track was placed on the timeline, and then color correction, 10% sharpen filter and a moving title were added. All products had their own filter for moving titles. For the, we used its Title Motion filter. For the, we used the Pinnacle Motion filter, and for the / RT.X100, we used its Matrox 2D/3D E s filter. All titles were 72 points, 7 characters and moving for the entire duration of 1 minute using a slide-in motion. p11

12 Test Test: Ten-second timeline duration 3 5 Streams 4 Static PiP s (size = 40%) 0 min, 0 sec Realtime 0 min, 0 sec Matrox RTX100 1 min, 30 sec 1 min, 30 sec 1 min, 47 sec 1 min, 47 sec 1 min, 28 sec 1 min, 28 sec Render Time (minutes) Five video tracks that were 10 seconds in duration each were placed on the timeline. Four of them had a Picture-in-Picture filter applied to them. All products used their own PIP filters. All PIPs were 40% in size and static throughout the entire 10-second duration. p12

13 Test Test: One-minute timeline duration 4 1 Video Track 5 Title Tracks ( 3 titles at 72 point, 2 titles 48 point) 5 Graphic Tracks 0 min, 0 sec Realtime 0 min, 0 sec Static Title 27 min, 2 sec 27 min, 2 sec 6 min, 15 sec 6 min, 15 sec 8 min, 12 sec 8 min, 12 sec Render Time (minutes) 0 min, 0 sec Realtime 0 min, 0 sec Title with Slide Motion 27 min, 8 sec 27 min, 8 sec 38 min, 57 sec 38 min, 57 sec 23 min, 2 sec 23 min, 2 sec Render Time (minutes) One Video track was placed on the timeline. Five Title tracks were added with 3 titles at 72 points and 2 titles at 48 points. Five graphic tracks were added. All titles and graphics had a one-minute duration. Moving titles also had a duration of one minute. p13

14 Test Test: One-minute timeline duration 5 1 Video Track 33% Slow Motion Color Correction 5 Title Tracks 0 min, 0 sec Realtime 0 min, 0 sec Static Title 9 min, 38 sec 9 min, 38 sec 7 min, 50 sec 7 min, 50 sec 6 min, 22 sec 6 min, 22 sec Render Time (minutes) 0 min, 0 sec Realtime 0 min, 0 sec Title with Slide Motion 0 min, 0 sec 0 min, 0 sec 10 min, 49 sec 10 min, 49 sec 20 min, 49 sec 20 min, 49 sec 13 min, 45 sec 13 min, 45 sec Render Time (minutes) One video track was placed on the timeline. A 33% slow motion was added to the video track using Premiere s speed control. Color correction was added. Then five title tracks were added. Three titles were at 72 Points and two titles at 48 points. Moving titles also had a duration of one minute. p14