7D footage appears choppy - correct workflow?
 

I am combining footage taken on my 7D (1080p 25fps pal) with my video cam (1080i 50i)
I am converting through MPEG streamclip to Apple ProResLT, same frame rate - but the footage I am getting out looks quite 'choppy' on my final cut timeline. Is this normal? The original file played on quicktime

I am choosing 'interlaced scaling' but have option of 'Deinterlaced Video' 'Frame Blending' or 'Better Downscaling' also, would altering the filed dominance make a difference to the convertion?

I have set the timeline on Final Cut Pro to mainly accommodate the video cam footage as I'm only using a few clips from the 7D.

Also, while I'm on - have noticed that Streamclip alters the colours quite a bit, making the picture more saturated/reddish - has anyone else noticed this?

Any advice would be appreciated.

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If you are mixing progressive and interlaced video. Convert the progressive to PSF (progressive segmented file) then edit in an interlaced timeline.

I do this all the time in M100 and it works great, both in SD and HD and even mixing HD and SD. I am sure it can be done in FCP as well.

thanks for the reply Olof - but how do I do this in my workflow? Do I need to do this through Final Cut on import, or can it be done through Mpeg streamclip as I currently use?

Thanks

In M100 it simply does it for you when you drop the clip into the timeline, it asks if you want to interpret as interlaced.

FCP does this as well. Though I dont think it asks you how to interpret the footage.

If you want to try, just create a sequence and drop in some interlaced footage and when FCP asks if you want the sequence to conform to this clip say yes. And set the sequence render to same as sequence. Then drop in the progressive footage. Depending on your CPU, RAID speed and SDI out card (I use AJA Kona II and Matrox MX02) you will be able to play out without rendering or need to render if the system is slower. When it renders I think it renders the progressive footage as PsF.

I have done this in FCP and never really thought about the settings. I will check exactly what they are tomorrow. My timelines are usually XDcam set to render as Prores these days.

My timelines are usually all progressive these days except when working with legacy projects or footage.

I used to have issues with progressive footage in earlier versions of FCP and M100. But it has worked well the last few years. I do use the latest versions of both.

Try bypassing the Mpegstreamclip and importing the 7D footage (clips) into the FCP then dropping the imported 7D clips in the 50i sequence. All the 7D clips in the sequence will have to be rendered to conform with the sequence's properties (which should also be the source 50i clips' properties previously imported into the project). After the rendering is finished, try playing back the rendered clips full size at 1920x1080 within the FCP and see how they play. My guess is they may not play as smoothly as the rest of the 50i clips in the same sequence. This is to be expected as the 7D clips have only half the temporal resolution of the other clips due to their progressive nature. If this is what it turns out you will have to convert the raw 7D clips in MPSC, Compressor or some other apps by constructing new interlaced clips from the raw original. The process required to do this with acceptable results will be very time consuming and require huge computing power.

My usual work mostly requires me to do it the other way around (deinterlacing 50i materials and converting to 25p) so I'm not sure this is the best way to go. You are also right about MPSC shifting the color balance to a little reddish when compared to the original. I've noticed this too in my workflow through MPSC but feel it minor in light of the compromises made in other areas.

Switch off "interlaced scaling" for a start. No need to deinterlace as the 7D is already progressive

No to frame blending and no to better downscaling and definitely don't alter the field dominance. If it needs to alter the fields FCP will add a filter automatically.

There are many reasons you are experiencing choppy footage. How are you monitoring? How are you playing the files into FCP are they on a firewire drive? What is your set-up? More details = more answers...