Strobing question in Pro 1.5...

[Coltrain]

I shot in 24PA, and watched the footage on a normal TV screen and it looked fine. However when I captured it and then exported it back onto a DV tape and watched it on the same TV screen, there was strobing in the brightest areas (sky and clouds). I have heard of this sort of trouble while filming in 24P, but I was using 24PA. Is there some setting I need to change. I am using the Panasonic defaults.

Any help would be appreciated.

[lmerino]

Coltrain,

If you shot in 24PA, go to playback settings and change the pulldown settings to "repeat frame." This should get rid of the strobing.

[kecorcoran]

Coltrain, I'm curious to hear if this fixes the problem, since it is my understanding that the "repeat frame" setting only changes the preview, and tape exports should not be affected.

[Coltrain]

Coltrain,

*If you shot in 24PA, go to playback settings and change the pulldown settings to "repeat frame." *This should get rid of the strobing.



That didn't help and I am running out of options. I have tried virtually everything imaginable.

Anyone else have any ideas?

[kecorcoran]

How about rendering your timeline to an AVI file, and then sending that file to tape?

Nesting the 24p timeline in a 60i timeline, and outputting that to tape?

Sorry, I'm grasping at straws. I've only done one export to tape with 24pa and it seemed to go fine.

[Coltrain]

How about rendering your timeline to an AVI file, and then sending that file to tape?

Nesting the 24p timeline in a 60i timeline, and outputting that to tape?

Sorry, I'm grasping at straws. I've only done one export to tape with 24pa and it seemed to go fine.
That's just it. It seems to work for everybody, but not me.

What's going on?

[kecorcoran]

Yikes. After reading your post, to be sure I went back and double checked the one 24p project I had dumped to tape. When I found an area of overexposed sky, I saw the flickering as well. So it's not just you.

Looks very similar to the 24p normal flicker that occurs when the 3-2 pulldown is removed. But my footage, like yours, is 24p Advanced. So it looks like 24p ADV has the same problem as Normal, it just shows up later in the workflow, when the pulldown is reapplied.

At least the DVD I created looked good.

I'll continue to investigate and let you know what I find.

[lmerino]

I remember doing a test with 24PA footage and changing the playback settings to either repeat frame or interlaced and it fixed the problem when playing from the timeline. I didn't try the 'print to tape' function though. I will also double check my test when i get back to my machine.

lucas

[kecorcoran]

Applying the Broadcast Colors effect to the offending footage with Maximum Signal Amplitude (IRE) set to 110 seems to make the Export to Tape strobing go away in my case.

I'm curious to see if others get the same results.

[kecorcoran]

I just tried the Broadcast Colors effect (110 IRE max) on 24p Normal footage, and it seemed to work there as well.

If you recall, overexposed areas in 24p Normal footage flickered from the get-go. 24p Advanced seemed to be OK until Coltrain discovered the flicker on Export to Tape.

As far as I can tell, applying Broadcast Colors fixes both problems, but again I'm cursious to see what results other people get.

[Coltrain]

I just tried the Broadcast Colors effect (110 IRE max) on 24p Normal footage, and it seemed to work there as well.

If you recall, overexposed areas in 24p Normal footage flickered from the get-go. 24p Advanced seemed to be OK until Coltrain discovered the flicker on Export to Tape.

As far as I can tell, applying Broadcast Colors fixes both problems, but again I'm cursious to see what results other people get.

Thanks guys for all the help. I will try this and let you know.

[Coltrain]

The broadcast colors did fix the strobing, but man, you shouldn't have to worry about stuff like this.

I still might be switching to Vegas 5...

[lmerino]

Hi,

Unfortunately it did not work for me. I tested it on the same interview footage I linked to before. It lowered the strobing, but it was definately still there.

sacul

[kecorcoran]

I'm surprised it didn't work for you, Lucas, the strobing in the clip you originally posted looked milder than my own footage -- the sky in my clip was more overexposed and the strobing was worse.

Anyway, could you try lowering the maximum IRE even more, say to 100, and see if it's any better?

