HD For Indies

So after the third project that I've either consulted on or been involved with to color correct that has had this problem, it's time to do a Public Service Announcement:

If you go to the trouble to shoot your indie project with a 24p capable camera in 24p mode (such as the very popular DVX100A from Panasonic), and you ever have any desire to make a 24p master (either DVD or theatrical), FOR THE LOVE OF GOD read up on the process FIRST, and capture and edit in 24p!

First I consulted on a doc that was largely shot in 24p, then shot some in 60i, but mostly edited in 60i timeline to start and then changed their minds and edited in 24p (23.976). So coverting the 60i footage to 24p had to be dealt with.

Then there was a doc that shot all 24p, but logged and captured ALL their footage in 60i, and NOW the "real" editor is coming in to work on it, and he's saying maybe when they are done editing they'll go back and recapture the selects used at 24p. I'm pretty sure some edits will bump a frame and other problems will present themselves.

Then there was the short film that some guys spent some time and money on with a real DP etc., but one of the cameras (not operated by the DP) had BOTH an anamorphic lens adaptop AND also shot in 16:9 mode...thus hosing their footage to the point that they had to use Shake to de-wonkus their footage, and in the end that cost them 25% or more of their resolution. THEN they captured and edited their 24p footage on a 60i timeline, and used time remapping (time stretch) on about 75% of the shots. Often just a little bit - only 95 or 110% speed, for instance - but it creates new fields and does all kinds of wierdness. What they REALLY should have done was used the new version of Shake (awesome new optical flow stuff) to retime their shots with good clean handoff back/forth with FCP 5, and their life would have been much happier.

But no, they didn't.

So even though this is officially HD For Indies, I end up talking to a lot of folks about 24p DV jobs, and this is apparently a very common issue.

So do your research BEFORE you shoot, and make SURE your editor knows what they are doing before agreeing with their "yeah yeah I've done this before" statement.

Also, if you're going to use 24p, use Advanced Pulldown mode to save yourself a lot of hassle as well. You can work with regular 3:2 pulldown, but it is a bigger hassle.

More on that some other time, I gotsta go eat me some barbecue, my ex-bidness partner Patrick is in town from Chicago, they've wrapped on Stubbs The Zombie: Rebel Without a Pulse and he's in town to celebrate and whatnot.

-mike