Shooting in different frame rates
 

Hey folks.

I'm starting to shoot some video with my 7D and have a question for somebody wiser than me. For weddings, the plan is to shoot everything 24p. But we're hoping to do some sports stuff as well. Obviously 24p is terrible for action sports so I'm planning to shoot the game footage at 60 frames a second. However, I like the filmy 24p look for studio interviews to cut in with the action footage. Does this workflow make sense or should I just shoot everything at 60? Obviously I can't edit footage with different frame rates but will converting my 60p footage to 24p in editing negate all the benefits of having those extra frames for fast moving action shots? Thanks for any input.

J.

I wouldn't recommend 24p for weddings, especially if you're doing any handheld camera work. You won't be able to pan or tilt any shots unless they're *really* slow or you'll get major stutters. You also won't be able to use slow motion in post, but if you don't care about that, I would use 30p instead. The footage will look a lot smoother.

Thanks for the input Jeff. Getting slightly sidetracked here, does anyone else have an opinion on which frame rate to use for a wedding? I've seen some beautiful wedding videos shot at 24p and thought it was pretty standard for that type of venue.

Hey Jarrod, 24p is pretty standard for that "film look", or at least part of the mix in creating it. Shooting 30p will add more of a "video" look to the weddings. Unless you are broadcasting, I don't see a reason why not to shoot 24p. Almost all DVD players play 23.976 and 29.97 material.

If you shoot sports, you can do 30p and just bump up the shutter speed. If you are at 30p, then you shutter should be faster than the 180° rule (30p and 1/60). Set it faster than 1/100 and you can get all of the action. Keep in mind that you don't want your aperture full open cause you will be battling shallow dof. You will have to crank up the ISO the higher f-stop and faster shutter speed.

I would not shoot a wedding in anything BUT 24p. it depends, do you want your wedding video to look like film or video? If you like that video look then by all means shoot it in 30 or 60p.

We shoot all our weddings in 24p and have absolutely no problem with pans, tilts, stedicam, etc... Although we do keep such moves to a minimum because they don't look very filmic. On Stedicam I would suggest a higher shutter speed, but other than that 24p looks great at the standard shutter speed of 50.