30p to 25p

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matty1980 Author

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30p to 25p

Hello folks,

I will be doing a film this year about an artist, whereby I am filming him for a few days painting/interviews etc with my camera at 1080 25p. I'm also looking to buy him a cheap pocket camcorder for him to shoot some stuff for the film, a sort of video diary.

The one I was thinking about getting was a Kodak Zi8, however a lot of these cams seem built more for the US in that many of them do not shoot at 25p. I've looked at quite a few of the forums today and starting to get a sore head about the number of varying views I'm getting about converting footage from 30p to 25p.

What I was going to do was simply edit his diary footage in a 30p timeline and then export his final film at 25p and drop it in with the rest of the footage. Either that or use cinema tools to convert the raw footage into 25p.

I was just wondering if any of you guys have done this for projects and would appreciate some feedback of the issues you had...

Many thanks.

MacPro, Mac OS X (10.6.6), 3.33 Ghz 6-Core Intel Xeon

Posted on Feb 9, 2011 12:35 PM

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Answer 1

Feb 9, 2011 1:02 PM in response to matty1980

If you're not using any of the footage with sync sound and you can tolerate the slo-mo (speed reduction from 30 to 25 fps) then conforming in Cinema Tools is absolutely the best way to handle this.

If you need sync sound (and don't want to spend a LOT of money) you will have to do a frame rate change using Compressor.

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Answer 2

matty1980 Author

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Feb 9, 2011 1:14 PM in response to David Kuhnen

Thanks for the reply David. I guess it depends really on what he films but the idea initially was a video diary where he is filming and talking about what/why he is shooting different things so getting the sync would be quite handy.

I'll go ahead and buy the cam and do a few tests, and as you say convert through compressor and see what it's like. Have you done this conversion before through compressor bud? If so what were the results like?

I can always conform through Cinema tools and get him to re-record the audio after so that's an option too I guess...

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Answer 3

Feb 9, 2011 1:23 PM in response to matty1980

I have converted from 29.97 to 25 fps to create a PAL file. The results were mediocre but the price was right. In Compressor, turn Frame Controls ON and select Rate Conversion: Best and Set Duration to: 100% of Source. Then sit back and watch the slow progress bar.

You may want to just drop the 30fps clips in to your 25fps sequence to get a rough edit instead of converting ALL the footage before edit.

If possible, I really like your idea of conforming and re-recording audio wherever possible.

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Answer 4

matty1980 Author

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Feb 9, 2011 1:26 PM in response to David Kuhnen

The results were mediocre? How so? If the footage doesn't look very good I will have to rethink getting this pocket camcorder and trying to find something similar that will shoot 25p. Annoying how all these mini-cams seem to record 30p!

Thanks for all your advice David, if I go ahead and get this cam then I will do as you suggest mate.

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Answer 5

Feb 9, 2011 1:36 PM in response to matty1980

"Mediocre", well, even with the 'Best' rate Conversion setting I could see a kind of frame blending as it tried to drop frames. Granted, this was Standard Def, you may have better luck at HD resolutions.

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Answer 6

matty1980 Author

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Feb 9, 2011 3:13 PM in response to David Kuhnen

Gotcha. Thanks for all your help David, very much appreciate the helpful info mate.

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