Create Proxy on Camera vs on Post

Markr041 wrote:

Andrew S10 wrote:

Create proxy files in your NLE.

The point of creating proxy files is to put your video into an intermediate codecs like Prores, DNxHD, Cineform, etc., which don't require high processing power to decode, and thus run fast and smooth in your NLE, even on underpowered computers.

Depending on your NLE & the power of your computer, transcoding to an intermediate codec might be enough to get the footage to play smoothly on the timeline, but you can reduce the resolution of your proxies to ensure that they play smoothly.

Cameras create low-rez H.264 proxies, which still take a lot of processing power to decode due to being highly compressed.

That is all good advice. But, those intermediate files take up a lot of space (they are lightly compressed after all). And they take time to produce, a lot of time if your equipment needs proxies to begin with.

Using the camera's proxies saves you both time (the camera does the production of them simultaneously in the field as you shoot) and disk space.

Whether your computer/editor can handle the camera proxies well you can test yourself. If they do, then the camera proxies are the way to go.

Yup.  In this day and age of widespread H.264/H.265 hardware acceleration, the primary disadvantage is only if you're doing aggressive seeking on a regular basis (and some cameras can mitigate that penalty with all-intra implementations, or reduction/elimination of B frames)