Has anyone done 60i hdv to 24p from material shot with the FX1 or Z1u?
If so, are there any clips online of these tests?

Pappas

We've done a LOT of it. But hosting the files? Nah...too big. Depends entirely on the app used, as to the quality of finished output

Douglas,

What do you use to go from 60i on the FX1 to 24p? Magic Bullet with FCP? How would you say it compares to CineFrame on the FX1 and to the native 24p of say the DVX100?

Thanks!
Douglas

I was going to ask that too! Second that ????

Douglas, is there a way that maybe you could host a clip for a day or two. Your footage that you have gotten with the FX1 is been awesome. Seeing some full res 60i to 24p would be a nice treat to see.


Pappas


Douglas,

What do you use to go from 60i on the FX1 to 24p? Magic Bullet with FCP? How would you say it compares to CineFrame on the FX1 and to the native 24p of say the DVX100?

Thanks!
Douglas

Magic Bullet in FCP does NOT do 24p. It doesn't de-interlace, and doesn't do a 60i to 24p conversion.

However, you should take a look at my Film Effects or Standards Conversion packages which will do an excellent job of converting HDV 60i to 24p. Free demo, www.nattress.com, try it out on your own footage.

Graeme

I'll second that for FCP, you really want to try out Graeme's excellent tools for conversion. FAR better than anything else out there. The price of the demo is right too....(free)

Thanks! I had a customer who wanted to use the plugin to do a HDV 1080i60 to DVCproHD 720p24 conversion, so the new version I'm working on now (free upgrade) will have much improved downconversion facilities. I'm also adding in some general and useful pulldown addition / removal plugins which can help with workflows involving 3:2 (and advanced) footage.

Graeme

Graeme/Douglas,

Thank you very much for the clarification and suggestion on software. I was misinformed.

Graeme, as for your software, (I know you might be a little biased) but can you compare the conversion with your software to native 24p and to the CineFrame in the FX1?

Thanks again,
Douglas

Douglas, the quality of my conversion is very good. It does look better than CF24, and it looks very comparable to "real" 24p. However, as with all such software it can look a touch stuttery on fast movement. However, real 24p doesn't look too hot on fast movement either. Use the software with well shot footage and I think you'd be very happy indeed.

Graeme

Graeme,

What % of resolution do you believe is lost doing this 60i to 24p conversion on HDV FX1/Z1u material.

What's the render time ( approx ) per frame your getting on your system?

Have you done a 1080i 60 to 1080p 24?

Can your system take the HDV from 4:2:0 to 4:2:2 or higher and do 60i to 24p at the same time? or does this need to be done at different times?

Graeme, is there any short clips of your 60i to 24p system that I can watch?

Thanks

Pappas

Sony HDR-FX1

http://www.uploadhouse.com/images/881807273snapshot20050704022237.jpg

60i to 23.976

http://www.megaupload.com/?d=24M5RH0X

640x360 5.12megs Xvid codec

60i to 30p

http://www.megaupload.com/?d=24YNVHBU

640x360 6.25megs Xvid codec

Original clips taken from here:

http://www.vasst.com/HDV/FX-1_images-Surfers.htm


If anyone has any 24 Cineframe files online let me know. Those can be converted nicely too. I have one on my HDD, but it is not of material to post on this forum (no, not porn).

I'll post a CF24 clip in a few minutes, but it will take a good 30 mins for it to fully upload. But, it'll be on the same page as linked above.
http://www.vasst.com/HDV/FX-1_images-Surfers.htm

I guess I need to rename that page, eh? :-)

It's now up...

Thank you Douglas!

Kyle Edwards,

For some reason I can not see your files?


Graeme,

Did you see the questions above?

I can't seem to be able to open the files either. What sort of player/viewer are you using?

Thanks again!
Douglas

Graeme,

What % of resolution do you believe is lost doing this 60i to 24p conversion on HDV FX1/Z1u material.

What's the render time ( approx ) per frame your getting on your system?

Have you done a 1080i 60 to 1080p 24?

Can your system take the HDV from 4:2:0 to 4:2:2 or higher and do 60i to 24p at the same time? or does this need to be done at different times?

Graeme, is there any short clips of your 60i to 24p system that I can watch?

Thanks

Pappas

% resolution is a tricky one. On still stuff the resolution loss is minimal and might not even be noticed due to the interlace factor, and for moving stuff you'll drop to 50%, but again, you'll never see it as it's moving. They end result, however, does look very good.

I will be putting in options for 4:2:0 into my filter packages.

I don't have any clips, but that's what the free demo is for so you can try on your own footage.

