Anyone done FX1/ Z1u 60i hdv to 24p files?
 

Has anyone done 60i hdv to 24p from material shot with the FX1 or Z1u?
If so, are there any clips online of these tests?

Pappas

We've done a LOT of it. But hosting the files? Nah...too big. Depends entirely on the app used, as to the quality of finished output

Douglas,

What do you use to go from 60i on the FX1 to 24p? Magic Bullet with FCP? How would you say it compares to CineFrame on the FX1 and to the native 24p of say the DVX100?

Thanks!
Douglas

I was going to ask that too! Second that ????

Douglas, is there a way that maybe you could host a clip for a day or two. Your footage that you have gotten with the FX1 is been awesome. Seeing some full res 60i to 24p would be a nice treat to see.


Pappas

Magic Bullet in FCP does NOT do 24p. It doesn't de-interlace, and doesn't do a 60i to 24p conversion.

However, you should take a look at my Film Effects or Standards Conversion packages which will do an excellent job of converting HDV 60i to 24p. Free demo, www.nattress.com, try it out on your own footage.

Graeme

I'll second that for FCP, you really want to try out Graeme's excellent tools for conversion. FAR better than anything else out there. The price of the demo is right too....(free)

Thanks! I had a customer who wanted to use the plugin to do a HDV 1080i60 to DVCproHD 720p24 conversion, so the new version I'm working on now (free upgrade) will have much improved downconversion facilities. I'm also adding in some general and useful pulldown addition / removal plugins which can help with workflows involving 3:2 (and advanced) footage.

Graeme

Graeme/Douglas,

Thank you very much for the clarification and suggestion on software. I was misinformed.

Graeme, as for your software, (I know you might be a little biased) but can you compare the conversion with your software to native 24p and to the CineFrame in the FX1?

Thanks again,
Douglas

Douglas, the quality of my conversion is very good. It does look better than CF24, and it looks very comparable to "real" 24p. However, as with all such software it can look a touch stuttery on fast movement. However, real 24p doesn't look too hot on fast movement either. Use the software with well shot footage and I think you'd be very happy indeed.

Graeme

Graeme,

What % of resolution do you believe is lost doing this 60i to 24p conversion on HDV FX1/Z1u material.

What's the render time ( approx ) per frame your getting on your system?

Have you done a 1080i 60 to 1080p 24?

Can your system take the HDV from 4:2:0 to 4:2:2 or higher and do 60i to 24p at the same time? or does this need to be done at different times?

Graeme, is there any short clips of your 60i to 24p system that I can watch?

Thanks

Pappas

Sony HDR-FX1

http://www.uploadhouse.com/images/88...0704022237.jpg

60i to 23.976

http://www.megaupload.com/?d=24M5RH0X

640x360 5.12megs Xvid codec

60i to 30p

http://www.megaupload.com/?d=24YNVHBU

640x360 6.25megs Xvid codec

Original clips taken from here:

http://www.vasst.com/HDV/FX-1_images-Surfers.htm


If anyone has any 24 Cineframe files online let me know. Those can be converted nicely too. I have one on my HDD, but it is not of material to post on this forum (no, not porn).

I'll post a CF24 clip in a few minutes, but it will take a good 30 mins for it to fully upload. But, it'll be on the same page as linked above.
http://www.vasst.com/HDV/FX-1_images-Surfers.htm

I guess I need to rename that page, eh? :-)

It's now up...

Thank you Douglas!

Kyle Edwards,

For some reason I can not see your files?


Graeme,

Did you see the questions above?

I can't seem to be able to open the files either. What sort of player/viewer are you using?

Thanks again!
Douglas

% resolution is a tricky one. On still stuff the resolution loss is minimal and might not even be noticed due to the interlace factor, and for moving stuff you'll drop to 50%, but again, you'll never see it as it's moving. They end result, however, does look very good.

I will be putting in options for 4:2:0 into my filter packages.

I don't have any clips, but that's what the free demo is for so you can try on your own footage.

Graeme

[QUOTE=Graeme Nattress] I will be putting in options for 4:2:0 into my filter packages.


Will there be an option to make a 4:2:2 version on output?

I can't wait to try your plugins, I have heard nothing but praise about them!

Thanks Graeme!

Yes, the 4:2:0 option will try to boost the chroma to 4:2:2.

Graeme

On the PC, install this file. It will let you view files encoded with the Xvid codec. Xvid is a free MPG4 codec, the same as Divx...but free.

http://www.koepi.org/XviD-1.0.3-20122004.exe

Here is the CF24 clip converted:

http://www.megaupload.com/?d=20P9EICE

While it gets rid of the pulldown perfectly, fast motion seems jerky. The reason behind that is that there is no motion blur. Watch the clip and look for the man walking in the background, he's perfectly smooth. Then watch the motorbikes, jerky. Do a frame by frame on the bikes and you can see how this mode would be great for slow-mo on fast moving objects...maybe. I'd have to do some tests with that.

