Chuck Westfall's thoughts on 24p and 5DII
 

I was at some Canon workshops this weekend, and Chuck Westfall from Canon was there the entire time. He was asked several times if 24/25p was imminent. He wouldn't confirm or deny, but he said that it took nine months for Canon to make the relatively simple firmware change for manual (and we all applauded) and that 24 or 25p would require more than just a firmware update. It sounded that it might even be a chip change. I for one am not hopeful.

We also worked with Vincent Laforet all day Sunday and when asked about 30 to 24p he said he works only with 30p with the 5DII since he has found no solution for conversion to 24p with the quality he wants. I asked him if he had tried Philip Bloom's method and he again told me that there is nothing out there that gives him the quality he's looking for.

Steve,
I am afraid you are correct.
unfortunately,

J

I have a method that works perfectly for converting 30p to 24p: slow the video to 80% of its original speed. :)

Actually, in Vegas I tried just that Jon. I slowed playback rate to 80%. I rendered that to 24p. Then I brought it on the time line, and had it play back 125%, and rendered that to 24p. Check it out on some moving stuff and see whether it might work for you.

I did this recently. Used Cinema Tools to conform the footage to 23.98. It's also called 30-for-24. The slight slow-mo effect is nice.

This is a Windows version of the FCP workflow first described by Denver Riddle & popularised by Philip Bloom's video tutorial. Philip described it as a 'perfect' conversion which it certainly is not. It's OK if there isn't too much movement.

I've looked at frame rate conversion in detail when making a Blu-ray Disc for an international standard. I plan to slow the footage in some projects, and stick with 30p in others (when I need real time).

The only reason I would want (real) 24p is for "the look". I'd rather run 30p at 1/80 for a bit more judder than have motion artifacts. After countless hours of looking at conversions in real time and frame by frame, I can see conversion motion artifacts in my sleep! :)

But if it looks good to you and your intended audience, go for it!

That's when you sleep in 24p, 25p or 30p??? ;-DD

It depends on what country I'm in at the time. ;)

I've been shooting 1/80 and then coveting to 24p right in quicktime and haven't run into a problem yet.

There's not a whole lot of motion in this vid, but I've shot moving cars with this method and it still holds up... maybe a little more jerky than true 24p, but no ghosting.

Jeff the Samurai 9000 on Vimeo

Nice.
What's the workflow of converting to 24P right in Quicktime ?

Thanks,
J

Bryce, the dropped frames are very obvious in your clip. Going frame by frame you can see the skipped frames clearly, and played at normal speed all motion has a stutter effect.

Has everyone seen Philip Bloom's latest video? Cherry Blossom Girl: Canon 5dmkII 25p on Vimeo. He has updated the "Denver Workflow" and it looks pretty much perfect to me. Crisp 25p motion. Phil will be presenting his new workflow to the London FCPUG tomorrow and then sharing here: Philip Bloom Main Blog.

This workflow will work for 24p and 25p.

Did you turn HD off? I'm not doubting that it could have dropped frames, but it skips like mad for me when HD is enabled even with 10mb Ethernet. Even the Cherry Blossom girl skips frames for me with it enabled... sometimes even without it. How do you do frame by frame in Vimeo BTW? I can only get it do second by second at best...

And yea, it does a have a little more studder than true 24p, but allot of people who seen the converted footage don't notice it, or think it's cool. I personally like a touch of extra studder, even with my xh-a1 I would bump the shutter speed to get the "hyper-motion" look. It could get annoying after 30 mins of it though, but I guess it's just personal taste in the end.

Personally I've used the Riddle/Bloom method. Yes, if you look at it frame by frame, you can easily see the glitches. As a whole though even on my 108" HD projector, it isn't that noticeable to me especially if there isn't that much movement. I'm sure most of the people (family and friends) who might see my stuff would hardly notice. And plain ole conformed 24p from the 30p looks real nice as long as there is no live sound. After I had asked Vincent about conversion I wanted to ask if he had TRIED the method, but I think I got all I was going to get from him on that subject. And for the types of projects he's doing these days, he probably has a point.

Bruce, I downloaded the original file using the link on the Vimeo page. Playing that in Quicktime enabled be to view the video frame by frame. High shutter speed can look very cool in certain situation, but I'm not so sure about missing frames...

As to Philip Bloom's video's using the "Denver Workflow," the first that I saw - Sofia's People - had noticeable frame interpolation artifacts. The most recent - Cherry Blossom Girl - had none that I could see. I looked carefully at the baby's arms as it flailed away and it just looked crisp. No signs of skipped or interpolated frames. Someone please correct me if my eyes are deceiving me!