Graeme

[QUOTE=Graeme Nattress] I will be putting in options for 4:2:0 into my filter packages.


Will there be an option to make a 4:2:2 version on output?

I can't wait to try your plugins, I have heard nothing but praise about them!

Thanks Graeme!

Yes, the 4:2:0 option will try to boost the chroma to 4:2:2.

Graeme

For some reason I can not see your files?

I can't seem to be able to open the files either. What sort of player/viewer are you using?

On the PC, install this file. It will let you view files encoded with the Xvid codec. Xvid is a free MPG4 codec, the same as Divx...but free.

http://www.koepi.org/XviD-1.0.3-20122004.exe

I'll post a CF24 clip in a few minutes, but it will take a good 30 mins for it to fully upload. But, it'll be on the same page as linked above.
http://www.vasst.com/HDV/FX-1_images-Surfers.htm

I guess I need to rename that page, eh? :-)

It's now up...

Here is the CF24 clip converted:

http://www.megaupload.com/?d=20P9EICE

While it gets rid of the pulldown perfectly, fast motion seems jerky. The reason behind that is that there is no motion blur. Watch the clip and look for the man walking in the background, he's perfectly smooth. Then watch the motorbikes, jerky. Do a frame by frame on the bikes and you can see how this mode would be great for slow-mo on fast moving objects...maybe. I'd have to do some tests with that.

The clip I tested on consisted of myself walking around a room touching certain objects and even jogging. That came out fine since I was not moving 20+ mph.

Excellent!

Thanks Graeme


pappas


Yes, the 4:2:0 option will try to boost the chroma to 4:2:2.

Graeme

Graeme/Douglas/all,

This was the original article that I remembered reading regarding Magic Bullet and the "film look".

http://thecarpark.net/products_magicbullet2_HDV.htm#

Although he doesn't claim it converts from 60i to 24p, Christopher Kenworthy seems to believe that Magic Bullet is excellent at giving video that "film look" through blurring, etc.

Since, I don't understand it, Graeme, can you please explain the difference between your product and Magic Bullet if both give the "film look"? Yours gives it apparently through 60i to 24p and Magic Bullet through some other means.

Thanks in advance,
Douglas

Really, the only thing magic about the bullet is their marketing budget!

Yes, I have my own proprietary algorithms that I believe produce an excellent look. But really, the major difference is that my plugins are significantly cheaper and you get tech support direct from me, the person who writes the code.

MB for Editors does not do the 24p thing, or de-interlace. The AE version does, but that's $1000, not $300.

Oh, and free upgrades for Film Effect customers from day one. Hopefully free upgrades won't end, but people who've bought from V1.0, will be getting a free upgrade to V2.5 which will be released this month, and I can't really get any fairer than that.

Graeme

I did this using VirtualDub and obtained near perfect results.

The procedure was to convert the M2T to AVIs using MidVid MJPEG. I'd like to do it with DVCProHD but can't find a good cheap codec (any suggestions?)

In virtualdub, I set it to inverse telecine with a 0 field offset to 23.976 fps. Then I added a 1-pixel blur filter, and finally I downed it to 1280x720 (since the blur does cause some resolution loss).

I think the blur causes a loss to slightly less than true 720p quality but certainly much better than 480. The footage is progressive and gorgeous and is virtually indistinguishable from 24p from a Panasonic AG-DVX100A when downed to 480p, excepd that the picture quality is immensly superior.

I will try to post a clip this afternoon.

What is the purpose of the 1-pixel blur?

Wouldn't matter anyway, you'd get blended fields. Might as well try to pass those off as motion blur.

converting 60i to 60p will give much better results when going to 24p.

with 30i or 30p the 24p frames happen within every 1.25 of the 30p frames. So only every other 4th frame will land on a real frame.

With 60p the 24p frames happen within every 2.5 of the 60p frames. That means only every other 24p frame is interpolated. The in between frames are real frames from the 60p.

There is no more quality loss from going to 60p either since you have to deinterlace anyways. When you deinterlace 60i to 30p you throw away one whole field of data or basically half the frames. If you seperate the 60i into 60 half height frames and then scale up to full height you get 60p that will look just as good as 30p.

The best would be to convert to 120p. 120p gives a 24p frame exactly every 5 frames. Just take every 5th frame from your 120 sequence and you have a perfect 24p. Of course going to 120p can take a long time.

I am working on a program to do a high quality 60p and convert that to 24p. Every other frame will be a perfect deinterlaced frame. The in between frames will be blurry or interpolated. I am still working on how to best create the in between frame. If I can make a time shifter that is fast enough I may even go the 120p route.

