GY-HD110E, Motion and Dropped Frames during capture to NLE
 

A couple of Motion Smooth questions...

1. Does anyone know if using Motion Smooth with the GY-HD110E causes dropped frames while capturing to Avid Liquid 7.2 or any other NLE?

I've been getting dropped frames and noticed Tim Johnson's analysis about how Motion Smooth works.

2. I film a lot of nature settings, so there's plenty of activity from leaves, water, snow, rain, etc. Just wondering if setting the shutter speed to 1/25 is better than 1/50, and Motion Smooth off?

Thanks in advance,

Seamus.

I know Final Cut Pro has problems with 720p HDV in the past withd dropped frames durring capture, so maybe Avid does as well? I capture with a FE DTE drive so I don't worry about it anymore.

I think most people give up on motion smoothing and turn it off just because how it looks alone. I would shoot 1/50th (PAL land right? Shooting 25p?) and ND2 with a screw on ND filter and you should be fine.

Thanks Alex,

Yes, I'm PAL. I'll do some A/B tests with Motion Smooth on and off, as you suggest with a screw-on ND.

I 'feel' that the droppout problem is neither the computer nor the camcorder, but some strange handshaking going on during capture. Anyway, I'm definitely going for the FE DTE. The main problem I was having with the droppouts is that Avid Liquid hides them! (edits them out). That's a major problem to fix. Retiming, etc.

Motion Smoothing records an image that slightly retains the previous frame as a way to reduce judder artifacts. It does this prior to recording the signal so it has no effect on later capture issues. Motion Smoothing works, sort of, but introduces a new set of image artifacts. I have it turned off.

I shoot 30p but frequently have the shutter set at 1/30th for a pleasing effect when I am shooting music concerts and dramatic productions. 1/25 may be a bit much and will cause loss of detail in motion. Try it out.

You capture issues might be solved by capturing the raw m2t files off the HDV tape to your computer thru another program (sorry, I'm not PC savvy in this area) and convert it to the files AVID wants. There are excellent low cost ways to do this in the Mac (DVHSCap and ClipWrap), so I'm sure there are PC based shareware programs that can do just the same.

Thanks, William.

I'll just keep experimenting till it gets right. I've lots of footage on tape to capture.

1/25 shutter sounds interesting - might try that!