[Aaron Bear]

[Nate Weber] “Your issue is more in software, Premiere 2.0 is just too old at this point. MPEG-4 isn’t a good codec in my opinion for editing either, not sure if it’s something Premiere recommended.

I recommend updating your software, the hardware sounds more than adequate, your software may not be able to utilize your hardware properly. Also what are you playing the footage off of and what is the bitrate of the files? Does it playback fine in any player app?”

Thank you for the quick reply. I’ll look into updating, that could help a lot.
The footage and project files are on an external USB HD. The footage plays fine in quicktime or vlc, both the 60i and 30p versions.
When I converted and deinterlaced the footage, I had tried different bitrates, ranging from 8,000-12,000 kbps.

What would be the preferred, or most general format for editing? I’ve had luck with jpeg/png image sequences for short vfx shots, but nothing more than a couple shots.

-Aaron-
“Wherever you go, there you are”

[Aaron Bear]

Thanks for the replies, helpful information that I’ll keep in my trouble-shooting notes.

I ended up figuring out the problem myself. Turns out I was doing the process correctly but somehow the image sequence of my raw video was exported as 15 fps. Once I changed the frame rate to 60 fps and re-exported the image sequence, everything worked like a charm.

Guess its one of those doh! moments 🙂

Thanks for the help and the tips.

-Aaron-
“Wherever you go, there you are”

[Aaron Bear]

Ok, I think Ive finally got this figured out and understand it.
I took my 60i image sequence, brought it into AE, interpreted the footage as 60fps with lower field first. I made the composition 29.97fps and exported the clip at 29.97fps and no interlacing. If I understand and did this correctly, it is now converted to 30p, which is better for my end of working on it since its deinterlaced.
Now then, wheres the aspirin? 😛

-Aaron-
“Wherever you go, there you are”

[Aaron Bear]

Thank you for the links, the more info the less confusing this gets.

I guess what I’m after is to take my 60i footage and convert it to 30p at its best quality for tracking and 3D elements. I would use the 60i original footage as an image sequence, but I do not know how to interpret it and it would take twice as long to render 60 fps of 3D elements rather than 24/30 fps.

I finally upgraded from my 640×480 mini-DV camcorder so I’m just trying to get all I can out of it 🙂

-Aaron-
“Wherever you go, there you are”

[Aaron Bear]

Would it make sense to take the 60i footage, convert it to an image sequence (as 60 fps), and interpret that footage as 29.97 fps with upper field first?

Im trying to understand the conversion on this. I plan to matchmove and when its converted wrong, the tracking jumps all over the place.

-Aaron-
“Wherever you go, there you are”

[Aaron Bear]

Thanks for the reply and advice, this is kind of a grey area for me.

Is my thinking correct that filming 60i will utilize the most of my camcorder and give me the best results that I can then de-interlace to 29.97? Or is it just easier to film 24/29 fps? I have two other frame rate options on my Canon; PF30 and PF24.

File size aside, I want to get the clearest smoothest video I can from my camcorder for editing later.

-Aaron-
“Wherever you go, there you are”

[Aaron Bear]

Thanks for the reply and advice, this is kind of a grey area for me.

Is my thinking correct that filming 60i will utilize the most of my camcorder and give me the best results that I can then de-interlace to 29.97? Or is it just easier to film 24/29 fps? I have two other frame rate options on my Canon; PF30 and PF24.

File size aside, I want to get the clearest smoothest video I can from my camcorder for editing later.

-Aaron-
“Wherever you go, there you are”

[Aaron Bear]

“Did you try to use HDV footage shot at 24p without removing the 3:2 pulldown first? And exactly WHAT application is telling you the frame rate is 48 fps, and under what conditions is it telling you this?”

Thanks for the response. Its been a long time since I’ve done video so ill try to run through my workflow thus far. When I filmed, I selected 60i, then I converted the raw .3gp to a png image sequence for AE. In AE I imported the footage and interpted it as 60fps and have been experimenting with upper/lower first, and playing around with the different pulldown options (Guess 3:2 and 24P in CS3 doesn’t seem to work). Once I hit ok, in the comp settings it shows 48fps and when I render out a test quicktime png .mov it also shows 48fps under the movie info.
So..am I confused on the process or am I missing something completely?
I guess I’m not too sure what 60i converts to. 24P? Would that require adding or removing pulldown?

-Aaron-
“Wherever you go, there you are”

[Aaron Bear]

Thanks, very helpful information, Mike. Im using After Effects CS3 so thats probably why the .mts files wouldnt import. Total Video Converter worked pretty well to convert the file to a quicktime png image sequence.
The 3D tracking program doesnt have the pulldown options like After Effects has, only the field order, non-interlaced or only one particular field. Do you think it would be best to export the image sequence from After Effects as a progress format and set the field order to non-interaced for tracking? If I do that would that change the fps or sequence length?
I never fully understood interlacing fields and how converting worked.

Thanks again!

-Aaron-
“Wherever you go, there you are”

[Aaron Bear]

I did find a work around. I exported the clip as a png image sequence and it imported just fine into AE. It might be a bit of a pain and an extra set, but at least it works.
Thanks again.

-Aaron-
“Wherever you go, there you are”