Advice for a music video with Canon HV30

ClipMan wrote on 5/5/2009, 11:36 AM
Hi,

This is a ONE camera shoot in a studio setting. There is a a pre-recorded soundtrack which will be fed into the camera for easy sync. There are 8 actors pretending to sing and play instruments all within a space of 20 by 25 feet. It's tight but it's all I have. The performance is 5 minutes long. I plan to storyboard and break down the shoot into approximately twenty separate segments. The overall lighting will be intentionally subdued. I will position camera and lighing for each segment. The camera shoots HDV mini-tape and has a 30fps frame mode (in addition to 24p and 60i) . Overall 1920x1080p . All output will be for DVD, the Web and maybe Blueray. No broadcast. I'll be capturing through Vegas 8 or 9. All segment transitions will be straight cuts on the beat. No fades or fx anywhere.

Should I shoot at 24p or 30 or directly as widescreen DVD or HD? Vegas will have to take care of any resampling. Does anyone have any advice for this minimalist shoot? It would be greatly appreciated. TIA in advance.

Comments

musicvid10 wrote on 5/5/2009, 11:49 AM
Shoot in the same aspect ratio and frame rate as your finished DVD will be.
If all you will be shooting for is a DVD, you can shoot SD DV. If there is a chance you will be producing HD content, then shoot HD.
Simple enough?
rs170a wrote on 5/5/2009, 12:03 PM
I'd personally shoot HD because you have the flexibility to zoom in on the shot if you're editing in SD.

Shoot the whole song on a locked-down cover shot a few times.
Then shoot each band member (once again,. on a locked down shot) separately as they go through the entire song.
THEN shoot anything else you want.
Unless there are specific lighting changes, don't change anything once you start shooting.
I did a shoot a year ago with some students who thought a few lighting changes would add to the video - after they'd shot the master shot without any of these changes.
Needless to say, trying to cut from one shot to another that had a totally different
look to it was an excercise in frustration.
I looked at it as a valuable learning experience for them.
They looked at it as a major PITA :-)

Mike
ClipMan wrote on 5/5/2009, 12:14 PM
"Simple enough?"

Well, almost maybe. If I shoot HD 1920x1080 and need to downsample later to an SD DVD Widescreen template, will there be any surprises aside from a smaller frame? I'm thinking about aspect ratio.
ClipMan wrote on 5/5/2009, 12:29 PM
"Shoot the whole song on a locked-down cover shot a few times."

Mike, that's the problem. The actors won't have had much time to rehearse so I'll have to choreograph their moves for each segment. Won't take long. It's not that complicated. I will shoot an "establishing" shot for the intro but after that it's going to be like shooting a three-ring circus. Each actor is doing different moves in each segment.
musicvid10 wrote on 5/5/2009, 1:16 PM
"I'm thinking about aspect ratio. "

There may be some very small differences due to the math involved. Just check "stretch to fill frame" when you render.

This was recently covered here.
sdorshan wrote on 5/5/2009, 3:45 PM
The HV30 shoots in HDV, which is actually 1440x1080, not full 1920x1080.

The aspect ratio is slightly different from widescreen DV. If you want to produce a DVD, add a Pan/Crop to each event (easier to do before you start splitting), right click on the image, and select Match Output Aspect. It will cut the vertical height slightly.

As others have said, definitely shoot in HD. You can fake-zoom somewhat, and it still looks pretty good.

If Vegas' HD performance is too slow, you can render an SD AVI file, edit that, and then select and replace the media with the HD version.
ClipMan wrote on 5/5/2009, 5:15 PM
Thanks everyone for all the input. Much appreciated.


sdorshan,
I looked at the specs again and Canon says it's a "Full HD CMOS Sensor (1920 x 1080)"
teaktart wrote on 5/5/2009, 9:54 PM
The aspect ratio is slightly different from widescreen DV. If you want to produce a DVD, add a Pan/Crop to each event

I have NEVER noticed a difference and would NEVER pan/crop or resize my HDV footage - that would resample everything and compromise image quality. Not necessary !!!
Use the built in DVDA template for your SD DVD in Widescreen 16:9 = (720x480)

Shoot HDV
Edit HDV

Render As:

Output > HDV template 1440x1080 60i AVI for archive
Output> DVDA WS template 720x480 mpeg2 for your SD DVD wide screen
Output> Use WMV, MPEG 4, Mpeg2 - templates for Youtube

My HDV camera shoots 16:9 and I keep everything in that aspect ratio all the way through all editing and rendering.
Keep your best quality all the way through till you are ready to render to the different formats for different playback options - all in 16:9

Eileen
ClipMan wrote on 5/6/2009, 9:01 AM
Eileen (or anyone),

There seems to be some confusion about the HV30 resolution. Here's a Canon forum member's posting:

"As for the resolution, yes, HV30 is 1440, but it's anamorphic. Therefore, it captures the image wide (1920x1080), then squeezes it onto 1440 pixels, and in playback, it expands it back, so what goes in (16x9) comes out the same."

So the question is do I use the Vegas 1440 or the 1920 template for HDV?
rs170a wrote on 5/6/2009, 9:18 AM
Go into Project Properties and click the Match Media Settings icon (looks like a folder).
Browse to the folder where you have your footage saved, click on any one of the files and click Open.
If what's now displayed in the Properties window is different than any standard template, save it under a new name.
This way, your timeline will match your project properties and should result in minimal grief during editing.

Mike
John_Cline wrote on 5/6/2009, 9:48 AM
Use the HDV templates, which is 1440x1080 with a PAR (pixel aspect ratio) of 1.333333. When you render for DVD, use the DVD Architect widescreen template. If you're rendering for the web or a computer, then render at a 16:9 ratio using a PAR of 1.0. You can use one of the 16:9 image sizes in the chart below. (Preferably something in the "Best (16)" column.)



teaktart wrote on 5/6/2009, 10:28 AM
Thanks John for the great size charts, very helpful...

I understand the confusion between 1920x 1080 and 1440 x 1080 PAR (pixel aspect ratio)

But notice that in the settings for 1920x1080 the PAR = 1.0
With 1440 x 1080 the PAR = 1.333 which means the pixels are a different aspect ratio.

However, if you take the 1440 x 1.333PAR = 1920 ! so your software will encode that 1440x1.333 PAR and you end up with a full screen size@ 1920 x1080

So as John says just use the HDV 1440 templates which have the 1.333 PAR built in and you will get the best results possible from your camera footage.
ClipMan wrote on 5/6/2009, 10:58 AM
Great, I know what to do now. Thank you all so much for your time.
Yoyodyne wrote on 5/6/2009, 12:42 PM
teaktart and John Cline are right on.

Also, I cast my vote for 24p :)