Playing back 59.94 footage in true slow motion
by Clara Rolls
on
Oct 8, 2009 at 4:27:08 am
Hello,
I've searched long and hard for an answer to this and the dumb thing is that I figured it out months ago and can't find the project file. So forgive me if the answer is obvious!
My footage is from a Sanyo underwater cam, 59.94fps h264 and all I want to do is put it in a half speed sequence in Final Cut and have it play back in slow motion.
I made a new sequence, changed the editing timebase to 29.97 + the usual format settings. Dragged the video in and its length was still equivalent to 59.94fps...so I set the speed to 50% with no frame blending and all it does is repeat each frame to double the length.
I know that I had it playing in half speed with unique frames but can't remember how. Please help!
Cheers,
Clara
p.s. Because there wasn't much footage or time to stuff around, I've already gone and turned it into an image sequence and conformed it to a proper slo mo video. I'm just after an answer because it's bugging me and will probably come up again in another project!
Re: Playing back 59.94 footage in true slow motion by Shane Ross on Oct 8, 2009 at 6:19:36 am
That's not how it works. You don't just throw 60fps into a 24fps tmeline and suddenly it is slow motion. Dropping 60fps into a 24fps timeline just yanks out the extra frames, but still plays back at normal speed.
You must use either the DVCPRO ZhD frame rate converter in the Tools menu, or use Cinema Tools to Conform the clip to 23.98.
Re: Playing back 59.94 footage in true slow motion by Shane Ross on Oct 8, 2009 at 4:16:45 pm
[Clara Rolls]" But I swear I have done it before - no conforming and it played back half speed in FCP. "
Dunno how...because that is not how FCP works. FCP won't do this frame for frame without conforming or converting. But Michael is right...you need to first convert this to ProRes then use Cinema Tools CONFORM. For some reason I didn't read the SANYO part, and thought this was DVCPRO HD...so that FRC won't work.
Re: Playing back 59.94 footage in true slow motion by Michael Gissing on Oct 8, 2009 at 6:43:08 am
You will need to convert the footage into an editing codec so use Compressor to do that (ProRes is recommended) and at the same time, use the frame controls to change the play speed to the frame rate you want.
This should give you a slo mo of the shot and set the correct frame rate.
Re: Playing back 59.94 footage in true slow motion by Garrett Gibbons on Oct 8, 2009 at 7:45:16 pm
Yeah, I use Cinema Tools (part of Final Cut Studio, still part of the FCP workflow) to conform to 23.98 when I'm shooting overcranked 60p stuff on my Canon 7D.
Technically, if you disable frame blending and do an exact % speed change, you will have the same frames with no interpolation, I believe, but you'll almost surely need to render.
FYI, you may not have to convert to ProRes to conform, but it should make your editing faster and require no rendering.
Re: Playing back 59.94 footage in true slow motion by Michael Gissing on Oct 8, 2009 at 10:21:33 pm
[Garrett Gibbons]"FYI, you may not have to convert to ProRes to conform, but it should make your editing faster and require no rendering."
As the source code is H264 you really must convert to an edit friendly codec like ProRes. This forum has hundreds of posts from people shooting with these new movie DSLR camera's about how to edit H264 and this is the consistent answer to the horror of trying to edit H264 in an FCP sequence.
I was suggesting that the frame rate issue could be solved at the same time as converting to an edit codec.
