24PA sucks.

ryan brown

ryan brown

lOwEr CaSe Member
What's the deal with this? Why do I keep running into problems trying to import into FCP HD?

Shooting in 24p(A), and when I import, only some of the clips log at 23.98, while the rest log in at 29.98. And... I keep getting the "break in cadence" error. Everything is set up right in FCP - I've gone over it a hundred times. I set the dial on the DVX myself, and went out to get some test footage, and DID NOT CHANGE THE DIAL while shooting.

I've tried logging with my crappy canon, and even with the dvx (which I hate to do) and get the same results. Clips are at 29.98 fps and I have to render into my 23.98 timeline. I logged the same clips a few different times, and sometime's they were 24, others 30! That's right... the EXACT SAME CLIP sometime's logs in at 23.98, and sometime's logs in at 29.98, causing me to have to render.

I'm to the point where I'm about to say "screw it", and just shoot at 24P Normal.


Any ideas what's going on here???

-brown

p.s. It is not a pirated copy of FCP, or anything like that. It's a full version from the disc. I'm shooting on ONLY panasonic tapes.
 
UncleBenji1977 said:
Why not shoot 24p normal... 24pa is more stroby to me anyhow.
Click to expand...

if your watching 24pa footage without the pulldown removed, then yes it will appear more stroby or jittery to you because the 24pa footage is not really intended to be played back as is.
 
Oh damn! I just checked some of my clips in a short film I'm doing and I found the same thing, it says 'vid rate @29.97' Why!!? Some clips are @ the correct rate. No wonder why the clips needed to be rendered. Help someone, Barry??
 
Rendering isn't the only problem here. Even after you render it, there's still a small "jitter", or "jump" in the footage because it's not supposed to be in the 23.98 timeline.

Untill I find a reliable way of importing 24pa, I'm shooting in 24P Normal.

P.S. what are you guys using to import your footage?? I'm wondering if a pro deck would make a difference (not that I have $2000 sitting around right now anyway).
 
I use the sony DSR11, a professional deck, and the same problem. I also noticed when I scan through footage in the viewer, it will skip, freeze etc...I know it's because of the frame rate, bujt why and how to fix it before I edit anymore of my film???
 
Well this is not good news. I normally use 24P but at the recommendation of others I just shot 25 hours of tape at 24PA for a documentary. I haven't previewed or imported it yet though. Any insight would be appreciated.
 
Maybe it has something to do with turning the unit on and off? Although I would think that would only lead to one switch back to the default. Just a thought.
 
Strange problems. I have used FCP HD and my DVX at 24pA and haven't ran into the timeline problem. I just start a new project and use the easy set up option for "DV NTSC Advanced (2:3:3:2) Pulldown Removal". I think the default composition that is created is still 29.97, so you just need to delete it and create a new one. After that, everything is good to go for 24pA and there should be nothing else to do.

This page might help in solving the problems:

http://www.kenstone.net/fcp_homepage/24p_in_FCP_nattress.html

From what I have read, the break in pulldown cadence message should only occur where there is a break in the timecode (and only every now and then). Even though the message pops up, the footage that you were capturing is still captured. You just need to start capturing again where the break occurred (which will be where a start/stop occurred in the recording).

Other than that, I'm not sure where the problems are coming from. Hope that helps some.
 
For the clips that are just labeled incorrectly you can open them in Cinema Tools and analyse the clip. It will note that they are actually 23.976 and then launch FCP again and it will update according to Cinema Tools.
 
krestofre said:
For the clips that are just labeled incorrectly you can open them in Cinema Tools and analyse the clip. It will note that they are actually 23.976 and then launch FCP again and it will update according to Cinema Tools.
Click to expand...

Nice. That worked for me... still doesn't really solve the problem, though. I'd have to open all the clips in Cinema Tools, etc., etc, and that take's up time I'd rather use to edit. It's a fairly quick fix, though. Thanks.

Snodart, consider yourself lucky. I have read through that 24PA page many times, and totally understand it. I have FCP's easy setup to pulldown removal. I've checked and re-checked my timeline's, setup, and capture settings, and still the problem remains.