The clip I tested on consisted of myself walking around a room touching certain objects and even jogging. That came out fine since I was not moving 20+ mph.

Excellent!

Thanks Graeme


pappas

Thoughts on this article?
 

Graeme/Douglas/all,

This was the original article that I remembered reading regarding Magic Bullet and the "film look".

http://thecarpark.net/products_magicbullet2_HDV.htm#

Although he doesn't claim it converts from 60i to 24p, Christopher Kenworthy seems to believe that Magic Bullet is excellent at giving video that "film look" through blurring, etc.

Since, I don't understand it, Graeme, can you please explain the difference between your product and Magic Bullet if both give the "film look"? Yours gives it apparently through 60i to 24p and Magic Bullet through some other means.

Thanks in advance,
Douglas

Really, the only thing magic about the bullet is their marketing budget!

Yes, I have my own proprietary algorithms that I believe produce an excellent look. But really, the major difference is that my plugins are significantly cheaper and you get tech support direct from me, the person who writes the code.

MB for Editors does not do the 24p thing, or de-interlace. The AE version does, but that's $1000, not $300.

Oh, and free upgrades for Film Effect customers from day one. Hopefully free upgrades won't end, but people who've bought from V1.0, will be getting a free upgrade to V2.5 which will be released this month, and I can't really get any fairer than that.

Graeme

I did this using VirtualDub and obtained near perfect results.

The procedure was to convert the M2T to AVIs using MidVid MJPEG. I'd like to do it with DVCProHD but can't find a good cheap codec (any suggestions?)

In virtualdub, I set it to inverse telecine with a 0 field offset to 23.976 fps. Then I added a 1-pixel blur filter, and finally I downed it to 1280x720 (since the blur does cause some resolution loss).

I think the blur causes a loss to slightly less than true 720p quality but certainly much better than 480. The footage is progressive and gorgeous and is virtually indistinguishable from 24p from a Panasonic AG-DVX100A when downed to 480p, excepd that the picture quality is immensly superior.

I will try to post a clip this afternoon.

What is the purpose of the 1-pixel blur?

Wouldn't matter anyway, you'd get blended fields. Might as well try to pass those off as motion blur.

converting 60i to 60p will give much better results when going to 24p.

with 30i or 30p the 24p frames happen within every 1.25 of the 30p frames. So only every other 4th frame will land on a real frame.

With 60p the 24p frames happen within every 2.5 of the 60p frames. That means only every other 24p frame is interpolated. The in between frames are real frames from the 60p.

There is no more quality loss from going to 60p either since you have to deinterlace anyways. When you deinterlace 60i to 30p you throw away one whole field of data or basically half the frames. If you seperate the 60i into 60 half height frames and then scale up to full height you get 60p that will look just as good as 30p.

The best would be to convert to 120p. 120p gives a 24p frame exactly every 5 frames. Just take every 5th frame from your 120 sequence and you have a perfect 24p. Of course going to 120p can take a long time.

I am working on a program to do a high quality 60p and convert that to 24p. Every other frame will be a perfect deinterlaced frame. The in between frames will be blurry or interpolated. I am still working on how to best create the in between frame. If I can make a time shifter that is fast enough I may even go the 120p route.

The way it works is:

A1 A2 B1 B2 C1 C2 D1 D2 E1 E2

becomes

A1+A2+blur = A_P

B1+B2+blur = B_P

C2+D1+blur = C_P

D2+E1+blur = D_P

You have to blur because the two interlaced fields happen at different points in time. Also known as "Blending fields" which VirtualDub doesn't do unless you tell it to.

But then to compensate for the blur, you go down to 720p so it all works out. And then you get beautiful 24p footage which only the most discerning eyes would know was artificial.

Hmm, Thomas I'll try your method and see how that works.

Using your method:

http://www.uploadhouse.com/images/625620499020.JPG

You're not creating a true progressive source to work with. You're basically blending. The motion may appear ok to your eyes, but you are creating a mess with the frames.


EDIT:

60i to 24p - 119.88 to 23.976
http://www.megaupload.com/?d=283SRN7Y

60i to 30p - Deinterlaced
http://www.megaupload.com/?d=2890NCTV

60i to 60p - Resized Fields
http://www.megaupload.com/?d=27BZ47GT

I've uploaded all three so we can compare the motion in each. The sample footage is only 10sec. I'll do a longer test tomorrow.

