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List of Video Editing Codecs

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Best Choices || Middle of the Road || Don't Even Go Near || Exceptions || Definitions || More Links

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Best Choices

• Lagarith Lossless is a good lossless editing codec for your AVI files. (Lossless is a bit slower and a bit smaller than Huffy and UT, but if you have the space on your hard drive, and have a fast enough computer, go for this.) But warning: sometimes it can be slow editing in NLE's, so keep an eye out.


• Huffy YUV is also an excellent lossless AVI codec, actually better Lagarith. It's a bit bigger in file size, but works great on older computers. But, the file sizes are VERY big, like lagarith, so this is only if you have the hard drive space. Also, the colorspace is different from others, so your editing program may have some problems with it. (Which is why this is not the top recommendation from me.)


• Ut Video Codec (AVI) is a newer codec that is lossless, like Huffy and Lagarith, but is constantly being updated to fix its bugs, and is a faster compressor. It's around 6-8GB per TV episode in Standard Definition (DVD quality), but it's actually bigger than Lagarith in most cases. I recommend this one the most. (Seriously, if your computer accepts it, use it!)

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Middle of the Road

• MJPEG (also known as Motion JPEG) is also pretty decent. It's also lossy codec, but is pretty decent for DVD footage (or downloaded footage—*cough*torrents*cough*). But if you use it, know that you'll probably have to shell out $20 for the Mainconcept codec (full version) for the AVI files if you're on Vegas Pro 8 and earlier. But you can also use MJPEG MOV files, through using a program called MPEG Streamclip, if you're on an earlier version of Vegas. (Another note: this is better to avoid if you edit anime/cartoons, for this is one more geared towards "live action" footage.)


• JPEG 2000 is actually pretty decent, just not as well known. It's better quality than MJPEG, but as far as I know, can only be encoded (on Windows) by MPEG Streamclip. But, it's a good editing codec, and I reccommend it over MJPEG. (Warning: file sizes are larger than MJPEG.)


• DV (Digital Video) is a codec that editors likes very much. It's stable and doesn't cause problems. I can't say too much more about it, except that it's lightly compressed (so not as good as Lagarith or Huffy), but comes at a price: video will be saved in fixed aspect ratios—720x480 (NTSC), or 750x576 (PAL). Use with caution.

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Don't Even Go Near

• Windows Media Video (.wmv) can load in Vegas, WMM, Premiere, After Effects, etcetera—no question—but it's very slow, and very compressed.


• MPEG-1 (.mpg) can be edited, but is not good editing quality. Don't use it.


• MPEG-4 (AVI or MOV) also can be edited, but it's still not a good choice. It pixelates. Badly.


• DIVX AVIs should only be edited in the official software. You'll run into random black frames, suddenly jumping in the footage, and more. Save yourself the headache and choose one of the codecs in the above two categories. (Not to mention if you've encoded in DIVX and haven't bought the full software associated with it, the DIVX watermark will randomly show up on the files.)

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Exceptions

• MPEG-2 VOB files can be edited, but don't load them directly. Instead, frameserve them into Vegas, Premiere, etc. using Avisynth and ffdshow's MakeAVIS.


• XVID AVIs can be loaded into Vegas (and I believe other non-linear editors as well) by changing the four cc. (My tutorial on this method here.) Now, please note that this is if you refuse to use the other good codecs. I don't really recommend this, but the method still exists.


• Matroska (.mkv) files can also be frameserved into editing programs similar to VOB files. (WARNING: HD MKV files frameserved into editing programs can cause a lot of memory/RAM usage, and can slow your system down; use only if you can't afford the hard drive space converting them to a good editing codec requires.) Note, please, that this is better if you're not using so many files (like just doing a movie series instead of a TV series), because your program can start to give you headaches with the problems this can create.


• BDAV MPEG-2 Transport Stream/MPEG-2 Transport Stream (.m2ts) files can be frameserved just like VOB and MKV; the same warnings apply.

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Definitions

• Codec
• AVI
• MOV
• VOB
• Lossy Compression
• Lossless Compression

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Other Links

These links also back up what I'm saying about these codecs and go into better detail than I can:

• IMPORTANT: Editing XviD AVI, downloaded clips, etc
• What's the deal with codecs? (Or, there's more to AVI and MOV than just saying they're AVI or MOV.)
• Types of AVI/MOV used for editing? Does it matter?
• DIVX Editing
• If You Want to Edit DIVX...
• The Ins and Outs of Video Compression
• MPEG Editors
• Preparing DVD Footage for Windows Movie Maker 2

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