24fps footage is played at 30fps
 

Hi, I'm having trouble exporting from PPro1.5 and maybe someone here can help. I shot 24p from DVX100a, imported at 24fps and I burned a DVD just to test which also came out 24fps. At this point, I have hired an audio engineer to clean up the audio. He needs an OMF file and either an AVI or MOV so he can see the video while working on the audio. Anyway, when I have tried to export and AVI or QT file, I noticed that the final product is 4 sec longer than the project on the timeline and when I looked closer, I noticed that my computer plays my 24fps footage at 30fps!!! I have tried different AVI codecs as well as QT, but nothing seems to change this. When you click on the settings in QT, it even shows that the file is 24fps, but it is being played back at 30fps!!! My audio guy says not to worry, video only plays at 30fps and it will revert back to 24fps once imported into Pro Tools, but I just want to make sure this is the answer, since I don't want him working on audio that won't be in synch. Is this the case??

Thanks in advance for everyone's help.

Not sure what the problem is . . .

But your audio guy is wrong -- a computer should play a 24p video file at 24 fps, not 30 fps.

When you rendered, did you include any kind of pulldown? Or did you render with a straight framerate of 24 fps (or 23.98)?

I rendered with a straight frame rate and I deinterlaced. How do I include a pulldown when I render in PPro 1.5??

I'm not saying you should include pulldown; just asking if you did -- trying to determine why it might play at 29.97.

If you are working on a 24p timeline, there's no need to deinterlace when you render -- and you shouldn't, because the results will not be ideal. (And Premiere's deinterlacer needs some work, anyway.)

If you render a straight 24p file (AVI or QT), your computer should play it at 24 fps. Where are you seeing that it's playing at 30?

"Where are you seeing that it's playing at 30?"

David, it's very weird. When I open the QT file and it plays and I click on properties, I see that it says that the file is 24pfs and it says that it is playing at 24fps. However, when I scrub the video in my QT player, I see that there are 30frames there. Further, my film is 75 min, but when I play in QT, it is 4 seconds longer than in my PPro timeline. I'm assuming these extra frames are responsible for the extra seconds. When I import the file into AE, it says that the file is 24fps, yet the file is still longer than my original PPro timeline. I normally wouldn't care, but I don't want any synch problems when my audio engineer starts working on it.

I hope this makes sense.

6 extra frames every second would give you a LOT more than just 4 extra seconds at the end of a 75-minute sequence. That's an extra 25% -- it would be about 19 minutes extra.

Are the four extra seconds at the end? As long as the sound begins on the same frame as the video, extra at the end won't matter to your sound engineer.

If it were 24p playing at 30 fps, it would be sped up by 25% and you'd definitely see it.

But I'm curious as to what you're basing your 30 fps scrub on -- are you counting off frames manually and watching for the second to flip?

What kind of QT did you render?

When I scrub, yes I count 30 frames manually, then the second flips. I notice it is copying a frame every fifth frame in order to keep at 30fps. So the frames go ABCDD ABCDD ABCDD, etc. Does that makes sense? Just experimenting, when I import into a PPro 30fps timeline, it is 4 sec long than the 24fps timeline and is the exact time as the QT file. There is no lag noticeable at all going second by second, but over a 75 minute project, a 4 sec lag has developed by the end. I just can't get to the bottom of it. I am using the Sorensen 3 codec, but also I have used numerous AVI codecs too, all with the same results.

Premiere has an option for a funky ABBCD "pulldown" scheme, which may be what you're seeing. Make SURE you're not employing that, and are rendering 23.976 only.

When I export, where are the pulldown options. I don't even see where they can be adjusted. Can you guide me through this?

The more I am reading about it, the more it seems that the issue here is that I shot in 24p, rather than 24pa, which is why it is reading it as 30fps and creating this crazy ABBCD pattern. I am disappointed, I should have shot in 24pa. Anyway, my main concern is that the QT and OMF I export will synch up in my audio engineer's system. Will they both be running in the ABBCD pattern???

If you were able to export a 24p MPEG and make a 24p DVD, you should be able to export a 24p AVI or MOV without pulldown, whether you shot in 24p or 24pA.

I just exported a 24p MOV (H.264) using 24p (not 24pA) footage and when I stepped through the frames, it was 24 fps.

This, however, was in PP 2.0, not 1.5. It's possible that 1.5 doesn't play nice with standard pulldown, but like I said, if you could export to a 24p DVD . . .

The pulldown pattern does not affect audio. You're not changing the speed of the video; 1 second is still 1 second.