opinions/help re:Sony V1U camera 24p

ddm wrote on 9/15/2009, 1:33 PM
I'm just about to start on a project that is going to be shot on a couple of Sony V1u cameras. It will be a 24p (hd) project and I was wondering what experiences others have had with this camera. The producer owns the cameras but he has never done a 24p project with it. Has anyone used this camera for 24p? Any opinions on the workflow, I've read up on the camera but since I've never used one I'd like to know what to expect as far as workflow issues. Specifically, the 3/2 pulldown and when and how that happens, and how Vegas deals with the progressive frames. Thanks for any help.

Comments

CClub wrote on 9/15/2009, 3:28 PM
My primary camera is a V1U. I LOVE the 24p HDV look from the V1U. I must say up front though that I use the Cineform intermediate software to address the pulldown. I don't believe that Cineform is required, and from what I understand Vegas can address it independently (I have to use it because my second camera is a Canon HV20 which has a 24p mode but Vegas doesn't recognize it).

You should be able to download a V1U manual online or find the workflow for setting up the camera for 24p. There is only one actualy setting to change in Menu options that I recall offhand (Menu, CAMERA SET, Prog Scan, 24P). 24p will also affect lighting/exposure settings/etc. differently than video speed.

Re workflow: if you're going to be using Cineform, I can give you that workflow. Otherwise, others here may know the workflow with just Vegas re pulldown.

If you're new to taping in 24p, you may know all this already but action shots are very tricky, camera movement needs to be very slow, etc. Much of this has been said here and elsewhere.
ddm wrote on 9/15/2009, 6:06 PM
Thanks. Do you use the 24pA mode or just 24p? I read that the "A" variant allows cineform to be able to batch all clips. Not sure how dated that material is where I read that though.
CClub wrote on 9/16/2009, 2:16 PM
The 24pA mode has a different purpose... I recall reading somewhere that for standard 24p, it's not the setting you want. The only additional comment made in the manual for 24pA: "When recording in HDV format, the phase of the 60i conversion is reset each time recording starts." That never mattered to me, as typically I'm taping concerts or long interview where I don't stop recording until the end of the tape, so it seemed like an irrelevant option to me.
farss wrote on 9/16/2009, 7:28 PM
My understanding is that the difference between 24p and 24pA is that with 24p it's impossible to completely remove the pulldown. With 24pA it is possible however if you don't intend to remove pulldown in order to edit on a 24p timeline then 24pA introduces an additional judder to motion.
So I believe you should first determine how you intend to edit this footage and the final 'look'. Removing pulldown and editing on a 24p timeline gets you as close ti the mythical 'film' look as you'll get. If that's what you want then shoot 24pA.
If you want the look of a midday soap then you shoot 24p and edit on a 60i T/L. This causes all FXs and transition to render at 60i which partially blows away the 'film' look.

My gut feeling is if faced with the choice I'd go for the whole 'film' look thing. That yields frame that are always discrete, throwing interlaced elements into the mix may cause grief later down the track.

Bob.
ddm wrote on 9/16/2009, 8:54 PM
What I was reading about 24pA was that it allowed for software to find the 00 frame as each time the camera starts there is a timecode reset (as it were) that lets editing software know where the 1st frame of a sequence is to apply the proper sequence of stripping out of frames in the 2/3 pulldown process. Most of what I found online was geared toward how Final Cut handled V1U 24p footage. The most recent articles I found talked about FCP version 6.02 so I'm not sure if Apple hasn't already changed their approach to editing V1U 24p footage. I've yet to see any mention of how Vegas deals with it natively, my guess is since it's a Sony camera, it works better than fcp.

My preference is probably going to be 24 frame on a 24 frame timeline, that's the look I think everyone wants on this project, so I assume i should be using 24pA.
farss wrote on 9/17/2009, 2:17 PM
I'm simply going on what I learned from the DVX100 days when Vegas was the only NLE that could edit 24p. If you want confirmation of what I think it all means you could dig deep into posts on this forum and even the Knowledgebase articles.
What I'm uncertain about is my understanding is based on what happened with DV, I've not seen this topic discussed regarding HDV.

Bob.
johnmeyer wrote on 9/17/2009, 2:37 PM
If anyone wants to post 2-3 seconds of 24pa and also 24p from this camera, I have the tools to analyze both and will then be able to tell you exactly what the differences in pulldown might be. Make sure to post footage which includes reasonably strong horizontal motion (i.e., I can't tell anything from a static head shot).
rs170a wrote on 9/17/2009, 6:10 PM
Free white papers from SCS:
24p and Panasonic AG-DVX100 and AJ-SDX900
24p HDCAM/DVCAM

Mike
CClub wrote on 9/17/2009, 7:56 PM
I'd love to provide samples of both to you, Johnmeyer, but currently my V1U is on the blink and heading for the shop.

DDM, I'd highly recommend taping at least a few minutes in each mode of various scenarios that you'll encounter in your project, load them into Vegas, and see how you feel about each look. Nothing worse than setting up lighting, sound, etc/etc, getting back home, loading the footage, and realizing you goofed on a camera setting and it looks completely different from how you planned (been there....).
ddm wrote on 9/18/2009, 10:49 AM
CClub, agreed. Since I don't have the camera I need to get the producer to shoot some footage so we can test the look.
ddm wrote on 9/18/2009, 11:00 AM
I just thought of something else, if we shoot on a Sony V1U in 24p, do I need to use the V1U to ingest? Or will any HDV deck or camera pass along all the information? Hmmmm. Seems like it should, since it's all data, but...
Laurence wrote on 9/18/2009, 1:55 PM
You'll need a 24p capable camera or deck. Most likely you'll end up using the V1U. Yes it does matter.
Seth Bloombaum wrote on 9/22/2009, 6:26 PM
I recently did my first shooting in 24p on the V1U. Been avoiding it for several years, but was shooting for yoyodyne and he's all about 24p.

My understanding: 24pa starts a new pulldown cadence at the beginning of every shot. That sounds good for later pulldown removal and is what I used.

Ingest from the V1 in Vegas Pro 8.0c HDV capture seemed smooth with scene detection. I set up a 24p project, and pulldown removal was automatic, and had good full framerate at best/full preview. At that point I thought this whole 24p workflow was easy.

However, I later saw that some clips were dropping frames like mad in best/full, (most were fine). Traced this down to some of the clips identified as 60i, which is visible in one of the last columns of the project media detail list, and in clip properties. So, the bad playback rates were due to Vegas resampling 60i to 24p.

Finding no way to edit this file header info (anybody know one?), I did some recapturing. This took 2 or 3 times per clip to get it right, but it did work.

This was just last Thursday - Yoyo is probably editing right now... a cyclocross bicycle race.