The way it works is:

A1 A2 B1 B2 C1 C2 D1 D2 E1 E2

becomes

A1+A2+blur = A_P

B1+B2+blur = B_P

C2+D1+blur = C_P

D2+E1+blur = D_P

You have to blur because the two interlaced fields happen at different points in time. Also known as "Blending fields" which VirtualDub doesn't do unless you tell it to.

But then to compensate for the blur, you go down to 720p so it all works out. And then you get beautiful 24p footage which only the most discerning eyes would know was artificial.

Hmm, Thomas I'll try your method and see how that works.

You have to blur because the two interlaced fields happen at different points in time. Also known as "Blending fields" which VirtualDub doesn't do unless you tell it to.

Using your method:

http://www.uploadhouse.com/images/625620499020.JPG (http://www.uploadhouse.com/)

You're not creating a true progressive source to work with. You're basically blending. The motion may appear ok to your eyes, but you are creating a mess with the frames.


EDIT:

60i to 24p - 119.88 to 23.976
http://www.megaupload.com/?d=283SRN7Y

60i to 30p - Deinterlaced
http://www.megaupload.com/?d=2890NCTV

60i to 60p - Resized Fields
http://www.megaupload.com/?d=27BZ47GT

I've uploaded all three so we can compare the motion in each. The sample footage is only 10sec. I'll do a longer test tomorrow.

What program are you using to convert to 120p?

Graeme & Co,

Once convert 1080i60 to 24p, using your, other top software, what we getting subjectively as result, is overall quality close to 720p, 1080p, somewhere in between, lower than 720p?

What I'm driving at, if lenses are same, would picture quality be better on 720p24 HDV, 720p24 DVCPROHD with 960x720 recorded pixels, or Sony HDV converted from 50-60i to 24-25p?

David Newman of CineForm already said that 720p24 HDV codec means theoretically better quality than DVCPROHD at 24p, which is 40 Mbps.

How close is Sony HDV codec to HDCAM codec at 1080i? Compressin on non-moving complex image is about same (significantly less than on DVCPROHD), once movement starts, compression increases but eye is less sensitive to movement so it may perceive it as natural blur.

Radek

1080i60 converted to 720p24 looks very close to real 720p24. 1080i only has around the same vertical rez as 720p anyway due to interlace filtering, so it's never going to look as good as 1080p24.

Native 24p is always going to look better than converted 24p, and looking at the footage I have from Varicam 720p24 DVCproHD, JVC HD100 720p24 and my conversions, I'd rate them like this:

1) 720p24 From the Varicam. The luma is slightly better in terms of less compression artifacting than the 720p24 HDV, but the chroma is way nicer. The slightly lower resolution is invisible in terms of percieved detail, probably because it's super-sampled from a higher rez CCD, and that the lens on the HD100 is a limiting factor, along with the compression.

2) 720p24 from JVC HD100. Very nice 24p, looks less compressed than other HDV footage I have. Has more of a real high definition feel than the Sony HDV in that the detail is much finer in relation to picture size.

3) 720p24 converted from 1080i60 from the Sony HDV. Reducing the frame size on this footage helps a lot. It looks better, to me, than the native footage, and on sympathetic material, looks very close to 2) and to 1) above, but is noisier.

720p24 HDV at 19mbps compared to 720p24 DVCproHD at 40mbps is a very interesting comparison. Normally you'd expect about a 2.5 times advantage for MPEG2 over a DV type codec, giving HDV an euivalence of about 47mbps, but there are too many differences between the codecs to make that simple comparison totally valid. We have HDV with a slightly higher resolution, but lower chroma sampling. DVVproHD has slightly lower resolution, but higher chroma sampling. Looking at the real world images I have, the DVCproHD stuff looks better in terms of less compression artifacting, but it's very close, but I much prefer the DVCproHD 1080i footage I have, which, to me, looks better still!

It's very hard to compare HDCAM to HDV. The only footage I have from HDCAM is from a project I did with Panavision, and they shot some green screen footage for me. This footage I have is from HDCAM tape, but I have it uncompressed on my system, and it looks very much better than any HDV I've seen, but obviously, it was recorded on a HDCAM camera with the nice Panavision lenses, and that's not fair to HDV as the Sony HDV camera really looks lens (and CCD for that matter) limited to me.

Graeme

"The motion may appear ok to your eyes, but you are creating a mess with the frames"

As I said,

"which only the most discerning eyes would know was artificial."

You can look at a still frame and say it's a mess, but look at it in motion and it's damn good.

