NTSC to 24fps

hi folks.

this is a first for me.
i have some NTSC footage that we are going to composite into a TV in our 24fps film.
and i'm wondering what's the best way to deal with it.

my guess is to conform it to 30fps in Cinema Tools then to do... something to it
but i'm not sure what.

any pointers?


thanks,
nick

Conforming it to 30 fps changes it from 59.94i to 60i but does nothing for the underlying problem: how to make 2 frames depicting 2 moments from 5 fields semi-depicting 5 moments?

I suggest changing 60i to 24p in two steps. First change the 60i to 60p by "double interlacing". You can find software to do this or else use the DIY method here.

Second change the 60p to 24p. There is a very fancy way and a very simple way to do this. Fancy is to use optical flow software or hardware. Try Compressor's: Duration 100%; High quality motion compensated. Simple is to simply discard 3 of every 5 frames. Use Compressor: Duration 100%; Nearest frame. The fancy way risks artifacts in every other frame. The simple way risks a slightly uneven timeflow. (The time steps are 1/30 sec, 1/20 sec, ...; if single deinterlacing were used in the first step they'd be less regular.)

Dennis Couzin
Berlin, Germany

[Note added 29 April 2014. The above suggestions were for making decent 24p from the 60i. Since Nick is compositing the material to become a TV screen, maybe he wants it to look funky, with roll-bars and all. This too is possible.]

conforming to 30 makes the maths easier

i thought there might be a simple formula in compressor for the next part, that could work in fields rather than frames,
then we'd get blended fields avery few frames, (which might not look so good?)

it doesn't need to look fantastic, the on-scrreen story has playback from VHS, but not terrible: not rollbars & static etc

i have access to Nattress Standards Conversion here at work.
that seems the best solution, perhaps.
there's also access to hi-level hardware standards conversion, but keeping it "in-room" keeps the costs down


thanks,
nick

Nick: it's actually disturbing when composited TV looks perfect. VHS, especially, should look imperfect. If it doesn't have to look accurately imperfect just use Compressor with some bad settings. For example, put your 59.94i material in and ask for 24p out. In Frame Controls select Reverse Telecine.

Dennis Couzin
Berlin, Germany

well, this footage is NTSC from 1983
perfect it aint

however we'll get the best transcode we can, and then do what we need to when we comp it in.

what sort of look would i get with the settings you suggest?


thanks,
nick

With the rude settings I suggested it would look interlaced and jumpy.
How the interlacing looks depends on the size of the TV screen.

Dennis Couzin
Berlin, Germany