HDV PAL to NTSC conversion, best method?

[Walter Biscardi]

[Ben Ged Low] “Any help would be most appreciated. Producers anxious. Deadline tomorrow.”

This is something that should never be thought about at the end of the process.

Are you converting HD PAL to HD NTSC? If so, a Terranex conversion is the only way I’ve found for this. There is no software conversion tool out there for this reliably. Graeme Nattress’ filter is only for SD.

We have to do a 1080i/60 (NTSC) to 1080i/50 (PAL) conversion on our show starting with the third episode and I’ve only found two places so far that can handle this conversion. Thankfully one of them is here in Atlanta.

Standards conversion must be thought about and tested BEFORE you start the edit. We spent a week testing SD NTSC to PAL conversions before we started episode 1 of Assignment Earth.

Walter Biscardi, Jr.
https://www.biscardicreative.com
HD Editorial & Animation for Food Network’s “Good Eats”
HD Editorial for “Assignment Earth”

“I reject your reality and substitute my own!” – Adam Savage, Mythbusters

[Meredith Holch]

Hi Walter, you answered some questions for me about pal to ntsc conversion (SD)a couple of weeks ago and suggested the Nattress software solution. Now I’m thinking I want to sort of start over and do a hardware conversion. I have an option of renting a Sony DSC 1024 digital scan converter for next to nothing which should do the trick, but do you have any idea if the quality is broadcast quality? Also, there are now quite a few inexpensive (under $400 new) standards converters on the market such as the ATLONA SB3690, or the CDM-830T (not sure who makes that one), and a couple others. I don’t trust the quality of any thing so inexpensive, but I don’t really have any idea! Since you said you thought about your own conversion issues for a week, did you learn anything about these options? Or do you have any other suggestions of something to rent or buy? Unfortunately, I have 40-50 tapes, so doing an Alchemy transfer at ($80- $100/tape) at a transfer house is out of the question. Then, I found a transfer house website that said they’d do it for $13/tape, but how do I know the quality is any good? I’d rather do it myself on a machine I can trust. Thanks!

[Walter Biscardi]

[chokecherry] “have an option of renting a Sony DSC 1024 digital scan converter for next to nothing which should do the trick, but do you have any idea if the quality is broadcast quality? Also, there are now quite a few inexpensive (under $400 new) standards converters on the market such as the ATLONA SB3690, or the CDM-830T (not sure who makes that one), and a couple others”

When I checked around the only equipment that was broadcast quality 1080i/60 to 1080i/50 or vice versa was over $100,000. I know of only one shop in Atlanta that has all the proper equipment to allow this transfer. I would not trust anything but this equipment for my broadcast projects.

Walter Biscardi, Jr.
https://www.biscardicreative.com
HD Editorial & Animation for Food Network’s “Good Eats”
HD Editorial for “Assignment Earth”

“I reject your reality and substitute my own!” – Adam Savage, Mythbusters

[Kevin Hamm]

Ok, so this is my experience, and while not extensive it did work. I cannot say that it was fun to sit through, but in the end, it worked better than I expected. The biggest problem that happens when converting between PAL and NTSC can be seen on shows like “Will & Grace” in the UK – the sound slips out. I was having the same issue, so I decided to two step the process.

Export your video tracks to a PAL format from your timeline
Export your audio to AIFF.
Start new project in PAL format
Import video
Import Audio
Export PAL movie.

Now, this caused *none* of the problems that I was told to expect, and my project was a 30 minute corporate piece, with chromokeying, titling, and lots of full-view scene changes, but perhaps I was just lucky. YMMV

Kevin Hamm
Video, Web, Print and coloring books.

[Meredith Holch]

Thanks Walter, well, but you are editing a TV show, right? and using the Nattress G-Converter? Of course my client isn’t sure
their show WILL be on BBC, but they do want a professional high quality product, I guess they’re thinking in terms of Al Gore’s documentary genre.. So, do you know of a good enough hardware converter? Or do you think Nattress delivers that same quality? Clearly my eyes are not a good judge, because even FCP’s conversion looks OK to me, (there is none of the stuttering you mentioned), but I know from what I’ve been reading, that it is NOT Ok. Or, what are the specific specs I should be looking for that determine a good converter from a problematic one?

[Michael Gissing]

Software conversions that change length and sound pitch are not what you want. Correcting the 4.1% shift (around 3/4 of a semitone) requires serious audio processing like MPEX3 on a Pyramix system.

I would go to a pro facility with a Terranex and do a real time dub so that length and pitch are maintained.

[Jeremy Newmark]

[Walter Biscardi] – “Graeme Nattress’ filter is only for SD.”

This is not true. You can use the Nattress filter for HD frame rate conversions, which is why there are HD resolutions under the “source pixel size” option of the plug-in. We have gotten very pleasing results converting 1080 HDCAM material from 25 to 29.97 using the the G-converter filter on two different features that we did. Granted, the best and fastest way to do this is with a Terranex, but Graeme’s plug-in works extremely well when going from PAL to NTSC frame rates. We have not had as good of success using it to go from 29.97 to 25, but this was coming from 23.98 material with a pull-down added. We have not tested it out with HD material actually shot at 29.97. Shake does a pretty good job converting HD material from 29.97 to 25, but it takes forever and is still not nearly as good as a Terranex conversion. It may be different for HDV material, but for the Nattress filter does work well with 25 to 29.97 HDCAM material.

best regards,

jeremy