At any rate, convert to 60p first, to 120p first, whatever. Bottom line there is no method that will give you 24p without blending fields because

FIELDS HAPPEN AT DIFFERENT POINTS IN TIME

You can convert to 60p by doing the following:

A1 + A2 *
A2 + B1
B1 + B2 *
B2 + C1
C1 + C2
C2 + D1 *
D1 + D2
D2 + E1 *
E1 + E2
E2 + A1

And then take the starred frames (inverse telecine) and get the same thing. But, again you still need to blur fields.

How you would convert to 120p from 60i I have no idea.

Graeme,

This is an interesting point that hopefully we will find out once all of the other cameras are out and we can compare. Due to lens and actually pixel count from the chips is there really going to be a quality change from a nice 720p to 1080i? I have been debating this with myself (no I'm not crazy) for a long time. I have tried doing test with 3D rendered images but that just doesn't help because it doesn't factor in lens and chip quality.

Even though there are ways out there of trying to get a high quality conversion from 1080i to 1080p do all of us really want to mess around with that much rendering when 720p shooters will be ready to go the moment they capture the footage. Workflow will become a huge factor when the playing field levels out.

I just read the article on the FX1 on the updated HDVinfo website and it was mentioned how shocked that the author and other people at the shoot didn't really see any resolution difference between the FX1 and a DVX100A when watching on many different HD displays. I found this to be a little shocking and not 100% sure if I agree with that. To be fair however the author was shooting in CF24 which we know kills the horizontal resolution.

Perhaps when the JVC camera comes out in a few months we will finally get to test this debate. I'm really hoping the lens options on the JVC will open up a whole new level of quality for HD even if it is only at 720p. The only thing I hate about 720p HDV is it's limit of only up to 30p. This kind of limits the camera in the broadcast market where a 1080i camera will at least have the same look motion wise as a high end camera. They have their motion thing but I haven't seen it yet. Will it be good enough for broadcast? I can see broadcasters easily rejecting 720p 30p footage where with 1080i dumping to HDCAM tape they might not be able to tell.

I guess we will have to wait a few months to really find out.

Graeme,

Since you are one of the only people to have seen footage from the new JVC camera and I know you know your image quality I take your word for it.

In your opinion do you think using uncompressed live from the JVC would look pretty damn good then?

I am actually one of the nut jobs that will be getting an uncompressed HD system in a few months. Right now I am leaning towards a Multibridge with 12 bit HD component input.

If you go out of the component outputs of the JVC and record uncompressed, I think it would look really good indeed, but at that point, you're also really limited by the lens, and a top end HD lens doesn't come cheap. Compression hides a multitude of sins..... The major thing I see in the JVC footage is the compression - the image itself looks pretty good. Take away that compression and you might be able to see other things wrong with it, that the compression would otherwise hide, but that's mostly conjecture at this point, as although the uncompressed analogue component output looked nice at NAB, I'd hardly call their setup as suitable for critical viewing comparisons.

I don't know enough about the noise levels on the JVC to know if capturing in >8bit will make any real world difference though.

Graeme

Just thought about one advantage of shooting and recording 1080i and converting to 720p.

This would be the only real way of getting 720p 60p from tape on a HDV camera. All 720p HDV cameras are limited to recording 30p. With 1080i you basically have 60 frames that are 1440x540 that will be of the same quality as a deinterlaced 1080i frame. You can now convert and actually get a pretty good 720p 60p this way.

Of course this conversion would require editing in an uncompressed format so you might as well just capture 60p live from a camera or edit as DVCpro HD.

I just read the article on the FX1 on the updated HDVinfo website and it was mentioned how shocked that the author and other people at the shoot didn't really see any resolution difference between the FX1 and a DVX100A when watching on many different HD displays.

Maybe we read different articles? Are you talking about Jon Fordham's FX-1 review? http://hdvinfo.net/articles/sonyhdrfx1/fordham9.php

If so, it didn't say the "author and other people" were "shocked" while watching the footage on "many different HD displays." Instead, Jon describes his experience watching dailies on a 34" consumer HDTV with the script supervisor.When I switched back and forth between the FX1 and DVX100A while she watched the monitor, she said she could see a difference. But that neither one looked better than the other. They just looked different. The fact that FX1 didn't look any better to her was something for me to consider.

Sorry. Shocked may have been more of what I was thinking about what was said in the article. It was too strong of a word but I didn't want to quote the article exactly. I meant there was "Something to consider" and "kept thinking about it" about the fact that some people couldn't really see any extra detail. I'm sure in some way the shooter may have been a little shocked based on the fact they were comparing SD to HD.

You are right though that on a 34" HDTV it would be harder to tell.

