Frozen picture with Z 1

[Walter Uhrik]

Hello everybody!
I am working with Sony Z1 for more than a year and I encountered strange problem recently. When I playback my recordings the picture sometimes freezes for a second or so but TC is running normally. The picture looks like still photo and there is no sound although I'm sure the camera was rolling when I was shooting. Has anybody heard about the problem like this? Thanks.

[Andrew Dean]

This sounds exactly like what dropout looks like for hdv. Because the frame information is spread over such a long period of time, a dropout can last a second or two, and is presented by the deck as a frozen image. The sound will often be unaffected. It's also possible it is a computer issue, but in the event it is dropout...

Its hard if not impossible to diagnose the cause over the net. Lots of things can contribute to it. Changing brands of tape stock where you've used one for awhile used to be the big nono but i havent had any problems with it yet. A head in need of alignment or having suffered a hit can be more prone to dropout. Cheap tape stock is another culprit and in my opinion a likely one. The fancier, more expensive tapes are less prone to dropout. Its one of those things that you can often get by with luck though. Lots of people use cheap tape stock with no problems and claim the more expensive tapes to be a waste of money... and if they have no problems, they are right. However, it doesnt take too many dropouts to make any tape savings not a savings at all.

The only real option for your existing footage (if the problem is indeed dropout) is to try capturing the same section with like 15 seconds padding several times. Some dropout can be read on some passes, but not on others. If you are lucky enough to have it "take" one of the times, you can insert it into your timeline and thank allah. the down side is that this will also wear that portion of tape and can possibly make the dropout worse for later playing. If the re-capture method doesnt help, then honestly i think your only option is to edit around the freezes and/or cry.

Its also possible that what you are experiencing is related to your computer bogging down for some reason. Drive fragmentation/corruption, attempted and failed realtime effects, etc can cause the picture to hiccup. Can you step frame through the freeze? if single frame advancing through the freeze still reveals a freeze, i'd revert back to thinking it to be dropout.

One rule of thumb regardless your tape preference: dont use your tape except when you need it. This means no casual playback "just for fun" before you capture the footage. If you have a director that is a whore for instant playback, an on-site laptop or pvr can give them the opportunity to wank around with the footage without risking anything.

And the more expensive solution is to record parallel, either to laptop, another recorder and/or to a hard disk recorder.

Sorry if i rattled on about stuff you didnt ask about. Not trying to talk down or preach... i'm just twiddling my thumbs waiting for a render and decided to babble.

cheers!
-Andrew

Originally Posted by Walter Uhrik

Hello everybody!
I am working with Sony Z1 for more than a year and I encountered strange problem recently. When I playback my recordings the picture sometimes freezes for a second or so but TC is running normally. The picture looks like still photo and there is no sound although I'm sure the camera was rolling when I was shooting. Has anybody heard about the problem like this? Thanks.