Go Pro

[Craig Alan]

https://forums.creativecow.net/thread/54/862133

Mac Pro, macbook pro, Imacs (i7); Canon 5D Mark III/70D, Panasonic AG-HPX170/AG-HPX250P, Canon HV40, Sony Z7U/VX2000/PD170; FCP 6 certified; FCP X write professionally for a variety of media; teach video production in L.A.

[Claude Lyneis]

I shoot sports and like to use 60p instead of 30 p because it does improve the slow motion sequences. Of course the faster the frame rate, the less light captured, which could be a problem shooting under water where the light level is likely very low.

[Jeff Kirkland]

As other have said, shooting a higher frame rate gives you more frames to work with. If an action takes one second (25 frames) and you slow it 50%, that action is now taking place over 2 seconds (50 frames). If you shot at 50 fps you have actual real frames to play back. If you shot 25 fps, there are only 25 frames so the software has to invent the extra frames. Optical flow does a great job of this but actually shooting the frames will always be that little bit better.

As also mentioned here, the faster you shoot, the more light you need.

Its always a trade-off between the importance of quality vs the convenience of just faking it.

Jeff Kirkland | Video Producer | Southern Creative Media | Melbourne Australia
http://www.southerncreative.com.au | G+: https://gplus.to/jeffkirkland | Twitter: @jeffkirkland

[Fabrizio D’agnano]

What exactly are you going to shoot? Depth? Sea? Lake? Swimming pool?
Unless you are going to shoot surface swimming competitions from underwater, and you think you’ll need slow motions from that footage, I’d stick to 1080p 25 fps (especially if you are in a PAL country and you are going to mix that footage with other coming from other PAL cams). Usually, there’s nothing really fast underwater, especially if you are shooting some breath holding swimming, while lighting can be an issue. I specialize as an UW documentarist, and I use a GoPro as a second angle in difficult conditions. I set 1080p 25 fps, delivering PAL. I uploaded some demos or various footage on Vimeo or Youtube, and they seems to play just fine. I think it’s best to keep the FOV at max width, maybe tall HD if you don’t have a display, so you have room to reframe the scene in post.

Fabrizio D’Agnano
Rome, Italy
early 2008 MacPro, BM Intensity Pro, early 2008 iMac, 2014 MacBook Pro Retina, Blackmagic UltraStudio Mini Monitor, FCP7, FCPX, OSX 10.9.4

[James Ewart]

[Fabrizio D'Agnano] “Unless you are going to shoot surface swimming competitions from underwater, and you think you’ll need slow motions from that footage, I’d stick to 1080p 25 fps (especially if you are in a PAL country and you are going to mix that footage with other coming from other PAL cams). Usually, there’s nothing really fast underwater, “

I need the slo mo for various reasons. Detailed analysis of fast swimmers but I’m not going to get time to do tests with frame rates and light levels so will stick with 25FPS. Can’t imagine shooting NTSC at 30 will make much difference when slowed down.

I would have been interested to see how it held up at 72P 100fps in the light levels. But alas another time.

Thanks

[James Ewart]

MODIFY >> INTERPRET FOOTAGE >> ASSUME THIS FRAME RATE

Is there this option in FCPX that I don’t know about please?

[Doug Metz]

Hi James,

You would use the Retime function for this. When you choose 100%, one second = one second, regardless of framerate – this is what FCPX does by default when you’ve got an established framerate in your timeline.

There may be times when you want to play all frames of an unmatched clip – let’s say you’ve got a 23.98 timeline and you want to use a 59.94 clip in slow motion using all of the clip’s frames. In this case, you’d select your 59.94 clip, and check Automatic from the Retime menu.

Doug Metz

Anode

[Tony West]

[James Ewart] “these higher rates should result in better slo mo no?”

You are correct James. The higher the speed you shoot at the smoother and cleaner the slo-mo

That’s what we do in sports. We use high speed cameras that can shoot 4 thousand frames per second.

If you have some time before the shoot try shooting some test footage at different rates and see which one you like best.

[James Ewart]

[Tony West] “If you have some time before the shoot try shooting some test footage at different rates and see which one you like best.”

I go way back to when we shot over cranked 35mm and 16mm film cameras at 50, 100 or more fps.

I am not entirely convinced video cameras absolutely replicate this process or do they?

Is the relationship between aperture and frame rate the same with modern digital cameras such as go pro? With Arri Alexa and suchlike I understand it’s very similar. But do these Go Pro cameras actually shoot at that frame rate or replicate it electronically somehow?

Thanks

[Tony West]

[James Ewart] “I go way back to when we shot over cranked 35mm and 16mm film cameras at 50, 100 or more fps.

I am not entirely convinced video cameras absolutely replicate this process or do they?
“

You can overcrank certain video cameras like a SONY EX1 and they look pretty good when you play back the slo-mo, but I don’t think a Go Pro has that feature.

I’m not certain though.