Never once did the author actually say if he agreed with the other person or not. He just said he kept thinking about it and considering it. Does that mean he agrees?

Maybe I should have perplexed instead.

1080i60 converted to 720p24 looks very close to real 720p24.

recorded on a HDCAM camera with the nice Panavision lenses, and that's not fair to HDV as the Sony HDV camera really looks lens (and CCD for that matter) limited to me. Graeme

Greame,

Thanks a lot. That is so much useful information from someone who is expert.

So actually if Sony comes with decent HDV camera with native resolution chips and interchangable lenses, we may have basically same quality as HD100, if understand right.

As it stands now, all 3 cameras create decent 720p product, superior to SD. Is right?

Sony has further advantage offering auto focus, 60i, which is what U.S. networks want. Want 1080i60 or 720p60. Smoothing of 30p on HD100 will mean longer open shutter, less sharp images, or similar effect.

Sony offers this quality in FX1E for 3,000 USD, now even HC1 for 1,800 USD, with worse low light performance. JVC is only slightly better than Sony HDV converted to 720p, will probably cost 2x as FX1 and 3x as as HC1.

Add price into eqation, 60 Hz, auto-focus. Sony immediately strike as super buys in 720p progressive environment.

Further, you can create 720p60 from 1080i60, as Thomas mentioned, giving Sony further advantage having slow motion capability.

As recording uncompressed, that's too complicated and expensive and time, manpower consuming.

Radek

"So actually if Sony comes with decent HDV camera with native resolution chips and interchangable lenses, we may have basically same quality as HD100, if understand right."

Native rez chips will do a few things:

1) require higher quality lenses
2) produce more noise
3) have less dynamic range

Unless they make the chips a lot bigger. At that point, it's called HDCAM and costs a fortune.

I do agree that limiting HDV 720p to only 30fps is a bit limitation. 720p60 should be the format, but you'd need to double your data rate (not quite double, but for a rough guess it's ok) to keep the quality the same.

1080i might be flavour of the month, but progressive video will be the future king, and we won't ever go back to interlace. Interlace is just compression, and pretty poor compression compared to what can be done digitally these days.

Graeme

Graeme,

thanks for all the information - really valuable - I have a question that perhaps needs a new thread - about going from progressive to interelaced... but while you're here... what about going from 720p to 1080i?

The HD100 camera and deck are able to output 1080i.

What are the image issues with this process?

Have you converted HDV 720P to 1080i using your own products, and is there a need for a third-party product, or will the JVC conversion options be as good as it gets?

thanks in advance,

Nigel

Anyone who has any thoughts or experience - I'd be very grateful to hear from you.... Cheers.


[QUOTE=Graeme Nattress]

1080i might be flavour of the month, but progressive video will be the future king, and we won't ever go back to interlace. Interlace is just compression, and pretty poor compression compared to what can be done digitally these days.

I must admit I've not done any 720p to 1080i conversions.

If you're doing 720p30, you'd just map frame for frame, so you'd end up with 1080p, but in a 1080i video. Because you've scaled up, you'd think that it would look soft, but 1080i has to be soft to stop interlace twitter, so in real 1080i you might have a higher horizontal rez, but in practical terms, I don't think you'll see much difference if the scaling up is of high quality.

For 720p60, you'd again scale up frame for frame to get 1080p60, then compress two frames into two fields to go to 1080i60. This should look very good indeed as again, the interlace and it's necessary filtering will give the 720p room to be blown up a bit without looking bad.

The only thing that's really going to improve things is scaling algorithms, and that's something I've been working on for quite a while now, as it seems that it's possible to do quite a bit better than standard and even exceptional video hardware manages.

Graeme

Actually the Multibridge wouldn't be that bad with Final Cut pro. What I plan to do for most things is actually run component in and capture directly to DVCpro HD or photo jpeg. This gets rid of the need to have massive hard drives but gives higher quality than using HDV. With photo jpeg you can get full HD resolution at 4:2:2 for around 30 MB/s which should work even on a single drive system. The Multibridge on a PC cannot capture to a compressed HD codec yet.

The other option is a Cineform Aspect system that captures directly to their cineform HD codec which would also only be around the datarate of DVCPro HD. This option costs a lot more than the decklink route but may give higher quality.

For the problem of 720p 30p only We could always try to interpolate the in between frames to make a 60p for broadcast. This would only have to be done after the final edit. If a really nice tool is used that actually creates new frames nobody may even notice. It would be really hard to see an interpolated frame every other frame 60 times within a second. Even if the in between frames were blended it might be enough to fool a lot of people.

Does anybody know if there are actually any broadcasts in 720p 24p? How does the pulldown work for 24p material on a 60p display device? What do 24p DVD's do on a 60p display device?