What program are you using to convert to 120p?

Graeme & Co,

Once convert 1080i60 to 24p, using your, other top software, what we getting subjectively as result, is overall quality close to 720p, 1080p, somewhere in between, lower than 720p?

What I'm driving at, if lenses are same, would picture quality be better on 720p24 HDV, 720p24 DVCPROHD with 960x720 recorded pixels, or Sony HDV converted from 50-60i to 24-25p?

David Newman of CineForm already said that 720p24 HDV codec means theoretically better quality than DVCPROHD at 24p, which is 40 Mbps.

How close is Sony HDV codec to HDCAM codec at 1080i? Compressin on non-moving complex image is about same (significantly less than on DVCPROHD), once movement starts, compression increases but eye is less sensitive to movement so it may perceive it as natural blur.

Radek

1080i60 converted to 720p24 looks very close to real 720p24. 1080i only has around the same vertical rez as 720p anyway due to interlace filtering, so it's never going to look as good as 1080p24.

Native 24p is always going to look better than converted 24p, and looking at the footage I have from Varicam 720p24 DVCproHD, JVC HD100 720p24 and my conversions, I'd rate them like this:

1) 720p24 From the Varicam. The luma is slightly better in terms of less compression artifacting than the 720p24 HDV, but the chroma is way nicer. The slightly lower resolution is invisible in terms of percieved detail, probably because it's super-sampled from a higher rez CCD, and that the lens on the HD100 is a limiting factor, along with the compression.

2) 720p24 from JVC HD100. Very nice 24p, looks less compressed than other HDV footage I have. Has more of a real high definition feel than the Sony HDV in that the detail is much finer in relation to picture size.

3) 720p24 converted from 1080i60 from the Sony HDV. Reducing the frame size on this footage helps a lot. It looks better, to me, than the native footage, and on sympathetic material, looks very close to 2) and to 1) above, but is noisier.

720p24 HDV at 19mbps compared to 720p24 DVCproHD at 40mbps is a very interesting comparison. Normally you'd expect about a 2.5 times advantage for MPEG2 over a DV type codec, giving HDV an euivalence of about 47mbps, but there are too many differences between the codecs to make that simple comparison totally valid. We have HDV with a slightly higher resolution, but lower chroma sampling. DVVproHD has slightly lower resolution, but higher chroma sampling. Looking at the real world images I have, the DVCproHD stuff looks better in terms of less compression artifacting, but it's very close, but I much prefer the DVCproHD 1080i footage I have, which, to me, looks better still!

It's very hard to compare HDCAM to HDV. The only footage I have from HDCAM is from a project I did with Panavision, and they shot some green screen footage for me. This footage I have is from HDCAM tape, but I have it uncompressed on my system, and it looks very much better than any HDV I've seen, but obviously, it was recorded on a HDCAM camera with the nice Panavision lenses, and that's not fair to HDV as the Sony HDV camera really looks lens (and CCD for that matter) limited to me.

Graeme

"The motion may appear ok to your eyes, but you are creating a mess with the frames"

As I said,

"which only the most discerning eyes would know was artificial."

You can look at a still frame and say it's a mess, but look at it in motion and it's damn good.

At any rate, convert to 60p first, to 120p first, whatever. Bottom line there is no method that will give you 24p without blending fields because

FIELDS HAPPEN AT DIFFERENT POINTS IN TIME

You can convert to 60p by doing the following:

A1 + A2 *
A2 + B1
B1 + B2 *
B2 + C1
C1 + C2
C2 + D1 *
D1 + D2
D2 + E1 *
E1 + E2
E2 + A1

And then take the starred frames (inverse telecine) and get the same thing. But, again you still need to blur fields.

How you would convert to 120p from 60i I have no idea.

Graeme,

This is an interesting point that hopefully we will find out once all of the other cameras are out and we can compare. Due to lens and actually pixel count from the chips is there really going to be a quality change from a nice 720p to 1080i? I have been debating this with myself (no I'm not crazy) for a long time. I have tried doing test with 3D rendered images but that just doesn't help because it doesn't factor in lens and chip quality.

Even though there are ways out there of trying to get a high quality conversion from 1080i to 1080p do all of us really want to mess around with that much rendering when 720p shooters will be ready to go the moment they capture the footage. Workflow will become a huge factor when the playing field levels out.

I just read the article on the FX1 on the updated HDVinfo website and it was mentioned how shocked that the author and other people at the shoot didn't really see any resolution difference between the FX1 and a DVX100A when watching on many different HD displays. I found this to be a little shocking and not 100% sure if I agree with that. To be fair however the author was shooting in CF24 which we know kills the horizontal resolution.

