FCP tips & tricks

[Roddy Jamieson]

[Shane Ross] “Broadcasters convert everything they send out over the airwaves as MPEG-2. But very high end MPEG-2.”

In the Uk digital TV is MPEG2 but at very poor bit rates I would never use the bit rates used by SKY or Digital terrestial.. HD transmission is H264 (MPEG4) it looks excellent.

Roddy Jamieson

[Rennie Klymyk]

Yes, in 1998 a law was passed that all tv broadcast in the US was to be digital (mpeg2) by 2006. I think there have been no clevats to the law since. You may still recieve some local stations who still broadcast analog rf locally.

[Mark Pope]

Here’s the address for the tips page:

http://www.mcpvid.com/prodguide/tips.html

[David Smith]

[Mark Pope] “The lattitude of levels info you had sounded sensible, but I only understood 63.79% of what you said.”

Projected film (either motion picture or still transparencies) has a much higher range of brightness levels that can hold detail in both the shadows and highlights. Video displays, or pictures printed on paper, have a much lower range. Many times this is described as “contrast ratio”, however that term gets used for other meanings as well so the term can be confusing. (for example, display manufacturers use the term to describe the difference in brightness levels between pure white and pure black, but that doesn’t tell you where detail in the shadows or highlights will be lost).

I’ve often seen these figures used: a film transparency can hold detail at contrast ratios of 1000:1, a printed photograph or video display… about 100:1. So image makers have to pay attention at both the acquisition and display stages. That is what Ansel Adam’s famous “zone system” is all about. (if you’ve never had the chance to see his actual prints, make a point to go to an exhibit of them. Books can show you his artistic eye, but they don’t do his printmaking craftsmanship justice.)

Working with video acquisition makes things tough in this regard, because the initial image capture has a pretty low contrast ratio. As Bret pointed out, a well lit scene keeps the lighting ratio low enough for video to handle, but that’s not possible in many real world situations. I’ve worked with DP’s who underexpose video in high contrast light situations, with the idea that video handles shadow details better than highlights, and the picture can be corrected in post and keep more detail throughout the range. That would be analogous to the Zone System’s use of exposure and developing strengths/times to keep detail in the image.