Progressive greyed out in DVDA properties, says "NO"

[Jeff Harper]

I have HDLink, but I do not know if it will interlace footage or not, I have to check into that. I have been converting to 720 60p intermediates, and it's worked well.

[David Jimerson]

Its the only way SD DVD's work-interlaced.

That just isn't so. 24p DVDs have been the cinematic standard for more than a decade.

[David Jimerson]

Originally Posted by Jeff Harper

So David you're saying I would want to interlace 60p for DVD? That would be an improvement over 29.97 progressive?

Whether it's an improvement is up to you. But I'm sure you notice a difference in the motion if you convert 60p to 30p. If you want the same motion as the 60p, then you'll have to make it 60i (standard NTSC).

[Jeff Harper]

There seems to be a disagreement here, but I do render to 29.97p (same as 30p?) already, so maybe I'm fine as is. With dozens of wedding to edit I don't need/want to take unnecessary steps if they can be avoided.

[David Jimerson]

Well, there's no 30p on a DVD -- it would be 60i, but would still appear to be 30p (because each 30p frame would be split into two 60i fields, so objects will remain in the same place over two fields, instead of moving in each new field, as they do in 60i). There's no real reason to do it unless you want 30p motion.

[Ron Evans]

Originally Posted by David Jimerson

That just isn't so. 24p DVDs have been the cinematic standard for more than a decade.

I stand corrected on my nomenclature. The point I was trying to make was that for most displays the result is a 2:3 pulldown cadence as the display has to refresh at a multiple of 24 to be a native reproduction of 24p without cadence. The combination of player and display can work at getting close but only a refresh rate of a multiple can really accomplish the task completely. The default is an interlaced 2:3 pulldown output from the player. Which was the point I was trying to make.

Ron Evans

[Jeff Harper]

Thanks, both of you. I'll leave things as they are then!

[David Jimerson]

Originally Posted by Ron Evans

The default is an interlaced 2:3 pulldown output from the player.

It is if it's an interlaced-only player or a progressive player set to display as interlaced. But that doesn't mean the disc doesn't hold progressive video, or that it can't be played that way. Output of the player is a different issue from authoring the disc.

[Ron Evans]

David, I have accepted the point that the disc can be 24P progressive. My real point is that to watch 24p in true progressive mode requires a very specific display chain. If that is not the case then the chain will default to a pulldown playback . How this is done is dependent on the chain. Just because the display is progressive and the disc is progressive and the player progressive does not mean that 24p will play as 24p . The display needs to refresh at a multiple of 24 otherwise pulldown will be necessary to match frame rate to refresh rate. That is all I was try to point out. Since most displays do not refresh at a multiple of 24 a cadence will be applied for playback somewhere /somehow. Either the player or TV. Depending on how the player is connected, this cadence will be applied in different places. But in most cases the viewer will see the cadence not 24P unless the display has the refresh rate needed. Most CRT and flat panel TV's in North America have a refresh rate of 60hz so pulldown is necessary. Newer 120hz TV's etc have the capability to correctly refresh 24p( 120 =5x24) but I do not think they all do this but I believe most do over HDMI.

Will the disc play? Of course it will play. My point is it really displaying 24p or a cadence to take account of the display refresh rate. If one is really watching 24p with pulldown cadence does it really matter if the source is a progressive disc or 24P embedded with pulldown in an interlaced stream on an interlaced disc. In both cases it will likely depend on the specific quality of the player and TV de interlacing/ cadence application and the connection cabling type ( component or HDMI).

Ron Evans

[Adam Stanislav]

Originally Posted by Ron Evans

If one is really watching 24p with pulldown cadence does it really matter if the source is a progressive disc or 24P embedded with pulldown in an interlaced stream on an interlaced disc.

Of course it matters. Just because your TV may be changing it to 60 fields per second, or whatever, does not mean everyone else’s TV does something like that. And just because you do not have a 24p-capable TV set now does not mean you will not have one in the future.

[Ron Evans]

Originally Posted by Adam Stanislav

Of course it matters. Just because your TV may be changing it to 60 fields per second, or whatever, does not mean everyone else’s TV does something like that. And just because you do not have a 24p-capable TV set now does not mean you will not have one in the future.

Not quite. If the TV is capable of displaying 24p correctly it will do so whether the source is progressive or from 24p embedded in a 60i stream with pulldown. The point I am making is the display chain is the important thing here. If the TV can do it then it will whatever the source encoding of 24P, if it cannot it will be a pulldown cadence. Most North American TV's cannot at the moment and I suspect that most flat panels sold at the moment cannot either since they are mainly 60hz refresh.

For the record one of my displays can correctly play 24P the others cannot. To me there is a noticeable difference.

Ron Evans

[Adam Stanislav]

But that has nothing to do with your choice for the format on the disc. If your source is 24p, you should put 24p on the Blu-ray disc. Why would you want to waste bits by converting it to a format with more frames per second? Considering you compress them to a certain number of bits, you get more quality if you keep the 24p because you lose less information in the compression.

Not to even mention that 24p can play in both the PAL world and the NTSC world.

[Jeff Harper]

What Ron seems to be saying, correct me if I'm wrong, Ron, is that 24p plays (we all know that at this point, this is not news) , but most TVs ruin it because they cannot display it properly.


Ron if what you say is true, it makes perfect sense to not put out 24p DVDs since they will not be displayed properly anyway, unless you know what tv is being used to view the DVD. This does not sound complicated to me. Is this what you are saying?

[Ron Evans]

Originally Posted by Adam Stanislav

But that has nothing to do with your choice for the format on the disc. If your source is 24p, you should put 24p on the Blu-ray disc. Why would you want to waste bits by converting it to a format with more frames per second? Considering you compress them to a certain number of bits, you get more quality if you keep the 24p because you lose less information in the compression.

Not to even mention that 24p can play in both the PAL world and the NTSC world.

Where did I suggest encoding 24P in a 60i stream ? All my comments are directed at the fact most of NTSC TV's cannot display 24P correctly. Nothing more. The best way of seeing 24p is encoded to Bluray and played back over HDMI to a high refresh rate display. I think the discussion actually started about SD DVD's

Ron Evans

[Ron Evans]

Yes Jeff. For maximum compatibility interlace is likely to give less issues with clients and you know what all of them are going to see whatever their playback system. If you are shooting exclusively for the WEB then you may chose to shoot 30P. If you are going to shoot for hard disc playback and really like smooth motion then you may shoot 60P. Not currently supported on recordable discs.

My views are colored by seeing lots of badly shot 24p ( camera used like a video camera not a film camera) played back with cadence so that the juddering is awful.

Ron Evans