DVCPRO HD Strobing Problem! Help!!

I am upconverting a documentary to HD. The doc needs to be layed out in DVCPRO HD 1080i 60 29.97. I have captured the original DVCPRO HD tapes which were shot with the Varicam at a 23.98 progressive frame rate through the AJA at 1080i 29.97. The interviews look great but there were also some pictures and new york scenics that were also filmed. That?s where the problem lies. Any shots with motion ? pans, racks, zooms, snaps are very stroby - almost jumpy and skipping frames on the Samsung Plasma HDTV that I am monitoring with. I looked at the footage on a Sharp Aquos and it wasn?t as bad. So Im not sure what to think?

Is there a filter or a plug-in (frame-rate converter) or workaround that can help with this strobe problem. I don?t want to present the piece to the client with the Cold Open being as stroby as it is. That would be a disaster.

Please Help.

Thanks,

Seth Shap

Stroby? Try toggling your field dominance- you should be on upper. I haven't worked on a vari-cam setup yet- is it the one with variable frame rates? Some of these codecs sounds like potential disasters to work on- HDV included (i'm not convinced that a GOP based format can be safely edited).

yes it has variable frame rates and was shot 23.98 fps, so im pretty sure that's where the problem is.

The strobiness, could be a result of a reversed field dominance (because you're in interlaced)....


Ouch!!!! Think i see the problem... You need to capture it on the frame rate that you shot in, AND do the conversion afterwards. AJA doesn't do the conversion for you- it's merely a capture card

so u think capture it in 23.98 and then lay it in a 29.97 timeline and then it will be fine??

Nope! Never convert frame rates in Final cut! it's an editing platform. It's like trying to kill ants with a monkey wrench! you can, but you'll not get optimum results.

I'd recommend you to capture it as 23.98, then send all clips into compressor (i heard cinema tools has an option to convert it, but i'm not sure about that, you'll have to check)... But yea, capture your clips in 23.98, convert all the clips to 29.97fps, then start editing.

Your 2nd option is to capture it in 23.98, do your edit in 23.98, then convert it during mastering.

The first option will mean that you get to see the full quality during your edit and this is exceptionally helpful if 1080i 29.97fps is your delivery format.

and oh yea, you could also use Natress's standards converter.

could i use natress to convert down from 29.97 to 23.98 from what i have digitized already? im assuming not...it would have to be the other way around, wouldnt it?

23.98fps media is best captured and edited as such. Any good card should add 3:2 pulldown on output to 29.97fps.

Graeme

[www.nattress.com] - Plugins for FCP-X

ok thanks - i appreciate your help.

Cool. Havent' worked on 23.98 fps yet... but might do some crazy super 8 stuff, if it's affordable in my part of the world. Way i see it is that the strobiness is caused by capturing it in 29.97fps- some frames were dropped on the capture.

Graeme,
If you dont mind me asking what would be your workflow on a project like this?

thx seth