C100: Can we start demanding proper 48p on cinema cameras?

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drummondb

Well-known member
Speaking as a fellow who likes to frequently mix 60p and 24p footage on a 24 timeline, wouldn't my life, and those similar to me, be much easier if we could do like our PAL brethren? In PAL land, it would seem to be very easy to mix 50p and 25p in the same project. You can slow down 50p to 25p for lovely 2x slow motion, and if you changed your mind on a file, or made a mistake while recording, you could drop a 50p shot on a 25p timeline at regular speed. Your NLE would throw out every other frame, and you can add a touch of extra motion blur to help the 1/100th shutter look like a 1/50th shutter.

As of now, if I accidentally shoot something at 60p instead of 24p, or if I decide later I'd prefer part of a 60p shot to play back regular speed at 24p, there doesn't seem to be any easy way to make that look nice.

I know the C300/II allows 48p recording, but aside from the fact there are many times I'd rather use a C100 instead, the 48p on the C300/II seems rather crippled--it disables dual slot and proxy recording, it disables DP auto focus, and it disables sound (actually, was the sound thing fixed two firmware updates ago? I can't keep up).

That seems to me like saying, "Yes this car will shift to 4th gear between 3rd and 5th, but only one tire will spin, the headlights won't work, and you won't be able to steer."

Will you all join me in demanding what this world really needs right now above all else--Proper 48p!
 
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I concur, but mostly because it appears that certain hollywood forces are trying to make 48p a standard in the future.

Also, I suggest shooting 60p (and future 48p) at a 360 degree shutter angle. It makes it much easier to drop it into a 24p or 30p timeline or slow down even more in post. Plus, since slow motion is already intended to look somewhat unnatural and have a reduced amount of motion blur, it really isn't much of an issue for the viewer.

Isn't the 60/30/24p standard more due to hardware and software limitations than anything else?
 
I think, especially in Canon's case, it's just a matter of consumer television standards. In NTSC world, common standards are 60i, 60p, 24p, etc. In old PAL land, it's 25, 50, etc. Why would they give us a regular 48p option when that isn't a broadcast or display standard? The answer is of course, because for those using 60p for slomo instead of intending to actually show their work at 60p, 48p makes more sense in some cases (easily changing 48p to 24p for one).

The 360 shutter idea is interesting to me because it seems adding motion back IN isn't as tough as say taking away motion blur.

Does anyone have a decent way to convert 60p to 24p at regular speed? One approach I've been using is to re-render the 60p files to 24p using optical flow in Premiere, and then I take that new 24p file as add some blur back in with the ReelSmart Motion Blur plugin. Problem is sometimes it works perfectly, and sometimes optical flow introduces interpolation errors.

I haven't bought twixtor yet, and it looks like while in AE there are some frame rate conversion settings, though it looks like it is also based on optical flow which is now free in Premiere. There do seem to be more settings obviously, so maybe with some tweaking it would be possible to minimize interpolation errors.

There also seem to be some specialized services who offer high quality 60p to 24p conversion, and will even add blur to approximate the look of a 1/48th shutter. Companies like Isovideo and Cinnafilm’s Tachyon.

Anyone ever use those companies, and does anyone have a good workflow for decent regular speed 60p to 24p?
 
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drummondb said:
You you all join me in demanding what this really needs right now above all else--Proper 48p!
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While you're at it, you may as well petition to adopt the metric system as well!

Tongue in cheek, of course; though I do love that we (ie, and pretty much the entire rest of the world) have the easy-to-use 25p/50p/50i standards.
 
drummondb said:
Eventually, even Canon listens. They listened to 24p, zebras, peaking, 60p, etc...
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While I really like Canon products, based upon my experience, they rarely listen to buyers directly. They seem to more follow the leaders which would be Sony and Panasonic. Pansonic, in my experience, actually gives buyers what they asked for in a timely manner, followed by Sony, then Canon at the rear, following what the others do.
 
I'm assuming this was why they shot the Hobbit at 48p instead of 50p or 60p: so they could easily make a 24p conversion by just adding motion blur. Not that I liked the idea or thought it looked good.
 
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