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PsF’s missing workflow, Part 9: Premiere Elements 10

Allan Tépper
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In parts 1-3 of the PsF’s missing workflow series, we introduced the terms benign PsF & malignant PsF, and revealed the PsF status of several AVCHD cameras from 3 manufacturers. In #4, we did the same with several HD recorders. In #5, we revealed how one recorder manufacturer is offering its own software to counteract the inappropriate signals offered over HDMI by many cameras. In #6, I published an open letter to all pro AVCHD manufacturers. In #7, I covered how to deal with PsF on a progressive sequence in Premiere Pro CS5.5. In #8, I showed how ClipWrap is an excellent solution for many Mac editors. Now in #9, I’ll discuss PsF with the sub US$100 Adobe Premiere Elements 10.

Tests made for this article

The observations and tests made for this article were done using the Mac version of Adobe Premiere Elements 10. To my knowledge, all observations would be identical with the Windows version, except when noted.

The terms Benign PsF and Malignant PsF

The terms benign PsF and malignant PsF were introduced in Part 1 of this series called PsF’s missing workflow. If you haven’t read it yet, please do, in order to understand the importance of proper handling of PsF, and be able to preserve the pristine quality of the footage you shoot throughout your workflow. It is a shame to degenerate your video by not having a good command of this important issue.

Can a professional really use Premiere Elements?

The answer is that it depends! I’ll be covering that in a separate article with that same name: Can a professional really use Premiere Elements?

Challenges to dealing with PsF properly in Premiere Elements

  1. The Premiere Elements team currently denies the existence of 1080PsF25 (aka 25PsF) and 1080PsF29.97 (“30PsF”) in consumer AVCHD cameras.
    2.  As a result, none of the 1080 AVCHD presets in Premiere Elements 10 are progressive. Instead, they are all 1080i (interlaced). The Premiere Elements team even continued to deny the existence of 1080PsF25 and 1080PsF29.97 in consumer AVCHD after I proved that it existed with a popular consumer AVCHD camera from Sony (the VG10), where Sony (consumer) had recently corrected the information on the SonyStyle.com website after my clarification here in ProVideo Coalition magazine. The e-mail conversation with the Premiere Elements team went through the Adobe Public Relations company, so I cannot quote particular names of Adobe employees, since the names were removed from the e-mails that went through the P.R. group. The e-mail conversation actually happened when I was testing Premiere Elements 9 (before 10’s release), but my testing with Premiere Elements 10 reveals that they are still in denial about this topic. See Premiere Elements 10 AVCHD presets below:

    The SonyStyle.com website continues to indicate that the VG10 (and now also the VG20) both record 1080PsF29.97, and they are only some examples of many consumer AVCHD cameras that do it. So much for deniability…

  2. Unlike with Premiere Pro CS5.5, Premiere Elements 10 does not allow the user to create new project presets or to modify the existing ones manually. This fact is confirmed by the Premiere Elements 10 documentation. There is a way in Premiere Elements 10 to provoke an automatic change to a preset to make it progressive when you drag the first progressive or benign PsF clip onto the timeline, but don’t count on it. It turns out that it isn’t the best workaround for this situation, since it will often get you into trouble later upon export, since even though the project is supposedly progressive, upon export it is often still perceived as interlaced by the Sharing section, which causes unnecessary and undesired de-interlacing upon export to progressive targets, with no possible override. But don’t worry, there is a better workaround that is a sure thing!

  3. Fortunately, there’s no problem for 720p presets with footage from a 720p camera. Fortunately, there is no problem with the 720p presets with footage from a 720p camera (since 720p is -by definition- progressive). However 720p-only cameras are becoming quite rare, and the remaining 720p modes on 1080p cameras are generally used for shooting 720p50 (in ex-PAL countries) and 720p59.94 (in ex-NTSC countries), where there is no PsF (only native) and it is obviously progressive because -fortunately- there is no such thing as interlaced with 720p, so Premiere Elements 10 has no other alternative but to handle it as progressive.

  4. Additional denial regarding native 1080p23.976 in consumer AVCHD cameras (aka “24p”). The Premiere Elements team also denies the existence of native 23.976p in consumer AVCHD. That’s why there’s no AVCHD preset for that framerate either in Premiere Elements 10 as of publication time of this article, even though that popular HG10 (consumer model) from Canon offers it, for example. But don’t worry: Your workaround is just ahead!

On page 2 of this article, you’ll see…

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