It's 25fps, which is going to make fast pans like that tricky.

In my mind, though, the issue with that particular footage isn't actually too much blur between frames - it's the lack of the correct amount of blur. You actually have more total detail in each frame than you want, giving the final video the look of a series of stuttering motionless snapshots, particularly due to the highly detailed background. For smooth natural motion at 25fps, you would've had to lock the shutter speed to 1/50th (which would likely require a neutral density filter).

I suspect a larger aperture to naturally blur out the background would've helped with the perception of smooth motion, but to ensure a higher level of detail in your foreground subjects would require a much slower pan at 25fps.

One final thought - was the original footage perhaps 50fps that has been dropped to 25fps by discarding frames?

Looks to me like the opposite of what you are saying. I see a shutter speed that is too fast. Thus there isn't the blur that is needed to make the motion appear smooth. Believe it or not, in this case I would say this is a good thing. The reason being that short shutter speed video stabilizes really well with Mercalli or the Deshaker script. I would try stabilizing it with Mercalli. I believe that a light version of this software comes free with Vegas. I would start there. That or upload this raw clip somewhere where one of us can stabilize it for you.

Where was this shot? It looks interesting. I have an East Africa documentary (I was the main camera guy for the Africa footage) that was finished recently and is starting to be shown, so this type of thing is particularly close to my heart:

givetolivethemovie.com

I would love to discuss shooting technique for this sort of thing if you are interested. I've done several mission trip things and have a few things I do in this context that I've never really seen described.

I'm seeing the same problem discussed recently in this thread: pan tilts stuttering on rendering..

I don't think there is a solution for web delivery other than re-shooting with a slower pan. Using Chrome for a browser seems to help, but it's not perfect.

...Jerry

I agree Laurence, looks like shutter too fast. Causing a strobe like effect on movement rather than smooth.
Just as a note to the OP, we always aim for a 50th sec when shooting 25p (pal land) thats 180 degrees in the film world. But sometimes to get the right exposure this gets changed and you get results like this. Exposures need to be changed in other ways, like NDs or simply with aperture control.
Also, as Jerry points out, i had similar problems with pans and tilts causing jerky motion or 'strobing'. It seems to be a combination of camera moving a bit too fast and web delivery. You just have to go easy at 25p, slow pans and tilts needed. But the web delivery causes its own set of problems even with well shot footage. So take a look at the original render file, not the youtube player, when deciding if its you, or youtube at fault :)

Paul.

The short shutter speeds look juddery on any movement, but the positive thing about them is they stabilize really. Traditional shutter rates of half the frame rate are nice on a tripod or with smooth movement, but that pretty motion blur isn't so pretty when it was caused by shake that has been corrected and is no longer in a direction that has anything to do with the movement. I will actually use fast shutters on purpose if I think the shot is going to be stabilized later on with Mercalli.

On tripod fast pans with a fast shutter I find I can keyframe in some linear blur on the axis of the motion, but with handheld stuff that goes in all directions that trick doesn't work.

After stabilizing, he could try Twixtor or ReSpeedr. Another trick if it is 30p is to slow it down 20% and render it out to 24p. I would still stabilize it first though.

Another trick that can work wonders is to use Mercalli SAL as if it was 60i on 30p footage. This will stabilize and actually generate in between even and odd fields that can really mask judder. I found that one out by accident because Mercalli SAL 3.0 will do this if you have a camera that shoots 30p in a 60i AVCHD wrapper (basically most of the new AVCHD cameras). In fact, that is why I don't use Mercalli SAL 3. Because I can't stop it from doing this on my GH3 AVCHD footage. You actually have control of this in SAL 2 or the plugin version though and it can do absolute wonders with juddery progressive footage.

When this Mercalli generated Interlace is run through the decomb in Handbrake it turns into surprisingly good looking motion blur that is only on the moving parts of the frame.

TEETIME

Your suggestion worked well when used in conjunction with the with the Mercalli v3 Program!

This is my work order:

1
I re-rendered it at 60 frames per second. (I didn't force resampling as this produced some ghosting, instead I turned resampling off)

2
I put the rendered footage through Mercalli. The settings:

Glide camera selected
Pan shot smoothing - 100%
Avoid border on - 1%

All other settings OFF

Here's the result!



Much better!

It's not perfect, but I can now use my precious footage!

Thanks to all you guys!

SUNFLUX

Hi Sunflux, thanks for the support. I managed a marked improvement, detailed in my response to Teetime!

The original footage was shot at 25fps, with a shutter speed of 1/60th. Feel free to ask me any questions!

LAURENCE

Hi Laurence, I'm happy to discuss technique anytime!

The footage It was shot in a town called Iganga, situated in Uganda. It was at the local orphanage. I'm putting together a film for the charity Tools for Self Reliance.

Here is the charity's website:

http://tfsrnorthampton.co.uk/

AMENDEGW

Found a partial solution, please read my other replies!