Does anybody know if there are actually any broadcasts in 720p 24p? How does the pulldown work for 24p material on a 60p display device? What do 24p DVD's do on a 60p display device?

Aren't the TVs that support 60p also support other framerates/resolutions?

Your post

If you can live with the problem and be content with the results, go for it.

Interlaced will be gone one day but what will replace it will be 1080p60.

After European HDTV organization decided make 720p50 standard for Europe, Sony pulled it's muscle, three things happened:
The commission retracted decision.
Sony started push for future 1080p50-60 HDTV, MPEG4, Part 10 based.
Sony introduced superb low cost 1080i HDTV cameras. FX/Z1 supposedly sold about 150,000 units by now worldwide. If that is correect/not I don't know, but new Sony HDV cameras sell at many times rate than PD150 was when was introduced.

Sony basically developed 1080i60 analog HDTV in Japan, later 1080i60 digital. They did with NHK. They very powerful in broadcast world, are able to push their technologies. They also very capable. Throughout their history they were able make better, smaller products than competition, in the past did not even care what competition is doing. Competition just gave up competing with Sony on new formats etc. When Panasonic developed M2 for broadcast, Sony just developed better format, M2 became history. I think we will see same thing in JVC HDV vs. Sony HDV. Can also see different marketing strategy compared lets say Panasonic, when their people get on these boards. Sony people are prohibited to do. They just make superb product, like XDCAM, HDCAM, Z1, let owners discuss advantages on these boards.

Lately Sony were mismanaged though, their movie division prevented electronics division produce avantguard products that would harm movie business, due concern about copy protection, etc.

Another advantage Sony has, make the best sensors. Have 75% of worldwide CCD market, are only company capable produce in quantity high quality CMOS with high frame rate at high pixel count, high S/N ratio. JVC normally use Matsushita CCDs, their top broadcast products use Sony CCDs. Nikon use Sony CMOS, top photography manufacturers use Sony CCDs.

HDTV and FILMOUT:

For broadcast 1080i has advantage because except some US 720p broadcast, is only 1080i HDTV broadcast anywhere in world, including two satellite programs in Europe.

When do film transfer, optical printers are 2K. 1080p is 2K, wheras 720p is 1K. So question is, if equal quality sensors and high quality lewnses used, would 720p24 HDV or DVCPRO HD look better when transferd to 2K than 1080i HDV transferd to 2K?

Digital projection in theaters - 2K. Future will be likely 4K, as new Sony projectors are 4K = about 8MP.

24p on a home screen:

1080p24 is part of HDTV spec, as far I know all 1080 broadcast is 50-60i and 24p is broadcast with pulldown.

24p does not look good on CRT, maybe not even LCD. 30p on screen has more of theater 24p feel than 24p does. In theters each frame projected twice, otherwise motion is jerky at 24, at stimulated 48 fps is better.

24 fps is rate that dates when sound film started in 1929, while video people always wanted 24p, top film directors wanted highest frame rate they could. Top 70 mm film productions were 30 fps, with 24 fps 35 mm cameras running side by side for to create 35 mm prints.

IMAX HD is 48 fps.

Some manufacturers catering to 24p hysteria, taking advantage of it, calling it "film look". Best film look something totally different. 24 fps and grain are negatives, not positives about film look.

DVCPROHD:

DVCPRO HD compressed about 7:1. It's just too compressed.

PROSPECT HD:

This superb 10 bit compression software now available saparately and bargain OEM price negotiateed could be with CineForm.

Radek

Radek - very interesting...

So if the standard lens on the HD100 is not much better than the Z1 lens (unknown, but likely given it's price) - and the optional wide is $12k ($16k AUD) - why would anyone shooting a run and gun doco for broadcast buy the HD100 ahead of the Z1?

In other words, I can shoot 720p 25 with the JVC, but if I want the product to be broadcast today, or in the next couple of years, I'll have to convert it to some form of interlaced or other - correct?

The advantage of having 24 or 25p is... archive... transfer to DVD... what?

Especially in the context of sacrificing steadyshot, autofocus, known quality product in the Z1. After all, it seems the 1080i can be converted effectively to progressive in post - correct?

The more I read, the more I learn, the more confused I become (in the sub 10k playground that is...)

Cheers

1080i HDV frame consists of 2 fields. Each is 1440x540 pixels. Makes total of 778,000 pixels, progressive, 25-30p. When you deinterlace properly, on still image or image with little movement, resolution will double, will be 1,555 pixels, progressive, 25p or 30p, so frame effective pixel count will vary between 778,000 and 1,555,000 pixels. Sony camera with true 1080i capability costs 1,800 USD. Sony people will not get on boards like this to defend products. Are satisfied with market share they control.

