Alternative to Clapperboard???

slate is definitely the best way to go for syncing and shot management.

Only alternatives that really work are either a verbal or paper written slate and clapping your hands. I always try to have the hands at an exact horizontal level and clap very flat together. Find this helps find that exact sync mark much easier.
 
Now this is only an opinion but I'm not sure why you would be using this with a TC work flow.

Turns out there is a workflow that makes sense and uses reasonable affordable equipment - see Ripples post later

To actually USE the TC you need a camera that can read and jam to incoming TC and an audio recorder that can do the same. So this lets out all the consumer camcorders and all the inexpensive audio recorders and all the DSLRs

IF your shooting file based projects, and if you aren't you want to be, all of your files are stamped with TOD. Providing you set the clocks on the devices your files are all stamped with in a second of each other so finding corresponding takes is as hard as looking at the creation date and time of the file.

So to get worried about the accuracy of the slate is a bit pointless unless your using tri level sync and full on professional gear. If that is the case why would you be slating with an iPhone!

Any talk of sticking LTC on the audio track is pretty much BS (in terms of workflow) unless you are tape based, and even then it's a work flow that hasn't been used in maybe 10 years so not a lot of folks are going to get any benefit from it. Files don't have continuos TC they have a TC stamp at the head of the file, just like the TOD time stamp that the device is always going to stamp there. And digital files/streams don't use TC for sync (they use it as a positional reference) they use wordclock. So all your getting is a time stamp at the head.

IF you are not running tri level sync to all your devices, and that means having them wired together, then the time stamp a DSLR puts on the file is not much worse than any drift the slate will have. ie you are slating (TC wise) to see which clips go together and your using the stupid slate aspect for actual syncing.

The plus to things like MovieSlate is that you can enter all kinds of info and notes on the slate and export it as an XML to FCP and then marie it to the clips.

But unless your doing a multi cam shoot with Tri Level then it really doesn't matter if the slate is off by a few frames, it's just a loose reference point. IF you are then you have the budget for a real smart slate and a dedicated person to take really good notes.

It's not that there is never a case where TC is important but I hear folks who are shooting DSLR and recording on to a Zoom going on about TC and drift like it had any place in their work flow and it really doesn't. If your devices are not all locked together with wordclock a slate loosing a frame or two over a day is completely irrelevant.
 
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I do a lot of multi-cam shooting - three to fourteen cameras isn't uncommon. I would have to ask my production sound operator (who always has real Deneke equipment on-set anyway) if the stated drift is acceptable. We usually check sync after a lunch break or when individual cameras change batteries and so on. Additionally, one or more free-run slave clocks or slates are usually left out and running for camera operators to grab shots of around the set after breaks or tape / media changes. First shots on new tapes are typically of a slate, regardless of what action is underway.
 
Just a quick plug for Movie Slate for the iPad (iPhone). Use it on DSLR projects. Works well for what it is and I love the ability to enter notes right there and then on set using the same tool.
 
Noiz,
The one thing I would say about your post is you don't actually need a timecode available camera.
(just one that doesn't suck)


FCP has an aux timecode box.

If you freeze frame on any frame with a accurate slate in picture.
Punch in those numbers in the "aux timecode" box

You can now highlight the timecode audio file and the video clip you just punched in and choose "sync using aux timecode"
and the 2 files will now be in ACCURATE sync. Done. Finished.

If you have a non accurate slate (iPad) thats varying 2 frames here, 4 frames there, -2 frames here..etc
It's going to slow you down syncing because every file will need moved a different amount of frames by hand.
If you're doing this for your own project it would just be a headache. If you delivered this to a paying client/post house
they'd probably ring your neck.

The aux timecode syncing inside the editor is an uber time saver compared to doing it by hand...
IFFFFFF you can count on an accurate slate/recorder combo.
 
I sort of think this is all going to go-away with the advent of GPS time stamping built into cameras. . .which can't be far off. Right now the price of TC smart slates and TC enabled audio recorders is an annoying festering sore when a sub $500 handheld GPS has the most accurate clock you could ask for. Nothing personal against Denecke but if I was in the business of building smart slates I would be asking the moon for them too, because the writing is on the wall.
 
aguia said:
when a sub $500 handheld GPS has the most accurate clock you could ask for.
Click to expand...


Boy I'd really like to see some proof to back up this VERY bold statement.

Last time I checked most GPS units are only accurate to XX amount of feet.

While a Denecke will hold perfectly for 6+ hours down to 1/30th of a second and never drift one single frame
back and forth for all those hours.
 
Rippie said:
Boy I'd really like to see some proof to back up this VERY bold statement.

Last time I checked most GPS units are only accurate to XX amount of feet.

While a Denecke will hold perfectly for 6+ hours down to 1/30th of a second and never drift one single frame
back and forth for all those hours.
Click to expand...

While I wouldn't make such a bold statement without testing, GPS time information doesn't require anything more than one satellite being visible, as the 'time code' doesn't need 'triangulation' as does location.

