Documentary shot on different formats

Hello all,

Great site and Great info on the boards!

I have recently been hired on a documentary that, for budget reasons, was shot half on HD and half on SD (Panasonic DVX 24p).

Just wondering if any editors here have advice on the post process. I know things can be quite delicate when various formats are involved.

Any workflow suggestions? codec suggestions? We have about 60 hours of footage (20 on HD, 40 on MINI-DV).

Thanks. jhusky

Any advice must be based on what you're trying to accomplish. Are you trying to create an HD project that is half standard def... or are you trying to do a SD project that's half HD?

It makes a huge difference in how you move forward.

mark

Just finished one that was shot DVCPRO HD with the Varicam, and incorporated stock footage consisting of DVCAM, PAL VHS and betaSP. Here is what we did.

Captured the DV at DV res. Transferred the PAL VHS to NTSC DV at a dub house, then captured that at DV/NTSC res. Captured the betaSP footage...at DV Res. Then when we edited we resized and rendered all the DV footage we used. We could have captured all the DV footage as DVCPRO HD with the use of the AJ-HD1200 deck, as it does this...either center extraction (cropping the top and bottom) or pillarbox (black on the sides...empty space). But we deemed that a waste of space. We had a LOT of DV footage, and only wanted to convert at the end. PLUS, we wanted to frame the footage, as the Center Extraction sometimes cut off what we needed to see.

This is how we onlined.

[lfhd.blogspot.com]

But you have mixed HD and DV. If you want to work HD, then you can upconvert all the footage via the deck, or with a Kona 3 card. But, as Mark said, what sort of master do you want to end up with? HD or SD?


www.shanerosseditor.com

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The ideal purist workflow for longform brings absolutely everything into a single format for edit. Depending on your hardware, this cna be an offline or online format.

In practice, you either don't have the deck, the storage, time or money. But when I look at mixed- format projects that is my first target-- get as much of it in the most efficient edit format with jam code if available, so it can be a) easily captured, b) easily recaptured from originals, b) archived for future use even if you have to return orignals, whichis often the case.

I've always found it worthwhile to help the producer plan for the initial expense of transfers from VHS, 3/4, DVD, DV, SD or HD etc to a reliable 29.97 format like DVCAM with jam code, for quick offlines, cheap storage, no bottlenecks hooking up noncontrollable devices or hours cueing for analog clips or extracting from disc, etc etc, and no surprises.

Even when the budget doesn't allow for $100/hour transfer house services, I have found it totally worthwhile doing them myself when required, ahead of edit-- the expense being no more than deck rental and DVCAM tape stock plus my daily fee (but be certain the timecode transfers over).

Otherwise, follow above stratgeies.

- Loren
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Thank you all for the wonderful responses

appreciate the expert opinions

We will want to finish this on HD (the final master will be an HDCAM SR)