DVCPROHD consists of 960x720 pixels = 691,000 pixels.

720p HDV consists of 1280x720 = 922,000 pixels

Radek

Radek/JG/Don Quixote/Etc, I think we liked you better when you posted under your Joseph George alias -- at least then you didn't drop words out of your sentences to make it sound like you were a foreigner. Your tirades have always been a little difficult to follow, but at least they were usually proper English; now it's even more difficult to follow what you're saying. Except for the one constant: "sony good, matsushita bad" -- that part's coming in loud and clear in your posts.

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Nigel, the question was: why the JVC instead of the Sony? There are many differences between those two products, and for some people's circumstances one will be obviously a far superior choice than the other. For someone doing TV commercials, the JVC. For someone shooting live events, the Sony. For someone shooting for a 720p network (Fox, ESPN, ABC) the 720p JVC. For someone shooting for a 1080i network (NBC, CBS, PBS, Discovery), the 1080i Sony.

If someone values the shoulder-mount form factor or the broadcast-style lens or the ability to interchange lenses, the JVC is obviously prefereable for those circumstances. But, the JVC costs more. And it doesn't shoot "live" footage. And that's a major, major drawback. For someone shooting live events or reality TV, someone who wants and needs the 60i/60p look, the JVC can't do it.


There are three basic frame rates that people are discussing here, which are 24p, 30p, and 60i/p. They break down like this:

24P: JVC should be superb, Sony is an atrocious simulation
30P: JVC should be superb, Sony is half-resolution simulation.
60i/P: Sony does superbly, JVC doesn't do *at all*.

So for those wanting a specific frame rate, the question should be really quite easy. Just pick which frame rate suits your shooting style (film-like, go JVC; reality-like, go Sony).

Regarding overall quality of the footage, you really can't compare them directly because they don't do the same frame rates at the same sizes. 720p HDV and 1080i HDV are utterly different, but at the core they will provide about the same perceived resolution, when all is said and done. But not at the same frame rates. The JVC's 24p/25p/30p should (should) be substantially, significantly sharper than the Sony's CF24/CF25/CF30. But the JVC has no way to compare against the Sony's 50i/60i. It doesn't even try. The best it offers is "motion smoothing" on 30p, which we have yet to see, but should be about comparable to shooting 30p with a 1/30 shutter (in other words, it'll probably be blurry and nowhere near a direct simulation of 60i). But, we'll see...

With the JVC, you could always change out the lens. I wouldn't be surprised if the stock lens of the JVC was not a great performer, probably comparable to the Z1's lens (not bad, but a lot of C.A.). But the JVC has the option to put on other glass, something the Sony can't do (well, at least, without a hacksaw and the help of Eidomedia, that is). BUT: the alternative lenses for the JVC are pricey pricey pricey, so I doubt fewer than 5% of HD100 users will ever get the optional lens.

For super-telephoto work, the JVC wins hands-down. For shoulder-mount "looking-like-a-broadcast-shooter" concerns, the JVC wins hands-down. For actual manual control of the lens, the JVC wins. For OIS and autofocus and the programmable zoom/focus feature and all that stuff, the Sony is the clear and obvious winner. And the FX1 is much, much cheaper... the Z1 is a little cheaper ($300 retail, we'll see what street price is). Plus the Z1 is true international (does both 50i and 60i, NTSC and PAL) whereas the JVC is only partially international (does 24p/25p/30p, but only NTSC OR PAL, not both).

Graeme's seen footage from the JVC on tape, and I believe he said it was the best-looking HDV footage he'd ever seen. JVC's implementation of HDV has a lot less compression than Sony's implementation, which should make it cleaner with less susceptibility to motion artifacting/macroblocking/etc. You just have to make sure that the type of shooting you intend to do with it is appropriate for the framerates it offers.

For TV display, probably (and this is a wild guess) 90% of the HDTVs out there are 720p-native. JVC's making a big point of that in their marketing. There are a few 1080i TVs (mostly CRTs) and a couple of 1080p televisions, but the vast, vast majority of LCDs and plasmas and DLPs and everything else are 720p native. Plus Europe looks poised to go 720p. The US allows both standards, and so far the major sports networks have gone 720p (ABC/Fox/ESPN) and the others have chosen 1080i. In Europe it'll pretty much be 720p-only, pending the EBU's release of a final recommendation.

So, in other words, there are very good reasons why someone would choose one of these cameras over the other. They both do things that the other one doesn't. You just have to determine which unique capabilities are more important to your shooting style -- after that, the choice should be easy.

