OT: Mastering advice for universal compatibility (NTSC, PAL, SECAM)

[Graeme Nattress]

No, you can just conform 24p to 25p in Cinema Tools. Works great.

Graeme

– http://www.nattress.com – Film Effects for FCP

[Graeme Nattress]

All region 2 players can play NTSC and PAL as Japan and Europe are region 2.

Graeme

– http://www.nattress.com – Film Effects for FCP

[Bj Ahlen]

…and in Europe even the top Japanese brands offer region-free players since years…

I’m intimately familiar with the reasons for doing regions in the first place (I have been on both sides business-wise), but I think this is a concept that is rapidly becoming obsolete.

The idea used to be that it was necessary to have an exclusive territory for each distributor. The distributor would pay a lot of cash upfront, handle translation for dubbing or subtitles, commit to high sales targets, etc.

Today people see prices in other countries, and they think “why should I wait 6-12 months to pay $40 for a localized version of a film on DVD, when I can buy it with an English soundtrack immmediately for $15, with delivery in a few days via air mail?”

[Graeme Nattress]

It’s not just that. The original idea was for regions to only protect first releases to make sure that people got the chance to see the movie in the cinema before the DVD was in the stores. Now the DVD is making more money than the cinema release, and even ancient back-catalogue DVDs have region codes.

However, there are some excellent companies in the UK that remaster, restore and release classic British television (Network Video comes to mind as a great example) and their discs are PAL, but not region coded at all. Now that just makes total sense, does it not?

Graeme

– http://www.nattress.com – Film Effects for FCP

[Emery]

Graeme, perhaps im dense but it seems as though everyone is saying you can basically use NTSC as a universal format. But am I correct in assuming having a PAL version for PAL and SECAM countries is the “safest” way to go?

As I understand things based on the posts, most European dvd players work fine with NTSC, ok great. But then they also need to have a compatible television set correct? Some one above mentioned that almost all televisions built in the past 10 years can display NTSC, is that the final aswer on the subject?

As I mentioned my audience is older and will most likely have some older equipment.

Oh by the way, is it possible to use the hardware downconvert out of the decklink without going to tape? Or can you loop it’s output back into itself? Am i way off base here or is that plausible? Is it better to go straight from the HD source into mpeg2 using a software solution or am I better off using the superior hardware downconvert and then encoding to mpeg2?

[Graeme Nattress]

NTSC will play on any Region 1 (North America) or Region 2 (Europe and Japan) player. I don’t know about the rest of the world. However, the rest of the world will either be PAL or NTSC when it comes to DVD there are no other formats.

You are right that it’s the TV where the incompatibility lies in Europe. Most TVs work fine, but not all.

For safety and courtesy I would make a PAL and an NTSC version.

For conversion, you’re 24p right – if you can cope with a 4% speed up, just conform to 25p in Cinema Tools for PAL, and I’d just use decent software MPEG2 compression.

Graeme

– http://www.nattress.com – Film Effects for FCP

[Chris Borjis]

If you already have the files as captured .avi or .mov movies
I would just convert them with procoder 2.

I converted some PAL footage to NTSC and the whole picture
looked completely perfect, matching the original.
It also took care of the audio too. No timing or out
of synch issues at all.

amazing product.

[Darron]

Hi Emery,

This is just ancedotal information, but over here in Hong Kong (Region 3, PAL broadcast standard), the VAST majority of the DVDs here are in Region 3 and NTSC. All most all of ’em. In doing a quickie survey of my discs, only 1 out of about 15 discs is PAL. So far, all of my Region 1 (and thus NTSC) DVDs have played with no problems.

I spoke to one of my broadcast equipment suppliers today (’cause I need a NTSC only TV!), and she said that almost all PAL TV sets nowadays can play NTSC.

Hope this helps!

Darron

[Nick Brenner]

All the DVD’s in the video stores here are PAL dvd’s. The only NTSC ones here are from C grade films that no one has ever heard from. So make one of each.
cheers

docofilms PAL 25fps