Compressor Settings: 60i to 23.98P for slow motion
by Graham Futerfas
on
Apr 1, 2008 at 10:33:30 pm
Hi,
Can someone please help verify the correct settings in Compressor to convert footage from 60i to 23.98P so that it looks like 60 frame slow-motion?
I shot test footage with the Panasonic HPX3000 in AVC-Intra, and converted it to ProResHQ 1920x1080 in 60i mode and 30P. I don't have Shake on my MacBook Pro, but I do have FCS2 and thus Compressor, so I decided to try it out. I've only just started learning my way around the software, so please be detailed with your answers.
Here's what I have so far:
Bring in the 60i clip from FCP to Compressor (very short, only 10 seconds or so), select my Hard Drive destination, select the Apple ProRes for Interlaced Material (High Quality) setting. Settings appear in the window as 29.97, Field Dominance is Top Field First.
Under the "Encoder" tab, I select Video Settings, change Frame Rate to "Custom" 23.98, uncheck Interlace, leave 4:4:4 Chroma Filtering Checked (not sure what it does). Leave the Audio and Streaming settings alone.
Under the Frame Controls tab, I turn it On, Select best for Resize Filter, Progressive for Output Fields, Best (Motion Compensated) for DeInterlacing. Adaptive Details Checked. Retiming Controls: Rate Conversion set to Best (High Quality Motion Compensated) and then Set Duration to 250.000% of source. (60/24 = 2.5)
Filters, Geometry and Actions are left alone.
Is this correct? Am I setting everything correctly? Will it make an optimal 60 frame slow motion when played over 23.98 from the interlaced material? (It may take an hour or two to create, but my prior test had slightly different settings)
Thanks from a Compressor novice,
-Graham Futerfas
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Graham Futerfas
Director of Photography
Los Angeles, CA
www.GFuterfas.com
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Re: Compressor Settings: 60i to 23.98P for slow motion by Russell Lasson on Apr 1, 2008 at 11:16:22 pm
Unfortunately, Compressor isn't the right tool for this.
Fortunately, Cinema Tools, which also comes with FCS2, is the right tool.
You said that you shot the original footage at 30P. So open up the clip in Cinema Tools and select Conform, the select 23.98.
This will tell the quicktime file to play back at 23.98fps instead of 30P. It doesn't change the frames at all visually, but simply changes how many frames per second it will play.
Make a copy of your clip and test it to see if you like the results.
WARNING: Your audio will be messed up. So if you want your audio to match, you'll have to fix that in an audio program.
Re: Compressor Settings: 60i to 23.98P for slow motion by Matthew Nelson on Apr 1, 2008 at 11:45:04 pm
[Graham Futerfas]"Can someone please help verify the correct settings in Compressor to convert footage from 60i to 23.98P so that it looks like 60 frame slow-motion?"
There is no setting in Compressor or CT that will make 60i look or act like 60p. When the footage is deinterlaced the video goes from 60 fields/sec to 30 frames/sec. So the slow motion you will get is the 25% speed difference between 23.98 and 30. Any further slowing of the footage will have to be done by using some form of speed shifting like optical flow or simple speed change with frame blending.
I understand what you're saying about 60i to 30P. They're both technically 29.97 fps.
I know I can ask Compressor to retime the footage. I'll test both the 30P and 60i footage to see what's better. Thinking about it, though -- with 59.94 fields to work with (all scanned in sequence temporally), the software only has to create half of a frame from one existing field. If using 30P, it has to take a whole frame and interpret an entire frame to get to 60P. I wonder which would yield better quality?
I understand that neither is ideal, but the HPX3000 doesn't shoot 60P, and if I want some slow-motion for a project, I'd like to be able to offer it to the director as a possibility with the caveat that it won't be as great as the 23.98 footage. How bad would it be? We get away with a lot in this business. :)
Best,
Graham Futerfas
(and every time I post I seem to fall behind on the thread...)