Poop.
 
rcbrown23 said:
Snodart, consider yourself lucky. I have read through that 24PA page many times, and totally understand it. I have FCP's easy setup to pulldown removal. I've checked and re-checked my timeline's, setup, and capture settings, and still the problem remains.
Click to expand...

I have no clue why this is happening to you. Very strange.

With 24pA, the info as to which frames FCP should remove are embedded in the DV data stream which comes from the DV tape via firewire. The info of course is embedded there by the DVX. With this in mind, it might be the mini DV tape that you are using. Either the brand or the specific tape itself. Next might be the firewire cable or connection. I know my firewire port on my 100B is one tight puppy, and I have to remove it very carefully. It shouldn't matter what deck you are using since the frame removal info is on the tape itself, but I've heard of some decks having 24pA issues. And the frightening one... maybe the camera is not embedding the info onto the tape correctly.

Also, what mac are you using... ram, etc?

EDIT: I just noticed you panasonic tape comment, so probably not the tapes.

EDIT: does it jump to 29 after a break in cadence message or at random?
 
snodart said:
I have no clue why this is happening to you. Very strange.

With 24pA, the info as to which frames FCP should remove are embedded in the DV data stream which comes from the DV tape via firewire. The info of course is embedded there by the DVX. With this in mind, it might be the mini DV tape that you are using. Either the brand or the specific tape itself. Next might be the firewire cable or connection. I know my firewire port on my 100B is one tight puppy, and I have to remove it very carefully. It shouldn't matter what deck you are using since the frame removal info is on the tape itself, but I've heard of some decks having 24pA issues. And the frightening one... maybe the camera is not embedding the info onto the tape correctly.

Also, what mac are you using... ram, etc?

EDIT: I just noticed you panasonic tape comment, so probably not the tapes.

EDIT: does it jump to 29 after a break in cadence message or at random?
Click to expand...


I'm on a powermac G5 dual 2.0 with 1.5 gigs RAM. There's no problem with the embedding, cause I analyzed the footage in Cinema Tools, and it's correct at 23.98. At least I've found out a fix, thanks to krestofre. But it's still a pain in the arse.

After a few test runs, I'm blaming the "break in cadence" on my sh!tty little canon deck I use to log. There is no break when logging with the DVX. I still don't undersand why FCP see's the footage as 29.98 when in actuallity, it IS 23.98.

I've got my prefs set to continue logging during a capture break - - - but that doesn't stop the break in cadence error.

Any other suggestions??

I wish more people running FCP would chime in and let me know if they are having similar problems, or if 24PA runs smoothly.:(

Anyway, thanks for the comments so far, and please keep 'em coming.

-brown
 
rcbrown23 said:
I still don't undersand why FCP see's the footage as 29.98 when in actuallity, it IS 23.98.


-brown
Click to expand...

Actuallity -- it IS 29.97.

Your miniDV tape will not record 24fps. Sorry. 24pA IS 29.97 actually. Of course you know the difference, so I won't go into that.

Yes, I've had issues with capturing 24pA footage, but usually ONLY when there are timecode breaks or I've somehow added a few frames of some other format either at the beginning of the take or at the end of it... and ended up capturing those frames too.

CaptM
 
FCP sees the footage as 29.98 becaue coming over the FireWire cable, it is in fact 29.98. The "original" 23.98 frames are flagged as such. FCP has to strip all the extra frames off. That's what the advanced pull-down is, and why you have to be very sure to have it set when you capture. What comes out of your DVX is actually a 29.98 NTSC signal, no matter what you had your camera set to during recording.

I shot a lot of 24pa and never really had problems with it. But some folks do, I'm not sure what the cause is.

Never shoot different frame rates on the same tape without some blank space inbetween. I found problems when they're butted up against each other on the tape. FCP seems to like a couple of seconds of good timecode to start with. Just like if you Batch Capture, you're tape should have at least ten seconds of blank tape recorded with timecode.
 
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