HPX500 with KiPro Settings and other questions

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Getting close to a feature film that I will be the DP for. We have pretty much settled on the idea of using the HPX500 with the KiPro.

We will be shooting in 1080p 24 with the Canon Anamorphic adapter and Fujinon Digital Primes....

The big question is:

What format are we setting for the signal for the HD-SDI out? The KiPro will be set to capture the highest bit rate and settings but on the HPX500 should we be shooting 24p or 24pA ?? Does it make a difference? Is the HD-SDI not affected by switching the settings from the camera in 24p to 24pA ?

Since it is a feature film I was going to shoot in 24pA on the P2 cards for ease of getting true 24 frames for a film-out. BUT I had no idea if setting it to pA will actually affect anything that is coming out of the HD-SDI signal. Any help would be wonderful.
 
Bump: anyone have any idea if 24pA affects the HD-SDI out?

Jan would you know?
 
still no one with any input? hmm did I stump you guys? lol
 
is it really only 8 bit? that's not good, I could have sworn it was 10.... oh well... either way we want to avoid the P2 cards and have native Prores drag and drop so even at 8 bit, we don't have to worry as much about all of that, we like shooting to a hard drive instead of swapping cards.


Either way the PA info is very hard to find, I would love to know what is actually coming out of the HD-SDI now, because there IS a difference in post work if the output is only a 24P and not pA
 
I just did this test with the HPX-500, which only outputs 1080i60 over the SDI connector in 24PA mode. The Ki Pro was not able to remove the pulldowndown, nor does final cut. So you are stuck with an interlaced pro-res file at 29.97fps

I'm looking for ways around this, but that was my test yesterday
 
A different way to do this would be to get a Nanoflash which is supposed to be able to remove the pull down from the 60i stream, Of course then you are not recording Pro Rez but Sony Long Gop.
As for whether you want to shoot 24P or 24PA if ou really want a 24 timeline then shoot PA which should have a different pulldown cadence added to the 60i stream than 24P. This may bother you as the movement will not look as smooth but should make it easier to remove.
 
My belief is that the HD SDI output can only output 720/60P or 1080/60i, as these are the only HD transmission formats. However, you can have 24P(23.98P) over 720/60P or 24P(23.98P) over 1080/60i. In the case of 1080/60i, the progressive 24P frame is made into two progressive segmented fields(Psf) to be compatible with transmission specs, tape specs and CRT monitors. It is still a progressive frame once it is reassembled in post with no interlace artifacts.

23.98PA cadence should be available over 1080/60i. Make sure the NLE settings reflect PA cadence.

Most feature films are shot 23.98P, not 24.00P, even with film out. 24.00P is really for combining video cameras with film cameras on-set.

Regarding Ki Pro, I prefer recording on P2 cards in AVC-Intra vs. external deck with spinning drives. I hope Ki Pro can drop frames for Native recording. AVC-Intra is a true Progressive, Native format with no concern for legacy transmission or tape format requirements. It is also MPEG4 based vs. MPEG 2, so theoretically twice as efficient. Obviously the HPX500 doesn't have Intra.

I would PM Barry Green for more information on your preferred workflow.
 
It seems like we are now going with a NanoFlash over the Ki Pro. So it is my understanding that the output stream will be 1080/60i out of the HD-SDI... The NanoFlash will automatically see that it is 60i and set it to that setting. Does anyone know if it will allow me to set the nano to 23.98p even thought the stream is 60i?

I personally would rather go to the P2 cards and forget about the Nano at this point, only because I am worried about the problems above. But the client does not want the lower bit rate of 100mbit and wants 220mbit from the nano. I do understand his concern as for we will be shooting a feature film, and more info is better, and we are shooting a bunch of green screen and vfx shots. I just hope this process wont end up giving us a headache for the above mentioned issues with 60i to 23.98p

anyone else with insight? We wont be able to test until we are already in pre-production, and I would like to have more info before I am stuck between a rock and a hard place.
 
Daniel Epstein said:
A different way to do this would be to get a Nanoflash which is supposed to be able to remove the pull down from the 60i stream, Of course then you are not recording Pro Rez but Sony Long Gop.
As for whether you want to shoot 24P or 24PA if ou really want a 24 timeline then shoot PA which should have a different pulldown cadence added to the 60i stream than 24P. This may bother you as the movement will not look as smooth but should make it easier to remove.
Click to expand...

