Jonathan Ziegler
Forum Replies Created
-
Sweet! I hope it works for you. I used to always think it was the dropped frames in NTSC, but since I’ve heard this happening with PAL as well as NTSC, it must just be a very slight difference in timing from the video and audio – losing .1% every 10 min? A scant few seconds? Since neither device will do a time code, you can’t really sync separate files and must fix it in post.
Jonathan Ziegler
https://www.electrictiger.com/
520-360-8293 -
Timing audio with DSLR footage is a pain sometimes. There are apps – most notably PluralEyes – that can handle retiming this for you and it’s really easy to use. I don’t own it, but I have had a chance to use it in a real-world situation. https://www.singularsoftware.com/pluraleyes.html
I generally do my sync manually with short clips and short audio and I don’t usually have issues – make sure to keep really good notes during production to shorten the process of locating clips and audio. With longer clips, you need a visual in and out as well as an audio in/out. Set markers in FCP for the visual and audio in/out points, get the timing between each one, then adjust audio scale to match video. I haven’t done this in PAL or 25fps, but it works for me with 24P and 30P footage. It’s a bit of a pain if you have a lot of clips, but it should still work.
My in/out points are usually when the clapper starts the scene and when I yell “cut” – for visual cues, it’s the clapper and usually a bit of dialogue or mouth sound just before or after cut because the drift will usually be apparent at the end of the clip. I should start doing an end clap on camera…hmmm.
In the future, record at 96kHz and 24-bit to ensure the highest quality. That’s what I do with the H4, but I haven’t upgraded to the H4n yet so the settings may be a little different.
Jonathan Ziegler
https://www.electrictiger.com/
520-360-8293 -
Hi there, scale the image down in Photoshop first.
First, make sure photoshop is set correctly: in Photoshop Preferences (General), you should have Image interpolation: Bicubic Sharper selected. This ensures it will use the correct mode for reducing image size. Also, deselect “Resize Image During Paste/Place.”
Create a new file in photoshop: File >> New >> Preset: Film & Video >> Size: NTSC DV – I’d stick with a transparent background or a color you need, but it’s up to you. Open your other image if it’s not already open. If the file is many layers, you need to merge it all first, then copy and paste the result into the blank NTSC DV file. It should be WAY too big. Now, scale it back (hit Cmd-T or Ctrl-T) and it should work – you may not see your handles when the resizable image is .
Motion usually does a good job of resizing, but it sounds like you are having trouble. Look at the design – if there are lots thin lines (2px or less), those don’t always reduce very well and you should scale it in photoshop instead. You can also load the image in Photoshop and choose Option-Command-I, then pick a size that works – change to a 480 height. The advantage to pasting into a NTSC DV frame, is that it will take into account non-square pixels. Now, if you are going to do a widescreen NTSC, you may want to work in 16×9 or HD mode instead and then export as Widescreen NTSC or export as square-pixel HD and then convert to NTSC Widescreen in compressor. You have lots of options.
Jonathan Ziegler
https://www.electrictiger.com/
520-360-8293 -
Hi there, the text files are just metadata. You can read these files with an EXIF viewer. They are not needed to transcode.
-Jonathan
Jonathan Ziegler
https://www.electrictiger.com/
520-360-8293 -
Okay, this is getting into serious DIY territory. First off, opening the case will void your warranty if one exists – so you know before you open it. The fans in the Lacie drives are small ones, but you’ll need the specs to drop in a replacement. There are a couple ways to do this:
1) hunt all over the internet and hope someone has posted the specs.
2) open the case and hope the specs are written on the fan itself (they generally are). This way, you can find the manufacturer, sometimes a model #, the exact specs, etc. and then just search google or something to find it.
3) call LaCie (or email). They made the case (or, at least specced it out) and should know the specs for the fan. On the back of your HD, you should see a serial # and a long string of text which describes the device (ie: “500GB LaCie d2 HD QUADRA 7200RPM 16MB U” – that’s mine, though the last part is the drive which I’ve replaced with a bigger one). If you give them this info, they might be able to help.To replace the fan, you will need the size in mm or inches, the voltage, and the amperage. The new fan should just drop in exactly where the old one was. Often, if you have a manufacturer and model #, you can find the exact specs on their site or simply order a new one based on that info.
Other things to check:
the drive – if you have the case open and have a different case to put the drive in (or can drop it in your machine as a regular SATA drive), try the drive elsewhere. If the noise follows, the drive is likely getting ready to die.
the case – make sure the drive is seated and securely attached. Drives vibrate and cause screws to loosen which causes rattling while the drive spins up.
I’m not recommending this as it can be a shock hazard, but most drive cases will still run when disassembled and the aluminum case is off. If you turn it on while it’s open, you can tell really fast what’s making noise. Since there are usually only 2 moving parts (a drive and a fan), you will know quickly. I’ve been zapped many times – you can fry the whole system doing this, too, so it’s at your own risk and if you’re not comfy with this, don’t do it.
Also, while you are in there, clean out some of the dust and debris – fans have tiny little motors which get bunged up with dust pretty quick (I have cats so I get some interesting dust balls if I don’t clean). Compressed air works, but so does a small, handheld vacuum (I have an attachment I use on a plain old vacuum which gives me more power and cleans up quick). I shouldn’t have to tell you this, but please unplug everything before you go messing about in there and ground yourself to the case after you unplug so you don’t zap the board.
