Freeze Frame

My version is Final Cut Express HD 4 and it is on a G5 mac with dual hard drive and plenty of memory
The issue is I freeze a frame and it looks fine but when I export it to DVD and watch it on the TV the frame is shaking ( pressumable playing 2 frames back and forth over and over ) This has happened before and I believe it is just an issue of where within the frame I freeze it but Im not sure how to go about fixing it. If some one has the answers Id greatly apprieciate it. My email is jaberardi1@aol.com or I suppose you can reply to the forum

As you are making one frame from two different interlaced frames of 1/2 of the frame, it is very possible to get the frame with an interlaced jump. You can use FCE to deinterlace a freeze frame. Sometimes it is good to find the aproximate frame you want to freeze and use the left-right arrow keys to select the very best looking one before freezing. If that frame is still twitchy, use the Deinterlace effect.

Welcome to the tricks that Final Cut uses to get the Canvas to work.

Each television *Frame* is made up of two television *Fields* separated very briefly by time. You get two low rez pictures (fields) that when added up, produce a normal, crisp, standard rez frame.

The canvas view consistently throws one of the two fields away and re-samples what's left to fit your screen. If you're left watching one quarter of the original television signal I'll be amazed.

As you found, you get killed when there is motion in your still capture. The two fields didn't come from the same instant in time and later--when you can actually see what you're doing--the two vibrate back and forth 30 times a second (in the US).

DeInterlacing the original image damages the picture. I'm sorry, it just does. It solves the problem because it mushes together the two fields to eliminate the differences and thus the "vibration" later.

You can deinterlace three ways; field one, field two, or both. The two field techniques work like the canvas does. They throw half the picture resolution away. The third, smashes the two fields together and eliminates the differences--and the sharpness.

The Grand Winner Best way to do this is pick a television frame in your project with no motion.

This is where we jump up and down and tell you to get an external glass television monitor connected to your Mac as that is the best and fastest way to see what you're doing.

Koz

"...pick a television frame in your project with no motion."

How do you do that? I'm not sure what you mean.

John & Eric,
You need to have a TV or (even better) a broadcast video monitor hooked up to your FCP System - as you work - in order to see this anomaly before it ever gets burned to disk. When you see a "shaking image" - just deinterlace it.

This is what the pros call: Monitoring Your Video. Guess what? Most self trained FCP newbs don't monitor. Whoops....

You don't monitor? Well then, I see a lot of DVD Coasters in your future. ;-)



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>>"...pick a television frame in your project with no motion."
How do you do that? I'm not sure what you mean.<<

When you choose a frame to capture, make sure that the place that you stop and take the frame from is not in the middle of a camera move, and that there's no high action happening onscreen.

It's true that you can't see if the picture needs de-interlacing in FCP without an external monitor, but often you can open it in Photoshop and see immediatly that the picture is kind of 'split'. You can then deinterlace it in photoshop and re-import the FCP. Much quicker if you can tell in FCP via your monitor, but not life threatening stuff.