It kind of depends on what your shooting now. If you are hand holding at a wedding no matter how sturdy you are that camera will have movement in every single frame which means pretty the whole image will get deinterlaced. Unless you are shooting something like a movie where you can keep the camera perfectly still a good deinterlacer will not help you very much.

So based on that hand help or shoulder shooting might be slightly better with 720p.

Another thing you have to think about also is how much rendering do you really want to do. It is nice to say we can convert and use a high quality deinterlacer but the fact is that most of us who have deadlines may not have that option. If you are talking about a few hours of raw footage for each project have fun converting. Now if you are doing small film shorts or commercials well that might be a little bit different.

Another thing to think about is how many bits do you get per frame in each format.

1440x1080i gets about around the same bits as compared to a DVD encoded at 5.5555 Mb/s

1280x720 gets around a DVD encoded at 7.25 Mb/s.

Depending how JVC will write 24p to HDV tape it may be even better. If they only write the 24p then you could get close to a 9Mb/s DVD which actually isn't all that bad. That is a lot better than 5.555 Mb/s considering even if you have a camera to shoot 24p 1080i that it would still be put in the same size 1080i stream like how the Z1 does it.

Even if the lens on the JVC is of the same quality( I highly doubt it would be less) you may be only able to read X amount of detail anyways. If that area is at or under the 1280x720 the Z1 1080i wouldn't really have any more detail since it would get cut off at about the same level. Even with pixel shift only so much detail can come through the lens. If you shift the green chip one half of a pixel that is like having a chip with the density of 1440 sensors. If that much detail can't come through the lens the pixel shift just doesn't have the same result. I actually think the new HC1 has a tiny bit more detail than the Z1 does. If that thing had a little bit better lens we might really see the difference.

I'm not really on one side or the other right now. In the next few months I will be buying 3 HD cameras along with an uncompressed HD system. I'm in no hurry so I am waiting until the other cameras come out. If the JVC had real 60p to tape this would be a lot easier. I may even get one of each since all three with have their advantages and disadvantages. Either way you look at it we kind of got screwed into a small format war again. If you are in the 720p camp it will be very hard to deal with footage from somebody in the 1080i camp.

To say 24p will go away and never be seen again is kind of silly. As long as there are people out there that want to watch any movies made from the 1930's up to today there will be some kind of support to view 24p.

Good post Barry. Really, it doesn't matter whether you shoot 720p or 1080i today, as long as it's:

a) good quality

b) good quality

and most importantly

c) good quality

because you can pretty much losslessly convert from 720p to 1080i or 1080i to 720p, and although they'll maintain their respective "look" in terms of progressive or interlaced, they'll have sufficient quality.

I do think that the 720p24 HDV footage I've seen from the JVC HD100 is the best HDV footage I've seen. It looks very, very much better than the early JVC HDV cameras, and much better than the Sony cameras which although offer higher resolution, don't seem to offer any higher detail, and do tend to look rather videoy.

Putting lots of pixels into a 1/3" chip is not an easy task. It puts stress on the major aspects of camera design:

a) the lens,
b) low noise performance,
c) dynamic range,

and hence all 1/3" HD cameras are going to be somewhat limited in their max picture quality, and given that, the 720p models with their larger pixels are just going to look better, and also given that they have less compression, if quality picture is what you want, they're going to be the clear winner.

I think Sony are rather blinkered in their approach to video in that they don't give you proper 1080p24 or 1080p30 on their FX1 or Z1, and don't give 720p either. Similarly, I think JVC should allow 1080i recording on their cameras, but I don't think it's such a necessity as the real progressive modes that Sony are missing.

Panasonic have the right idea in giving us both 720p and 1080i, and even 1080p in one camera. They are telling us to make the choice, not for it to be fixed for us.

But to get into debates about the number of pixels an HD format has is ludicrous.

I find that DVD's 720x480 pixels is good enough to stand up to being projected on an 80" screen. Sure, the picture could be better, but it's more than acceptable. HD looks better still through the projector, but if the screen was any smaller, I'd not be seeing the HD benefit unless I was to sit up really close. Shooting 4k HD matters for a cinema screen, but it's ludicrous to think that it matters in a typical home setting. 720p has more than enough resolution to make great looking big pictures in the home.

But even worse than just looking at the number of pixels, is to ignore the quality of those pixels. I want high definition, not resolution. Resolution is easy, just stick VHS into a Terranex upscaler and you've got high resolution, but you don't have high detail or high definition. HD is high definition, so lets see some real definition!!!

Graeme