So you are saying if we shoot standared 24p not PA the pulldown will be a normal 24p stream? I understand that the moment for the PA will not look correct and I have a feeling for client/producer reasons and onset looking, that may create some worried people for a month long shoot... I am not the editor but I would opt for the 24p over the PA if it seems the workflow with PA will be more intense and the images during normal playback will be "ghosted" with that weird motion we are talking about.

Any thoughts on this?
 
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Giuseppe Pugliese said:
The NanoFlash will automatically see that it is 60i and set it to that setting. Does anyone know if it will allow me to set the nano to 23.98p even thought the stream is 60i?
Click to expand...

The only way I see this being possible is if the 60i output has flags embedded in the frames when the camera is set to 23.98 to allow a 2:3 pulldown that the recorder will recognize.
 
Giuseppe,
I think your editor will prefer the 24PA in the Nanoflash. You should check with Convergent Design how to set it up so it extracts the 24 frames from the 60i on the fly. You are right to be concerned about workflow issues with the Nanoflash record rate above 50MB as editing footage at the higher rates and outputting it seems to still a bit of an issue depending on the edit system. I think we are neighbors in NY by the way and maybe we should try and meet. I will send you a message off list.
 
Daniel Epstein said:
Giuseppe,
I think your editor will prefer the 24PA in the Nanoflash. You should check with Convergent Design how to set it up so it extracts the 24 frames from the 60i on the fly. You are right to be concerned about workflow issues with the Nanoflash record rate above 50MB as editing footage at the higher rates and outputting it seems to still a bit of an issue depending on the edit system. I think we are neighbors in NY by the way and maybe we should try and meet. I will send you a message off list.
Click to expand...


Hey thanks, I got your message as well. I have talked to Convergent Design and they actually didn't know much about the HPX500's info at all. I was also shocked to hear that the guy on the phone only could really answer questions about the lower end cameras, such as JVC, Canon, or others, and nothing really in the PRO range. When I asked him about the 2:3 pull down he said yes that is very possible, and the nano should do it just fine, but they have not tested with an HPX500 so he couldn't tell me for sure. When I asked "what about 24PA" he said he didn't know what the difference between P and PA was... That concerned me a bit as well... I don't know if he was the best person to talk to there and I'm sure I could have gotten someone better. I will try again tomorrow. He did tell me this, which could confirm that it does work with the PA settings... he said it will see 2 types of pulldown 3:2 and 2:3:3:2 (PA) so I guess that confirms that the Nano could do it... but the big question is now over to Panasonic...

Jan maybe could answer this?

Does the HPX500 output via the HD-SDI the PA 2:3:3:2 cadence so that another device can see the PA signal instead of just the P signal? If so, I believe that the NanoFlash will absolutely do the right thing and pull down the advanced frames and make for a total native PA recording.


On another note, we have been debating over bitrate's which would be the best bang for our buck... The director wants to shoot at the highest ( 280mbits I-Frame) but I am worried that the 280 will be not much better than the 220 and might just add lots of extra harddrives to our work-flow and not much else... Can anyone give insight as to the help it would be to go all the way up to 280 in regards to green screen, or is 220 to 280 not that large of a jump in information?

Thanks for all the info so far. Once we get the NanoFlash here we will do tons of tests and post footage and info for all of you guys to benefit from.
 
to update this thread, I have since found out that the NanoFlash will work fine with the HPX500. The 500 puts out the PA pulldown info and the Nano understands the pulldown and removes it if you set it to do so.

I will be ordering the one for our shoot soon, and shall post up some 1080p footage as soon as we do.
 
Giuseppe Pugliese said:
to update this thread, I have since found out that the NanoFlash will work fine with the HPX500. The 500 puts out the PA pulldown info and the Nano understands the pulldown and removes it if you set it to do so.

I will be ordering the one for our shoot soon, and shall post up some 1080p footage as soon as we do.
Click to expand...

please do post footage! And give us some news on how you like working with the nanoflash on the 500!
 
Yes, how did the nano/500 combo work out? I was thinking of shooting some green screen 4:2:2 with that combo.

chris
 
Hello,

sorry for the long wait on the updates...

The feature film was canceled due to the director leaving the country

We made it to the testing phase and I have to say it is very nice hooking up the NANO with the hpx500 but I never really got to test anything because the director left just as we started. So im sad to say, I have no test footage available to post.
 
Another update, we have a new film that will be shooting with this setup, will update when more comes down the pipeline.
 
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