Perhaps when the JVC camera comes out in a few months we will finally get to test this debate. I'm really hoping the lens options on the JVC will open up a whole new level of quality for HD even if it is only at 720p. The only thing I hate about 720p HDV is it's limit of only up to 30p. This kind of limits the camera in the broadcast market where a 1080i camera will at least have the same look motion wise as a high end camera. They have their motion thing but I haven't seen it yet. Will it be good enough for broadcast? I can see broadcasters easily rejecting 720p 30p footage where with 1080i dumping to HDCAM tape they might not be able to tell.

I guess we will have to wait a few months to really find out.

Graeme,

Since you are one of the only people to have seen footage from the new JVC camera and I know you know your image quality I take your word for it.

In your opinion do you think using uncompressed live from the JVC would look pretty damn good then?

I am actually one of the nut jobs that will be getting an uncompressed HD system in a few months. Right now I am leaning towards a Multibridge with 12 bit HD component input.

If you go out of the component outputs of the JVC and record uncompressed, I think it would look really good indeed, but at that point, you're also really limited by the lens, and a top end HD lens doesn't come cheap. Compression hides a multitude of sins..... The major thing I see in the JVC footage is the compression - the image itself looks pretty good. Take away that compression and you might be able to see other things wrong with it, that the compression would otherwise hide, but that's mostly conjecture at this point, as although the uncompressed analogue component output looked nice at NAB, I'd hardly call their setup as suitable for critical viewing comparisons.

I don't know enough about the noise levels on the JVC to know if capturing in >8bit will make any real world difference though.

Graeme

Just thought about one advantage of shooting and recording 1080i and converting to 720p.

This would be the only real way of getting 720p 60p from tape on a HDV camera. All 720p HDV cameras are limited to recording 30p. With 1080i you basically have 60 frames that are 1440x540 that will be of the same quality as a deinterlaced 1080i frame. You can now convert and actually get a pretty good 720p 60p this way.

Of course this conversion would require editing in an uncompressed format so you might as well just capture 60p live from a camera or edit as DVCpro HD.

Maybe we read different articles? Are you talking about Jon Fordham's FX-1 review? http://hdvinfo.net/articles/sonyhdrfx1/fordham9.php

If so, it didn't say the "author and other people" were "shocked" while watching the footage on "many different HD displays." Instead, Jon describes his experience watching dailies on a 34" consumer HDTV with the script supervisor.

Sorry. Shocked may have been more of what I was thinking about what was said in the article. It was too strong of a word but I didn't want to quote the article exactly. I meant there was "Something to consider" and "kept thinking about it" about the fact that some people couldn't really see any extra detail. I'm sure in some way the shooter may have been a little shocked based on the fact they were comparing SD to HD.

You are right though that on a 34" HDTV it would be harder to tell.

Never once did the author actually say if he agreed with the other person or not. He just said he kept thinking about it and considering it. Does that mean he agrees?

Maybe I should have perplexed instead.

Greame,

Thanks a lot. That is so much useful information from someone who is expert.

So actually if Sony comes with decent HDV camera with native resolution chips and interchangable lenses, we may have basically same quality as HD100, if understand right.

As it stands now, all 3 cameras create decent 720p product, superior to SD. Is right?

Sony has further advantage offering auto focus, 60i, which is what U.S. networks want. Want 1080i60 or 720p60. Smoothing of 30p on HD100 will mean longer open shutter, less sharp images, or similar effect.

Sony offers this quality in FX1E for 3,000 USD, now even HC1 for 1,800 USD, with worse low light performance. JVC is only slightly better than Sony HDV converted to 720p, will probably cost 2x as FX1 and 3x as as HC1.

Add price into eqation, 60 Hz, auto-focus. Sony immediately strike as super buys in 720p progressive environment.

Further, you can create 720p60 from 1080i60, as Thomas mentioned, giving Sony further advantage having slow motion capability.

As recording uncompressed, that's too complicated and expensive and time, manpower consuming.

Radek

"So actually if Sony comes with decent HDV camera with native resolution chips and interchangable lenses, we may have basically same quality as HD100, if understand right."

Native rez chips will do a few things:

1) require higher quality lenses
2) produce more noise
3) have less dynamic range

Unless they make the chips a lot bigger. At that point, it's called HDCAM and costs a fortune.

I do agree that limiting HDV 720p to only 30fps is a bit limitation. 720p60 should be the format, but you'd need to double your data rate (not quite double, but for a rough guess it's ok) to keep the quality the same.

1080i might be flavour of the month, but progressive video will be the future king, and we won't ever go back to interlace. Interlace is just compression, and pretty poor compression compared to what can be done digitally these days.

Graeme