Jonathan Ziegler
https://www.electrictiger.com/
520-360-8293 -
Hey there, white balance on the T2i and 7D (I don’t have the 5D) is better if you use a grey card. To warm up colors, I throw a blue filter on my light or lights, then WB to a grey card – you can also put a thin blue filter in front of the camera lens and then do your wb. To cool down, use amber filters. if you don’t already have a grey card, I strongly recommend getting one – they’re pretty cheap (I use this one cuz it’s large and portable and is white one side and grey the other – https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0009QZDL6/ref=oss_product ). Also, you only need something white or grey in the very center of the frame. I’ve used concrete, paper, white cards, grey cards, etc.
My worst was doing WB for sodium vapor lights. We only had that as it was a remote location and our light guy failed to show. Still got the shot, but sodium vapor lights put out a very narrow color spectrum so even white balance can’t put all the colors back.
Jonathan Ziegler
https://www.electrictiger.com/
520-360-8293 -
I would use compressor. Here’s a link I’ve used in the past:
https://www.kenstone.net/fcp_homepage/vimeo_hd_compressor_douglas.html
and a Vimeo video which is appropriate, “HD Video Encoding for Vimeo using Compressor:”
Jonathan Ziegler
https://www.electrictiger.com/
520-360-8293 -
It sounds close, but I always thought DV NTSC Wide was 720×480 x 1.21 pixel ratio (1.2?).
Not sure if it will work, but can you convert to a square-pixel 16×9, then convert to DV NTSC Wide? I’ve never shot PAL before – dunno if there will be a significant generation loss. Was thinking since PAL has more vertical resolution, you may want to preserve as much of that as possible before converting to NTSC Wide.
I’m curious if this is even valid. Anyone else?
Jonathan Ziegler
https://www.electrictiger.com/
520-360-8293 -
Hey there, I get this once in a while when I open the footage first in Quicktime and hit Command-0 to reduce to half size. Because I sometimes make minor editing trims in QT, I’ll save, forgetting to bring it up to full size. When I load the clip into Motion or FCP, it comes in at 960×540. The fix is to open in QT and hit Cmd-1 to bring to actual size, cmd-s to save, then drop the clip into the timeline again in FCP and voila, 1920×1080. Dunno if this is what is happening with you.
What are the clip’s settings and what are the timeline settings? Try also creating a new sequence, drop in the clip and you should get a warning about clip settings. Hit yes to change settings and then see how the clip plays. Also, will it open in QT? You can also view clip settings there.
Jonathan Ziegler
https://www.electrictiger.com/
520-360-8293 -
1) if it’s your ONLY video camera and you expect to shoot a broad range of things, a DSLR won’t cut it. I have the T2i and I love it, but I use it for very specific things (stock video shooting, lowlight, indie film, etc.). It sucks for anything where you have a really long shot (even though most of my shots never hit the 3 min mark – who wants to watch something running continuously for 12 min? Boring!). You can’t do zooms with the default lens while shooting video which isn’t completely worthless and the ones you can zoom with are not cheap – the aperture will close down in 1/3 stop increments as you zoom in.
2) The Canon HD-DSLRs shoot to quicktime movies using h.264. AVCHD is actually more compressed than what’s coming out of these DSLRs – AVCHD is basically MPEG-4 with H.264 compression. I like MP4 a lot better than MPEG-2, but it’s still heavily compressed. Also, I get around 50mb/s with my DSLR and AVCHD is around 25mb/s. Still kind of an apples to other apples thing. Basically, AVCHD is the consumer electronic format to replace miniDV, hard drive camcorders, etc. Panasonic has included it on the AG-HMC150 (the successor to the DVX100) whereas Canon has put it on mostly consumer cameras (like the Vixias) and now they are putting it on their new prosumer camcorders. I like AVCHD better than HDV because it’s a native 1920×1080 whereas HDV has to stretch and HDV is still using MPEG-2 and tape, BUT AVCHD is still a CONSUMER format. Oh and I would still Transcode to a better format from AVCHD – I wouldn’t edit AVCHD native. Convert to ProRes or AVI or Cineform or whatever first. AVCHD doesn’t edit well natively.
3) SDHC cards – get class 10s – since I switched from class 6 to class 10 for any manufacturer, I’ve never had an issue. Not all class 4s or 6s are created equal. Like anything else, you can spend a lot of money or a little. I don’t have oodles of cash so I’m using ADATA and PQI class 10s. They work fine. On a 16GB card, I get just shy of an hour. For an 8GB, just under 30 min.
4) Lenses – none of the above. Pick up prime lenses if you are going the DSLR route. They are generally faster and less expensive. No, you don’t get a zoom, but how much zooming are you planning? Check this site: https://nofilmschool.com/dslr/ – all you wanna know about DSLRs and then some.
5) Obviously, this is your call. You will need to weigh the pros and cons and decide for yourself. If you are going to be making indie films, I can heartily recommend the T2i – I’ve shot 2 features and a couple shorts now on both the 7D and the T2i. I’ve shot greenscreen, slo-motion, stop-motion, etc. I love the camera. The T2i very much reminds me of shooting 16mm – setting shutter, aperture, measuring the distance, even doing push/pull focus. The narrow DOF is gorgeous – especially at longer focal lengths. There is a little focus helper that works great on the T2i, too.
If you want to do anything where you are shooting for long periods at a time or when you need your camera to be instantly ready to go at the drop of a hat with no fiddling with settings or lens changes, stick with a pro camera. Better for handheld, too – easier to use, much more convenient.
Most of my stuff involves planning the shots and a stationary or otherwise mounted camera. I don’t like doing handheld with the T2i – the rolling shutter issues and the jelly frame make handheld look sloppy and psychedelic. I love this camera for tons of other things, though.
Jonathan Ziegler
https://www.electrictiger.com/
520-360-8293