16mm transfer/edit question

[Sean Oneil]

[David Jones] “Should I transfer the film to 720p or 1080p(since it was shot at 24 frames), edit it in progressive mode, and then out put to 1080i, or just transfer it to 1080i to begin with?”

Edit in 23.98p. Absolutely, positively, no question about it. To do otherwise means you will have cadence breaks within the 3:2 pulldown. This can be disastrous and may not even pass the QC requirements for some broadcasters. Consumer television equipment will not be able to deinterlace it properly without a clean 3:2 pulldown pattern. Plus, you’ll also have more difficulty doing speed changes and other effects if it’s interlaced w/ pulldown.

When you’re ready to master, outputting you final edit to 1080i w/ clean pulldown is simple and automatic with any Kona or Blackmagic card.

Sean

[Jeff Carson]

Sean makes good points. Cadence issues are a mother to manage. It makes my head hurt. Can a person can get film at 24 frames telecined onto HD tape recorded at 23.98? I recently used Flying Spot Film Transfer in Seattle to transfer 35mm to an AJ1400 DVCProHD deck at 1080i @ 29.97 (59.94 actually, I think). We shot scenes at various frame rates, transferred at 24fps, and it all looked really nice on tape, and in FCP, captured at 59.94, editing on a 59.94 timeline. However, this was for TV spots, and not for a broadcast show. Does the AJ1400 for example, really have the ability to record at 23.98? Or is it possible only at 29.97/59.94) and then you remove pulldown once it is captured to create 23.98?

The biggest mystery I have is the pulldown cadence when mixing all these factors. Even though 24p material (either shot on our HDX-900 or 24fps film transferred and captured at 59.94) looks right in my 59.94 final timelines when playing, stepping through those timelines gives no clue as to the actual pulldown. I have a new AJA ioHD. How automatic is the 23.98 timeline to 29.97 conversion? Anybody have some Tylenol?

Dual 3Gb Mac Pro Intel 8 Core, 5GB RAM, OS 10.4.11, QT 7.3, FCP2 6.0.2, CS3, AJA ioHD

[Sean Oneil]

[Jeff Carson] ” Can a person can get film at 24 frames telecined onto HD tape recorded at 23.98?”

Don’t know about telecine, but DI is obviously more common these days.

[Jeff Carson] “Does the AJ1400 for example, really have the ability to record at 23.98?”

Yes.

[Jeff Carson] “and then you remove pulldown once it is captured to create 23.98? “

You can remove pulldown during capture.

[Jeff Carson] “looks right in my 59.94 final timelines when playing, stepping through those timelines gives no clue as to the actual pulldown”

What are you monitoring on? A broadcast CRT it will look fine. The problem is that on progressive scan consumer televisions, it will look awful.

[Jeff Carson] “I have a new AJA ioHD. How automatic is the 23.98 timeline to 29.97 conversion?”

It’s XTREME-ly automatic. So automatic you don’t have to do anything :). Playing back a 23.98 sequence, your AJA outputs 29.97 by automatically adding pulldown.

Sean

[Gary Adcock]

[Jeff Carson] “Can a person can get film at 24 frames telecined onto HD tape recorded at 23.98? “

unless you work in film – video is considered to be 23.98 NOT 24.0 .
23.98 fps the is the most common- outside of LA virtually noone cuts at 24.0 since it is hard to monitor 24.0 when this side on the world wants 29.97

“captured at 59.94, editing on a 59.94 timeline. However, this was for TV spots, and not for a broadcast show. Does the AJ1400 for example, really have the ability to record at 23.98?”
You had your content as 23.98 on that tape I would bet. And the deck defaults to non integer
captures change your capture settings to varicam 720p 23.98 and check the ioHD control panel under timecode- it will tell you your actual frame rate.

[Jeff Carson] “tepping through those timelines gives no clue as to the actual pulldown.”

going thru a clip that was shot on a panasonic camera at 24/60 you should see 2 dupe frames them 3 dupe frames- open the clip and advance it frame by frame with the arrow key.

gary adcock
Studio37
HD & Film Consultation
Post and Production Workflows
Inside look at the IoHD

[Jeff Carson]

[Jeff Carson] “Does the AJ1400 for example, really have the ability to record at 23.98?”

Sean – Yes.

So true 23.98 or is is 23.98 while still recording at 59.94 (I see nothing in our AJ1400 manual about that)?

Sean – What are you monitoring on? A broadcast CRT it will look fine. The problem is that on progressive scan consumer televisions, it will look awful.

I am monitoring on the Panasonic 26″ BTLH2600

Thanks Sean. I remember when it was all just television. This gets complex.

Dual 3Gb Mac Pro Intel 8 Core, 5GB RAM, OS 10.4.11, QT 7.3, FCP2 6.0.2, CS3, AJA ioHD

[Jeff Carson]

So, let’s say I shoot 23.98p on our HVX-200 on P2 cards , and I want to archive them to tape with our AJ1400. Simply playing back the 23.98 seq with all the P2 clips does not seem to “tell” the AJ1400 to record at 23.98. Is that a Deck software thing that I don’t know about?

Dual 3Gb Mac Pro Intel 8 Core, 5GB RAM, OS 10.4.11, QT 7.3, FCP2 6.0.2, CS3, AJA ioHD

[Sean Oneil]

[Jeff Carson] “So true 23.98 or is is 23.98 while still recording at 59.94”

Essentially yes. It adds dupliacte frames to make it 59.94. Dupe frames are flagged, so that when you capture it you can remove them automatically and have a 23.98 capture.

Again, I don’t know much about the norms of having a telecine done. I can’t imagine that a facility doing high-def telecines would not be able to them at 23.98.

Sean

[Gary Adcock]

[Sean ONeil] “Essentially yes”

Panasonic’s HD Camera Tape formats ALWAYS record as 60 frames or 60 fields

so in 720p the frame rate on tape is always 60 frames ( at a 59.94 timebase in the NTSC world)
or as 1080 60i
so the frame rate is always X/60 ( ie: 24/60 or 30/60)

P2 media is not recording to tape but a solid state storage device, so the smpte rules do not apply.

gary adcock
Studio37
HD & Film Consultation
Post and Production Workflows
Inside look at the IoHD

[Steven Gonzales]

When film goes through telecine to be put on video, it is not played at 24 frames per second. It is played at 23.976 (slowed down by 1/10th of 1 percent).

This allows the frames to sync with:

1) NTSC SD video at 29.97 frames per second (if 3:2 ratio video field manipulation is going on, referred to as “pull up” and “pull down” ),

OR

2) with HD video at 23.97 frames per second (if a 1:1 frame relation is being maintained between film and video).

This is also the reason that when you shoot dual system (as film does– sound and picture recorded separately) and you bring that new video and the original sound together you have to make some choices:

Edit at true 24 fps, by speeding the video back up in the computer by 1/10th of 1% (.1%) and syncing that way with the sound speed unchanged
OR
Edit at 29.97 and slow the original sound down by .1%
OR
Edit at 23.97 and slow the original sound down by .1%

Those are the basic ideas. Of course, when you finish on film, you have to undo all this timing mess in the opposite direction, but luckily once you are on video you are staying there.

[David C jones]

Thank you all for your helpful insight. I’ll keep it progressive :o)