[Neil Rowe]

..since ive had the entire 1.5 video collection pro edition ive never had a single strobing or cadance problem. *im not sure where you guys are getting it from. *are you still using a panasonic preset project to try to edit 24pn or 24pa on a regular 29.976 timeline? if you are.. dont. just use a regular ntsc 29.976 timeline...there no reason to use the panasonic one if you dont want it to do the pulldown- even if your changing the framerate to 29.976.. just dont, and use a normal project. now i must say that i normally *use my rtx100 pro in ppro 1.5 for the 29.976 projects that i do, but *it also allows me to still use any adobe filters or effects, and it edits the footage fine without removing the pulldown, and no strobing. *but i havent had any issues when using a regular 29.976 timeline either. i loaded some very bright footage last night just to try and recreate what you are getting, but i could not. *either on a 24pn or 24pa panasonic preset project usig the pulldown to edit at 24p or using either 24p setting on a 29.976 non-panasonic project... both matrox and regular adobe ntsc preset. *.. it would be nice to have an answer to this, but i just cant seem to get it to happen in the first place :-/

..not that thats a bad thing.. for me anyway.

[lmerino]

iamloser,

I'm glad its working out for you... but just one thought. I also have a Canopus DVStorm, and although the PPro 1.5 drivers are not out yet, Canopus reports that their dv codec will not support 24p pulldown in premiere. Which means that if I were to digitize via the DVStorm using the Canopus codec (rather than the msdv codec), it will recognize any 24p or 24pa material as regular 29.97 (as it was laid down to tape).

Are you digitizing through the Matrox card? If so, it's possible it's using a codec different than msdv, just like the Canopus card. If so, it will not use pulldown on the footage, and indeed will look fine. In order to use the msdv codec and 24p pulldown, you must digitize through a standard OHCI firewire card.

Thanks,
Lucas

[Neil Rowe]

..the pulldown isnt done during capture.. its done when you import the footage into the program using the panasonic 24p editing project setting.. you can take the same footage into a different program and edit as normal ntsc 29.976 no matter how you captured it... even after using it in a 24p project in premiere.. * ppro *doesnt change the actual footage by removing frames.. it just skips the interlaced frames, and displays the 24p frames in a 24p timeline for editing.. and only actually changes it to a new seperate 24p file on export.

the matrox card doesnt work with the 24p either, but its besides the point i guess. it doesnt really matter what codec you use for capture or editing.. none of the dv codecs have 24p support(besides quicktime). its all handled by the software, and only actually converted on export. *the files that i am editing in 24p were all captured through the matrox card and use the matrox codec, and all work fine for 24p editing.

im not sure, but i think the pulldown is ONLY performed when using the panasonic presets.. even if you change it a 29.976 timeline. i cant test for sure cause mine works fine.. when i use regular non panasonic preset it doesnt do the pulldown at all.. with or without using the matrox hardware, and no strobing or any of the above stuff mentioned.

[Guest]

Are you exporting to tape from the PPro panasonic preset and are you looking for strobing in bright or high contrast areas?

[kecorcoran]

I've been regularly posting about the strobing problem over on Adobe's Premiere forum, as has Lucas and maybe one or two other regulars here.

The thread has been going on a while, but we recently got a reply from an Adobe Premiere representative. He can't say whether a fix is in the works, but he did at least acknowledge that the Premiere team is aware of the problem.

He also recommened the ProcAmp filter as a workaround, since this filter will correct the strobing while still keeping in the YUV colorspace. (Some of the other filters, like Brightness and Contrast, will force a conversion to RGB.)

[skunker]

Wow Kevin! Thanks for the alert. I am the guy that was suggesting we get a petition going...I guess that action prompted their response. Thanks for keeping all us Premiere users in the loop.

[HansK]

now i must say that i normally use my rtx100 pro in ppro 1.5 for the 29.976 projects that i do

iaml - Suppose you select one of the Matrox preset projects (29.976), capture some 24pa video, place it on the 29.976 timeline, then make a bunch of edits. Can you then export as 24p for DVD that would look as good as if you had used a 24pa project and 24fps timeline?

I thought the benefit of using the 24pa project was that the 2:3:3:2 pulldown allowed for a cleaner extraction of the original frames and for later generation to 24p.

[Neil Rowe]

hans,

as far as i know at this time you cannot export a 24p file from a matrox project . I wouldnt use 24pa for somthing i was going to be editing at 29.976. i use 24pn. and edit it just like any other telecined material.

you are correct about the benefit of 24pa when staying in native DV. the workflow you described is nonexistant, and would not make sense to do if it did work. 24pa is for editing in true 24p after removig the judder frames. if one does not plane on editing in 24p they will get smoother 29.976 playback from 24pn.