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Help requested for a timecode mess
Hello – I edited a bunch of footage and then ran into problems exporting. Looking into closely, I found I’ve been working with two timeframes. It says footage_A is 23.98 and footage_B is 29.97. It also says my sequence timeline is 23.98.
When I output, no matter how many different ways I try to export it, Footage_B (29.97) comes out ok but footage_A (23.98) is messed up – the in and out points are shifted.
Looking at the timecodes, I got the following:
The timeline counts straight through, 23 frames in a second:
0,1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10,11,12,13,14,15,16,17,18,19,20,21,22,23Footage_A (23.98) counts up to 29 but is only 24 frames in a second
0,1,3,4,5,6,8,9,10,11,13,14,15,16,18,19,20,21,23,24,25,26,28,29Footage_B (29.98) counts up to 28 but is only 12 frames per second
1,3,6,8,11,13,16,18,21,23,26,28Is there any way to make Footage_A and Footage_B play together nicely? Or is there no way to keep them from hating each other? It would be really nice if there was a way to do it where I didn’t have to re-edit it all, but at this point any solution is welcome.
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6 Replies
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Where did each piece of footage come from / How was it digitized? Where are you getting these timecodes? Are you reading them off the record timeline? Or in the source viewer?
Footage A sounds like 29.97 material put into a 23.98 timeline. Or 29.97 footage that was 3:2 pulldowned to 24fps on the fly (keeping the original TC with each frame instead of re-striping clean code)
from what you’re saying Footage B is only 12 frames per second. Which would make it very herky jerky regardless. Something is definitely wrong here.
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I got the time code numbers by opening the clips in the viewer and watching the timecode in the upper right corner while advancing it frame by frame. I figured out the frame rates of the clips by looking at their properties.
I filmed the footage with my Panasonic DVX100 and I thought the film speed was set on 24Advanced. I captured it onto fcp treating it all like it was 24 speed using advanced pull-down to remove the frames (but with a cheaper camera that doesn’t have different frame rates because the DV out on the Panasonic is fried). So if halfway through, I started recording with a normal DV framerate, that would explain why it looked like “29.97 footage that was 3:2 pulldowned to 24fps on the fly” like you said.
It seems like one solution would be to re-capture the original tapes, but then I’d have to re-edit. Any jerkiness really isn’t a problem for this project since most of it is playing sped up anyways, and jerkiness would just add to the feel that this project is going for. However, what does get in the way is how it’s changing the in and out points of edits to Footage_A when I output it (and which I wonder if that’s caused by the weird timecode). Do you think there’s any way to fix the messed up timecode without having to re=capture it? (and without having to re-edit it?)
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Ah, are you on FCP 5 by chance?
I recall we used to have the SAME problem of FCP rending the “wrong in/outs” when we had footage that had 29.97 timecode on 24fps media (we used to capture with live 3:2 pulldown over our Kona card).
you can try to to “modify timecode” and re-strip the clips with new code, but can’t guarantee if that’ll work. We ended up re-capturing our tapes and doing 3:2 pulldown in software
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owe me a case of beer ?
create a new TL at 29.97 FPS
go to your original TL , select all, copy
go to new TL, Paste
done.
FCP will add 3:2 PD to your 24fps material on the fly, and the 29.97 won’t have frames being dropped which is most likely the source of your play back problems. if you material really is 12 fps… well thats another story all together
Steve Oakley
DP • Editor • VFX Artist
http://www.practicali.com -
Looks like I owe you something. When I paste it in the 29.97 timeline, it adjusts the clips so that they look the way they are being exported – so I still need to go through and fix the clips, but at least now I can fix them because I can see how they are going to come out!
Thanks very much!
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Thank you Aaron for your suggestions! It’s actually fcp 7.0.1, but it sounds like the same problem. But putting everything in a 29.97 timeline seems to solve the problem (or at least make it so I can see the shifted in and out points so that I can correct them). Your posts were very helpful – thanks!
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