720 vs 1080i

M

Michael23

New member
We have a project next month where we will be shooting out of a helicopter with a small Gyro unit. I am trying to decide what HD format to use. I have allot of experience with 1080i camera, but not a 720 24 or 60 camera. We are leaning towards shooting in 60 fps because we think that will give us more flexibility in editing, but space issues makes 24pn very attractive. We are not sure what the final project is going to look like and where it will air so we are trying to keep our options open. My questions are: what are the advantages and disadvantages to 720p or 1080i? Am I mistaken about the flexibility of 60i over 24pn? We will be in some spectacular parts of the country and we want to get the best quality possible.

Thanks
Michael
 
what sort of shots you planning? any fast pans?
Or mainly wide shots?
I love 720 24pn cause it saves space becuase it's just straight 24 fps.

What is the project going out to? Film, HD in some flavor or SD DVD?
 
No quick pans mostly wide shots from the air and nice steady sequence stuff on the ground, and interviews. We would eventually like to use it for a documentary and get it on HD channel, but in the meantime we are going to be making DVDs for media outlets, presentations, and maybe some stock type footage.
 
I don't know how the gyro units work, but, assuming that you have video and control lines from the cam to the cockpit, you could also run a firewire cable from the cam to stream the video to a laptop or firestore. That would certainly help with space issues.
 
First of all, just do some tests and look at both. Try down rezzing the 1080i to 720p and vice versa. See how substantial the image quality is. Most indicate that you'll only get a 10-20% quality increase by going to 1080i if that. Is that worth the space? It depends how many cards you got.

Personally, the bigger issue to me is the lack of 24 native frames. It's not just the variable frame rates (since I really don't use them that much) it's just much nicer have 24 pure frame from the get go and not having to worry about converting in post and trying to account for the redundant frames and such. Just being able to tell Avid or Combustion that I've got 24 progressive frames, no fields, no redundant crap, really makes my life a lot easier.
 
Michael,

If you don't absolutely NEED to shoot 60fps I would go with 1080 / 24p.

Shooting from a helicopter you get a lot of detail to capture (very different from typical close-up work) and the extra detail (+ getting slightly less artifacts), could make a big difference in this kind of situation.

Also, for film-out purposes it would make a noticeable difference and some HD broadcasters (most of them) demand all HD programing to be 1080i.

I would only choose 720 if I knew I needed 60fps.
Rent a few P2 cards (they are cheep to rent) and use the P2 store and you will be able to continuously record throughout the session.

Good luck!
 
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