Conversion

krayzeeman wrote on 9/6/2004, 7:16 PM
Trying to hunt down a simple numerical conversion...

Movie Studio puts the time markings in a "minute, second, _______" format. I can only decipher that the blanks are "frame" number.

Call it a lack of math ability, but I am wondering how I can get that number converted to "second" measurement with a reasonable amount of accuracy.

Can anyone help?

Comments

GerryLeacock wrote on 9/6/2004, 8:04 PM
29.97 frames = 1 second (NTSC)
25.00 frames = 1 second (PAL)
Former user wrote on 9/7/2004, 9:00 AM
Just a quick reference,

10 frames = 1/3 second
15 frames = 1/2 second
20 frames = 2/3 second
30 frames = 1 second

(or 29.97 = 1 second to be exact, but you can round it off)
gogiants wrote on 9/7/2004, 11:26 AM
I've always been curious about that "29.97" thing. Why not 30? Or 29 for that matter? Must be some interesting background there!
Former user wrote on 9/7/2004, 12:20 PM
Quick explanation. B& W TV was 30fps. When color was created, they had to create space to put in the color information. As a result, it slowed the video down to 29.97fps.

Dave T2
Chienworks wrote on 9/7/2004, 12:53 PM
And, if you're really curious, the frame rate is actually 30000/1001, not 30 x 999/1000. This means that the speed is 29.9700299700299700299700..., which is just a tiny bit faster than 29.97. As far as we know, SONY's media software is the only sub $10,000 system to get this correct.
gogiants wrote on 9/7/2004, 1:49 PM
Excellent! So now we can quantify that Movie Studio is at least .0000299700299700299700 better than Pinnacle Studio!
IanG wrote on 9/7/2004, 3:41 PM
>As far as we know, SONY's media software is the only sub $10,000 system to get this correct.

As well as being several orders of magnitude more accurate than an atomic clock! That's value for money!

Ian G.
Former user wrote on 9/8/2004, 7:33 AM
But n the overall scheme of things, snce I can play video from any software in this or any other Sony package, what difference does this really make?

Dave T2
Chienworks wrote on 9/8/2004, 8:57 AM
It does make a difference if you are working on frame-critical animations and moving the files from one editing application to another. If you have 29.97fps files created in other software and bring them in to Movie Studio you'll see an occasional frame get doubled since the frame rate doesn't match Movie Studio's playback rate. True, this should only happen once every 9 hours, 16 minutes, 6 seconds, and 22 frames or so, but for some odd reason the first occurrence happens in the first 12 seconds. It's not a good way to make a professional first impression. Telling your critical audience that it won't happen again for at least another 9 hours isn't much consolation. On the other hand, folks working in Movie Studio probably aren't worried about pleasing such critical audiences. It has been the topic of rather heated discussion in the Vegas forums though.