Didn't know that the browser can affect playback quality, thanks!

PAUL W

I was recording at with the shutter at 60th a second at 25fps. Next time, I'll go for the 50th.

Thanks!

I would love to have a go at the raw footage. Can you post it with a link, either to this forum or to me privately?

A fiftieth of a second vs a sixtieth is going to make just a small amount of difference. More important is to really move the camera very slowly. With progressive I shoot almost everything on a tripod with a fluid head and only the slowest of movements. I realize that you can't just go back to Uganda.

I think the biggest issue here is due to the bright, detailed background; it just makes the whole thing more obvious. But, the rule of thumb is typically twice your framerate for ideal results - 24fps = 1/48th, 25fps = 1/50th, 30fps = 1/60th and so forth... or at least as close as you can get.

For example on my Canon 5D MkII, when I shoot 24fps I have to live with 1/50th framerate, but honestly the difference is minimal - 20.0ms vs 20.8ms. However 1/60th vs 1/50th might actually be visible - you're talking 16.7ms per frame versus 20.0ms.

If you watch an animated movie done at 24fps with fast pans across scenes - pause it and go frame by frame and you might be amazed at how much blur there is to make that smooth looking.

Watching it in 720p full screen and giving YT time stop dropping frames it looks as expected. The fundamental problem is you're moving the camera around too quickly for 25fps. Stabilizing is going to help a bit but sorry to say you just need to realise that anything under 30 fps means some serious limits on how you can wave the camera around.

Sticking my head in a noose here:
Give your audience time to see what you want them to see. If you cannot make up your mind what you want them to see waving the camera around like a firehouse is not the answer.

Bob.

FARSS

Come on, you have to admit, that footage stabilized really well!!

I'll post the web addresses of the two videos again for your information:

Before stabilization



After stabilization



Check t it out!

LAURENCE

Hi Laurence, it's okay, I'll edit it myself. However, I would like to show you the finished product when it's done, and would really appreciate your feedback! Since this film depends on timings as to when I can record particular people, it will be finished by the end of the year.

And thanks for all your help.

[I]" Come on, you have to admit, that footage stabilized really well!! "[/I]

Watching the stabilized footage at 720p on my PC down here and after letting it play several times it exhibited a lot of "cogging" i.e. the motion was jerky.

From my experience getting great shots from that type of setting is patience. I just set the camera up on a tripod and leave it recording. Once you start trying to chase shots you invariably miss the good ones. As you were waving the camera around I briefly saw what could have been great shots. It's not unheard of for such work to have a shooting ratio of much greater than 10:1.

Bob.

"Really well" isn't how I would call it. Better, yes. But hose-piping is extremely poor technique and there are no excuses for it.

i'm sorry, but that was truly awful footage. i'd be ashamed posting for anyone to see, well certainly not in a professional forum anyway.

A few years ago my wife lead a non-profit mission trip into Ecuador giving out backpacks full of school supplies to poor elementary school age children. I couldn't get the time off so she took my camera (a Sony VX2000 at that time) with the idea that her uncle would shoot the video. He was a nice guy who had shot some family video on a camcorder. That was the extent of his experience. Worse yet, while I had put the camera in fully auto for the most part, I'd forgotten to put the lens back into auto.

What I got back was footage that was pretty bad. It was the typical "guy standing in one place pointing at everything" kind of shooting, and it was all to different degrees out of focus. Very fast movement and unbelievably shaky as well.

My wife absolutely insisted that I had to make a workable promo video out of this. Otherwise I would have simply given up. I hadn't been doing video very long at the time.

Anyway, I posted some unedited video here (that was worse than what the original poster linked to) and got some really helpful replies. This was before Mercalli, so I used the Deshaker script. Douglas Spotted Eagle gave me some tips on how to deal with the out of focus shots: layering the same thing twice, turning up the sharpening on the bottom layer, then fading the top layer for the best compromise. By the time it was done, it didn't look half bad. Nothing like what I shoot now, but servicable.

Anyway, that is why I wanted to have a go at the footage. Not to edit it, but just to come up with a recipe that would bring out the best possible outcome given the rough current state.

Many of us have overcome some pretty challenging raw material in the past, and each time I do I have learned valuable skills. I've fixed stuff that was underexposed, shaky, out of focus, had distorted audio, high amounts of background noise, and made a passable end product out of stuff that initially seemed unsalvageable.

Yeah, the footage is rough, but come on, it's in Uganda. There has to be a way to make it presentable.

Pardon my confusion about this:

"But, the rule of thumb is typically twice your framerate for ideal results - 24fps = 1/48th, 25fps = 1/50th, 30fps = 1/60th and so forth... or at least as close as you can get."

How does a shorter then framerate shutter improve "strobbing" of the video? I thought that if the shutter is shorten then the framerate then the temporal space between two frames is bigger and that is what causes strobbing?