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Graham Futerfas
Director of Photography
Los Angeles, CA
www.GFuterfas.com
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Re: Compressor Settings: 60i to 23.98P for slow motion by Matthew Nelson on Apr 2, 2008 at 12:37:16 am
Following the strategy in the article Jeremy posted try using the frame controls of compressor under retiming control setting the duration to 200% with better motion compensation.
Re: Compressor Settings: 60i to 23.98P for slow motion by Matthew Nelson on Apr 2, 2008 at 1:50:02 am
Graham
Here are the steps I took to get slow motion footage from 60i. Thanks Jeremy for that article.
In Compressor create a new Quicktime movie setting.
In Encoder select the video settings. Since you were using ProRes HQ I selected that then changed the frame rate to 60.
In Frame Controls I selected Better for resize, progressive for fields, better for deinterlace with adaptive details on, anti alias and detail I left at 0 for render speed reasons. Rate conversion I set to better with duration set to "so source frames play at 60.00fps."
Rendered the QT.
Open the new QT in Cinema tools and conformed it to 23.98.
Not as good as true 60p but a heck of a lot better then frame blending. Let me know what you think.
Re: Compressor Settings: 60i to 23.98P for slow motion by Matthew Nelson on Apr 2, 2008 at 2:04:06 am
[Matthew Nelson]"In Encoder select the video settings. Since you were using ProRes HQ I selected that then changed the frame rate to 60. " Change the frame rate to 24.
[Matthew Nelson]"Rate conversion I set to better with duration set to "so source frames play at 60.00fps." " Set the duration to 200%
Re: Compressor Settings: 60i to 23.98P for slow motion by Graham Futerfas on Apr 2, 2008 at 2:16:18 am
Thanks, Matthew, I'll try that.
My test with the original settings I mentioned finally rendered, and it looked pretty good. Much better than my 30P originated footage. I used 250%, because 60/24 = 250. Perhaps it's a simpler way of doing what you suggested above?
I'll give your method a try and compare.
Thanks!
-Graham
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Graham Futerfas
Director of Photography
Los Angeles, CA
www.GFuterfas.com
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Re: Compressor Settings: 60i to 23.98P for slow motion by Graham Futerfas on Apr 2, 2008 at 12:09:00 am
Thanks, Russell.
I'll admit that I'm not sure that Compressor is the right tool for this, but I don't think Cinema Tools will do what I want either. I did try it, though, and thanks for the tip -- I've never opened Cinema Tools, either. I could get 30P to play slightly slow motion when conformed to 23.98. I didn't realize it was going to modify the original clip though, so I made duplicates.
I'd like to create 60 frame slow motion over 24 frame playback, though. I shot both a 60i test and a 30P test. In theory, I can do one of two things: take the 60i footage, deinterlace and use the fields to create new whole frames and play back over 24, or take 30P and double the frames using frame interpolation, and then play back over 24.
I know there is some new high-tech motion interpolation mojo in Shake and Compressor that I want to take advantage of. Of course, both options I have above will involve creating interpolated pixels, because I'm either reconstructing missing fields or in-between frames. I don't have Shake, but I think Compressor might be able to do this because I technically want to convert one thing into another and whatever information is missing I want it to create.
Thanks for taking the time to respond... Final Cut crashed on my last Compressor attempt, so I'll try it again. I think I got it close on the previous try, but some of my settings were wrong (200% instead of 250%).
Best,
Graham Futerfas
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Graham Futerfas
Director of Photography
Los Angeles, CA
www.GFuterfas.com
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Re: Compressor Settings: 60i to 23.98P for slow motion by Joseph Moore on May 20, 2008 at 7:00:07 pm
Definitely shoot 60i versus 30p. It is easier for a good de-interlacer to reconstruct spacial detail, than for a re-timer to reconstruct temporal detail.
Definitely get your shutter speed at 120 (or more if you can.) Motion blur that wouldn't be there if you actually recorded at that speed will destroy the illusion.
Regardless, after you've conformed the new progressive frames to 24p, you can then use optical flow in Motion 3 to take it down even further. Optical Flow works best on progressive material, and the results can be amazing. It will take forever to analyze, but after that you can play with the timing as fast as your system allows.
