Converting NTSC to PAL

Adobe After Effects

Converting NTSC to PAL

Posted by Matt Hargrave on August 23, 2012 at 3:58 am

Hi everyone,

I’m having some trouble when converting a NTSC animation project into PAL for delivery. Most of it looks fine but whenever there is a fast camera move or quick action on screen it looks jumpy. I’ve tried converting these specific clips using numerous programs, settings, and processes with no luck. It still always looks off in the PAL version when it looks fine in the original NTSC. I’ve tried using AE, MPEG Streamclip, and Compressor to convert the footage with no luck. Any help would be appreciated.

Thanks,
Matt

Tudor “ted” jelescu replied 13 years, 9 months ago 2 Members · 4 Replies
4 Replies

Matt Hargrave
August 23, 2012 at 4:39 am

One problem I encounter when trying this conversion in AE (besides it not looking good) is that the clip length is greatly lengthened. As an example when I export one clip it says it is going to be 146 frames at 25 fps (4 seconds, 21 frames) but when I bring it into FCP it says it is 5 seconds, 22 frames. Thoughts?

Thanks, Matt
Tudor “ted” jelescu
August 23, 2012 at 8:23 am

There’s quite a few threads on this matter.

You ca search for more, but here are a couple that can give you useful information:

https://forums.creativecow.net/readpost/2/986313

https://forums.creativecow.net/readpost/2/903084

Tudor “Ted” Jelescu
Senior VFX Artist
Matt Hargrave
August 23, 2012 at 9:17 am

Ahh, perfect Ted, this is exactly what I was looking for, I’m surprised I didn’t find these threads in my search. I tried the time stretch method in AE which solved my clip length problem. I still get a some jumpiness on fast movement or fast camera movement but I guess that’s inevitable when going from 30 to 25 fps. I was hoping it wouldn’t happen since most of it is animation but I might just have to live with it.
Tudor “ted” jelescu
August 23, 2012 at 10:46 am

If you have the project files, just apply the conversion method to the comp itself and not to the rendered output. You can resize the comp to fit the PAL standard by using the script that comes with AE and then drag your resized NTSC comp in a PAL comp. Apply Time Remap on the NTSC comp to match the length for the 25fps – this way AE will render all animation frames like it would if you had a PAL project to begin with- any 29.97 video you have will be Time Remapped though.

Tudor “Ted” Jelescu
Senior VFX Artist

Reply to this Discussion! Login or Sign Up

Creative Communities of the World Forums