WWVB is broadcast to the US, with appropriate hardware anyone can pick it up, and is tied to an atomic clock located in Colorado. By locking to the signal, one can maintain highly accurate time.

Whether the iPad IOS software exposes the highly accurate time info from the GPS, and would allow a piece of software to lock to such a time signal, is not known to me, as I've not gotten into
IOS in this direction. But it would be a question to ask of the 'clapper' app developers.

With GPS timing information, one can use multiple transmiters spread over distances to synchronize broadcasts, or with receivers triangulate RF emitters, or RF reflectors, which requires sub microsecond timing.
 
It's all great if it can be pulled off down the road but as I said..
I just like a lil fact mixed in with a post when presented as such.

More importantly is this is all great if you're outside on a road, but good luck picking up the current typical GPS signal when you're inside.

Could that change down the road? sure, but I'll worry about that when I see a working product on the market.
Till then personally I'll stick with gear that is time tested, road worthy gear.

I think there is a ton of gear out there that is ridiculously over priced for what it does because of the market we are in.
A timecode slate isn't one of those in my opinion.
 
Rippie said:
More importantly is this is all great if you're outside on a road, but good luck picking up the current typical GPS signal when you're inside.
Click to expand...

Sounds like another gizmo I could do... damn not enough time... a monitor that displays the PWM characteristics of LED light, and gives
an indication whether there will be 'flicker' in such 'out of the studio' conditions...

And now a gizmo to indicate accurate time, based on synchronizing with a time standard when available, but accurate enough during
unavailability so as to avoid time drift...

Navigation systems do this all the time... it's not rocket science...

Just need a USB/iPad/iPhone adapter interface... a bit of software on the device...
 
j1clark@ucsd.edu said:
While I wouldn't make such a bold statement without testing, GPS time information doesn't require anything more than one satellite being visible, as the 'time code' doesn't need 'triangulation' as does location.

WWVB is broadcast to the US, with appropriate hardware anyone can pick it up, and is tied to an atomic clock located in Colorado. By locking to the signal, one can maintain highly accurate time.

Whether the iPad IOS software exposes the highly accurate time info from the GPS, and would allow a piece of software to lock to such a time signal, is not known to me, as I've not gotten into
IOS in this direction. But it would be a question to ask of the 'clapper' app developers.

With GPS timing information, one can use multiple transmiters spread over distances to synchronize broadcasts, or with receivers triangulate RF emitters, or RF reflectors, which requires sub microsecond timing.
Click to expand...

So many questions about how the iPhone / iPad keep time makes me nervous that the device might try to adjust the free running time within the app.? I don't know - I'm not an electronics engineer or programmer.
 
j1clark@ucsd.edu said:
And now a gizmo to indicate accurate time, based on synchronizing with a time standard when available, but accurate enough during
unavailability so as to avoid time drift...

Navigation systems do this all the time... it's not rocket science...
Click to expand...

All the time? for how long? seconds..mins?
You want hours..and a number of hours at that.

Jamming timecode is the throw away in this.
And thats what a GPS signal would do.

I don't care if the signal is atomic clock time or 5 mins fast
its after you jam and disconnect (or in this case lose signal) that you can count on a frame accurate clock
to keep that intital jam for the hours mentioned.

And if the "unit" you mention cant continuously see an accurate signal via GPS
what you're talking about is a box with an accurate clock already built in.
We have those.
 
Rippie said:
Noiz,
The one thing I would say about your post is you don't actually need a timecode available camera.
(just one that doesn't suck)


FCP has an aux timecode box.

If you freeze frame on any frame with a accurate slate in picture.
Punch in those numbers in the "aux timecode" box

You can now highlight the timecode audio file and the video clip you just punched in and choose "sync using aux timecode"
and the 2 files will now be in ACCURATE sync. Done. Finished.

If you have a non accurate slate (iPad) thats varying 2 frames here, 4 frames there, -2 frames here..etc
It's going to slow you down syncing because every file will need moved a different amount of frames by hand.
If you're doing this for your own project it would just be a headache. If you delivered this to a paying client/post house
they'd probably ring your neck.

The aux timecode syncing inside the editor is an uber time saver compared to doing it by hand...
IFFFFFF you can count on an accurate slate/recorder combo.
Click to expand...

Well OK then. I didn't know that. That would indeed change things a bit. You still need a recorder that can jam to TC or the TC stamps on the sound files will off.
But I would guess that a DSLR would be steady enough for the length of the takes to make this a workable scenario.

Thanks for the correction.
 
The title of this thread makes me think of this:

attachment.php


Sad really...
 
At least on the iPad2, MovieSlate doesn't seem to drift as much as reported in this review.

We have a Denecke SB-3 TC generator and that's our "master". We use the LTC output of Movie Slate to jam-sync the
SB-3 and then let the SB-3 free-run. We re-sync periodically with Movie Slate. If the shot-log produced by Movie Slate
is a couple of frames off, we don't much care .. but we would not consider using Movie Slate as the LTC master.

Knowing Denecke is working on an iPad app is very intriguing. Either way, I think the ability to get an FCP XML file
out of Movie Slate is a big time saver.

jeff
 
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