Playback issue
 

Help!

So I received my LS300 last week and have been doing some test shooting with it. I'm having an issue with playback on my computer, the video seems to skip frames which is very noticeable during pans. I've tried different frame rates, resolutions and codecs. I've tried QuickTime, WMP, and VLC. I've compressed web videos in Sony Vegas....and still get stutter steps during playback. I tried three different computers at home(2 PC and a MacBook Pro). I even took the card to an editor friend who edits on FCX and saw the same issue.

Could the internal clock/sync be off in the camera?

Scott Berrington

Re: Playback issue
 

Can you maybe shoot a few seconds of testfootage showing the problem and make the clip straight from the card available for download?

Re: Playback issue
 

Interestingly I was just working with footage from an HD camera that had a random recording error so your worry isn't unwarranted. The footage had to be rescued with a free program called MPEGStreamclip as every other program would get stuck on the frame breaks and not even recognize the footage. Even then I could only rescue the footage around the frame breaks as the breaks would halt the conversion from mp4 to ProRes.

First of all, don't play 4K directly off the card if that's what you've been doing. Card readers may not all have the ability to play the footage fast enough for smooth playback. Second, you should be sure that the video cards in the computers you are using have the ability to decode h264 4K fast enough. This is one of the reasons that programs like Final Cut Pro X have a proxy option.

To see if the footage is OK, load the footage in any suitable player and go frame by frame with the keyboard for several seconds worth of footage. If the recording is OK every frame will be there. If the frames skip or there is a frame of digital distortion then, yes, the camera is broken.

Re: Playback issue
 

I tried 4K, HD(50mbs, 35Mbs) and AVCHD(28Mbs). I tried to play off the card(Sandisk U3) on 2 PC's, a brand new MacBook Pro, and a new Mac Pro. We saved the media to the Mac Pro SSD and still had the issue. Even compressing the shots to small web videos wouldn't play smoothly.

I went through a few of the shots frame by frame, all the frames were there with no picture breakup.

I've tried to upload a sample here, but the website won't allow me to do that.

Here is a Vimeo link.

Re: Playback issue
 

You can upload the raw file to a google drive, hotmail one drive or you can use some free cloud services. It's better if we can have a look at a raw file instead of one that has been passed through a NLE or a service like vimeo.

Re: Playback issue
 

Or is the original file on vimeo that can be accessed through the download button straight from the card?
edit: just see it's not as it has a 12mbs bitrate.

Re: Playback issue
 

I just downloaded the lower bitrate file to my pc and had a look at that, it appears to play smooth when you are panning? Not sure if others see this as well?

Re: Playback issue
 

Let's try this.

https://drive.google.com/open?id=0Bz...TRMSGVmcG1lYlE

Re: Playback issue
 

The 50mbs file was smooth while panning, the 35mbs file not, if you want I can do the same today with my ls300 so we can see if it is a "bug" or not.

edit: just looked at the files again and now the 35mbs file was smooth also. Not sure what's going on here.

Re: Playback issue
 

I've put your two files into FCPX.
Playing back in the browser had slight stuttering which went away when FCPX transcoded them into ProRes.

Using a 25p timeline I set the clips to 'Automatic Speed' to retime the 29.97 down to 25fps.
Again both clips played back fine.

Re: Playback issue
 

Scott, Thank you very much for this thread. I absolutely see it in your video. I have the same exact problem and I'm at my wits end. You can see in my signature I have a lot of great gear. I bought my iMac 5K retina computer (fully loaded) thinking I would have no problem editing HD and 4K video. I was wrong, I cannot pan, tilt, or zoom without this horrible judder. After searching the internet and consulting my friends who do not have this problem I have come to the conclusion that it is graphics card related. Our cards not everyone else's.

Re: Playback issue
 

Michael,

I don't think it's a graphics card issue, but I could be wrong. I've tried all the frame rates and codecs on the camera with four different computers. Even editing and compressing shots to YouTube videos will playback with stutter. Tomorrow I'll try some test footage on another system with Adobe Premier.

Fingers crossed.

Re: Playback issue
 

I just looked at your videos again (I use vlc player) and both play fine, I don't get any stutter. I took your native files into edius and rendered a h.264 mp4 file and placed this on my vimeo account, can you have a look to see if it still stutters?

password: test
vimeo.com/160203257
vimeo.com/160203256

Re: Playback issue
 

Hi Noa, just took a look at your Vimeo links and I'm still seeing the stutter at my end...strange. JVC has posted a new firmware(v0204-137) update just yesterday. I'll update the camera and see if that makes a difference.

Thanks for your help.

Scott

Re: Playback issue
 

Yeah it's weird because when I look at the vimeo videos I uploaded they don't stutter. Do you have a link to that firmwareupdate because acc to jvc it was going to be released in April?