The 1001st PAL-NTSC Question

Adobe Premiere Pro

The 1001st PAL-NTSC Question

Posted by Johannes Schwarz on February 5, 2013 at 9:13 am

Hi,

So many PAL-NTSC Qs out there…. and I still did not find what I was looking for.

I have a 25p PAL Project in Premiere. I want to prepare it for a NTSC-DVD (24p / 23,976p)

Now, NORMALLY:
1) I would just export the timeline as 25p avi.
2) open new NTSC Project in Premiere.
3) interpret 25p as 24p
4) adjust speed of audio (4%)
5) export as 24p NTSC and move over to Encore

BUT, this is a super large project with 72 timelines.
Exporting to AVI would eat up 3TB (would need more HDDs, etc…)

so my QUESTION:
Can I skip step 1 and output 24p (23,976?) NTSC files directly from my 25p PAL timeline via the Premiere Media Encoder…
…then continue with step 2?

Cheers,
Johannes

Johannes Schwarz replied 13 years, 3 months ago 2 Members · 5 Replies
5 Replies

Bill Stephan
February 5, 2013 at 6:47 pm

You can right click on your clip in the bin and “reinterpret footage” as 24P. Do this before you drop anything into the timeline.

When encoding for DVD, you should encode using an encoder that will flag the 3:2 pulldown for correct playback in the DVD player, as there is no 24-frame NTSC in the world of DVD.

Bill Stephan
Senior Editor/DVD Author
USA Studios
New York City
Johannes Schwarz
February 5, 2013 at 8:57 pm

Hi Bill,

thanks for your reply. So effectivly I will have to output a lossless avi from my pal timeline first – as I suggested in my post to be the “normal way”. No way around that. For it is not possible to take my project and re-interpret all the files from 25 to 23,976 because this would mess up the timing (and beginning and end of cuts) completely.

Looks like I need more hard drives then…
Bill Stephan
February 6, 2013 at 5:18 pm

Johannes,

If you have ProRes or DNxHD codecs available on your system, you can use that instead of the lossless AVI. You can download the DNxHD codecs from Avid’s website. These codecs will compress the data with only a very minimal difference in picture quality.

If you don’t want to reinterpret your 25P footage as 24P, then you need to standards convert your finished 25P program before encoding the media for the disc.

Bill Stephan
Senior Editor/DVD Author
USA Studios
New York City
Johannes Schwarz
February 6, 2013 at 10:48 pm

Bill,

thanks for your response and the tip about DNxHD (I’m on a Win-Box).
Will give it a try.

I will re-interpret those resulting files as 24p. I just meant to say that I can’t reinterpret the source files without messing up the timeline.

Thanks,
Johannes
Johannes Schwarz
February 7, 2013 at 12:49 pm

Hi again,
If someone with experience in this PAL – NTSC thing could glance over my settings and give me feedback, that would be great. On the PC the result plays fine, but I have no NTSC DVD-Player to test it.

So I’m exporting from my PAL project: pal-export.jpg

– I’m using the Avid DV codec. AVI uncompressed is an option (though lossless comes at 5 times bigger)
– I stick to 25p – because I will reinterpret the footage later in the NTSC Premiere project to 23,976
– I change the aspect ratio here, because I assume it will then fit perfectly on a NTSC timeline

The resulting files I import into premiere, interpret as 23,976 and place onto a DV 24p time line. Place language track

Then I output with these settings: ntsc-encode.jpg

These files go into Encore.

Does this seem a legit workflow or am I missing something (like a 3:2 pulldown or something)

Thanks,
Johannes

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