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1080p footage not showing fluid
Hello.
I lately happened to try some progressive shot footage on FCP (latest version). I tried both 25fps footage coming from my Canon HF s100 and some 1080p 30fps coming from an action camera. I use a Black Magic Intensity card to output to a full hd tv. First, FCP does not interpretate the footage correctly, showing sometimes upper field first instead of none in the browser. If I edit the footage on a HDV timeline, render and output the footage from a HDV sequence via the Blackmagic card, it looks not fluid enough. I mean that every movement, panning, tilting, even if very slow, shows bad strobo-like effect. I tried to export the timeline as a QT hdv movie, but the stuttering remains. I then tried to edit on a 1080p ProRes sequence, even if the card has no 1080p output, but the result was the same. I seem to see on the FCP canvas view that the video is not that bad as it shows on the tv set (I also tried to export as a DV Pal QT movie and played it to a crt tv set, same result).
Where am I going wrong?
Thank you in advance and best regards
Fabrizio D’Agnano
Rome, ItalyFabrizio D’Agnano
Rome, Italy -
3 Replies
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Firstly that camera records H264 codec and you need to transcode that to an edit codec like ProRes. Secondly dropping the files into an HDV sequence is a poor choice as it is highly compressed and interlaced.
If FCP is interpreting the files as upper, then it thinks the file is interlaced. I don’t know that camera so I can’t comment on whether FCP is getting it right or not. Some progressive formats are embedded in interlaced codecs, a technique referred to as psf.
So there are possibilities that you have the wrong sequence settings, the wrong codec for smooth render free editing and perhaps the wrong understanding of the configuration of the camera codec. So there are numerous reasons why the playback will look bad. Do not use the canvas as a reliable judge either.
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Thank you Michael.
I log and transfer the footage from the Canon HF S100, so it’s actually transferred into Apple ProRes. The one coming from the action camera has a MP4 extension, and it’s ready to use, but I tried transcoding it to ProRes and a bunch of other different codecs as well. I tried to drop the clips onto a 1920×1080 ProRes sequence, and also tried to export the clips both via Compressor and Export as a self contained Quick time movie. I tried deinterlacing the clips, and changing the field order both in the browser and via the video filter. None of this seems to work, but I saw a lot of video samples coming from 1080p footage not as jittery as the one I get, which is really too bad to be accepted.
The reason I’d like to get it working fine is that low light performance of the Canon HF S100 is said to get better in 1080p, and that the action camera do no have any interlaced option, so I’d have to drop it.
Thank you again, and best regards
FabrizioFabrizio D’Agnano
Rome, Italy -
[Fabrizio D’Agnano] “The one coming from the action camera has a MP4 extension, and it’s ready to use,”
.mp4 is just mpeg4 like H264 so proRes is best there.
If the Canon is truly 1080p then the motion artefacting may may be a factor of shutter speed. Being a prosumer camcorder, you may not have much option there.
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