HVX Frame Rate Voodoo!

A

AronCAmp

New member
I recently shot 720p/24-Native (Varicam-like 24p) to P2 cards. Upon transferring the data directly from camera to hard drive via Firewire, the resulting files became 59.94p.

Uh, how do I get my nifty Native 24p back? I need to composite it with 24p DVX footage.

I'm on a PC, using Vegas 6c, and even after managing to open the dreaded 59.94p MXF files in Raylight, Vegas can't seem to reshuffle them correctly.

Focus Enhancements has "DV File Converter Pro 2.0" which, according to them, is "sold exclusively through authorized Panasonic dealers only".

Assuming that this application exists, will IT get my 24p back?

Thanks in advance, every little bit helps. I'm staring at a nasty pile of MXF files in a funky folder hierarchy, unfortunately, ON A PC. I rented the camera, and no longer have the data on P2 cards.

- Aron

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Aron Campisano
The Master Plan
http://www.myspace.com/themasterplanfilm
"God has a wonderful plan for your life..."
 
Did you shoot "native" or not? Varicam-like would imply 720/24p, not 720/24pN.

Sounds like you shot 720/24P.

Had you shot 720/24PN, the files would be recorded as 24fps, and Raylight would make a 24fps file from it.

720/24P mode is Varicam style, meaning a 60p data stream with 24fps embedded using 2:3 frame duplication.

If that's what you did, I, uh... don't know exactly how to go from 60p to remove the pulldown for 24p.

Sounds like something Marcus could add to Raylight perhaps without too much effort; I wonder if he's considered doing so?
 
Hmmm. I was under the impression that shooting 720/24pN (native) file data was Varicam-like and did not involve pulldown like other 24p schemes, which is why I intended to shoot that.

However, I only got 8 minutes per card, so I may well have shot 720/24p (over 60p). I rented the camera, so I don't have it handy to quadruple check (nor do I have the original P2 cards).

Bottom line is, I appear to have 59.94p on my hard drive, and I need to restore that to 24p.

Raylight sees it as 59.94 and does not offer to convert it to anything except more 59.94.

- Aron

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Aron Campisano
The Master Plan - Coming Soon
http://www.myspace.com/themasterplanfilm
"God has a wonderful plan for your life..."
 
Well, the confusion is that Varicam-style means that there IS pulldown. 24pN makes no pulldown, it records only the raw frames.

But if you were getting 8 minutes per card, then that means you shot "over 60", which is Varicam mode.

FCP has a frame rate converter that should be able to extract just the frames that are legit. I don't know about a PC-based tool that can do it yet, although it would seem to be a fairly simple task.
 
Ah, thanks. I thought it was the other way around with Varicam.

Looks like I can hack 24p from 59.97p MXF files on the PC by:

1. A Raylight 59.94 MXF conversion to AVI

2. Reshuffling the frames to "48p" in TMPGEnc and converting a TMPGEnc project file in VFAPI to AVI.

3. Doubling the playback speed in Vegas 6 while disabling resampling and all interlacing options... then rendering to 24p.

This seems to mean that if you have P2 cards and a PC... find a Mac running the latest/greatest FCP and extract the file data from there.

- Aron

--------------------
Aron Campisano
The Master Plan - Coming Soon
http://www.myspace.com/themasterplanfilm
"God has a wonderful plan for your life..."
 
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