24 or 30 fps for panning?

D

DCAD

Member
I leave for the Peru this evening.

I will shoot a bunch of outdoor video in the Andes. Not many moving objects/subjects. But I will do a lot of horizontal panning (slowly!) to show the landscape (a video panorama) and even some vertical panning up to the summits of high peaks.

Can someone confirm the following is true?

  • I understand that the rolling shutter on the T2i will cause undesirable effects when I pan. I was told that 24 fps will reduce panning effects vs. 30 fps.

  • I was also told to keep my shutter speed as low as possible (preferably 1/30 and no more than 1/125) to minimize the effects of panning.

If I need a shutter speed around 1/30, I can see I might have some problems with exposure in bright daylight unless I stop my lens way down. Goodbye shallow depth of field even at ISO 100. Yes? I guess it’s a bit late for a 72mm ND filter.

Thanks, -DCAD
 
As long as you pan slowly (there is a rule of thumb I can not remember) you will not have *noticeable rolling shutter. The speed of your pan is a million times more important than all the other factors.


*noticeable - A very objective term to people on this forum versus actual people in the real world.
 
The choice of 30fps vs. 24fps should really depend on the look you think will tell your story. However, is your country PAL or NTSC? If it's PAL, stick with 25. Otherwise...

Panning should go slowly. It should take about 8 seconds for an object to cross from one side of the viewfinder to the other. That will minimize artifacts which, by the way, also occur as a long-known artifact of 24 frame shooting.

Try to keep your shutter at 1/60 (1/50 for PAL), which means that you'll need ND filters to make sure you have a few choices in aperture.

The best thing you can do is to get out and shoot, and pay attention to what your shots look like at different settings. Knowing what your camera can and cannot do is crucial to creating a final product that looks good.
 
Your country is only important if you plan on distributing via broadcast within that country. If you're distribution is DVD/bluray/internet, then you can pretty much pick anything.
 
Yeah, unless I have something like a 4x or an 8x ND filter, I can forget shooting at wide aperatures in broad daylight.
 
I think, though, to clarify, in your post you have reversed the basic idea: a FASTER framerate will reduce the effects of panning. So, to clearly answer your first question, 30f will be better for reducing panning effects than 24f.

As to depth of field - do you WANT shallow depth of field when shooting landscapes? In any case, you may want to find a way to get that ND filter... either where you are, or in Peru!



DCAD said:
I leave for the Peru this evening.

I will shoot a bunch of outdoor video in the Andes. Not many moving objects/subjects. But I will do a lot of horizontal panning (slowly!) to show the landscape (a video panorama) and even some vertical panning up to the summits of high peaks.

Can someone confirm the following is true?

  • I understand that the rolling shutter on the T2i will cause undesirable effects when I pan. I was told that 24 fps will reduce panning effects vs. 30 fps.

  • I was also told to keep my shutter speed as low as possible (preferably 1/30 and no more than 1/125) to minimize the effects of panning.

If I need a shutter speed around 1/30, I can see I might have some problems with exposure in bright daylight unless I stop my lens way down. Goodbye shallow depth of field even at ISO 100. Yes? I guess it’s a bit late for a 72mm ND filter.

Thanks, -DCAD
Click to expand...
 
Last edited:
If your gonna shoot anything with fast paced motion, shoot in 50i or 60i, or if you plan on panning a lot then same shoot in 50i or 60i. You can always change it over in post to 24 or 25P. Shooting at 50i or 601 will make your pans seem smoother, even if you convert to 24 or 25p in post. Sometimes, when recording in 24 or 25p, you can get a jittery effect because your only catching 24 frames per second, versus 50 frames per second. It will help reduce the jumpy effect. As far as panning to fast to reduce rolling shutter, only practice and playing with it will show you how fast of a pan you can get away with. What seems fast to you, isn't fast to someone else. So just practice panning a few times and just play back the footage, make sure your don't see rolling shutter. You can see what rolling shutter is here. See how the straight edges don't look so straight. Hope it helps.

Best of Luck,
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top