Contacting Canon re: adding 24p pulldown flags

[John Godden]

Originally Posted by Peter J Alessandria

Cineform seems to be a good product.
>> snip

The primary negatives with Cineform are 1) price - another $250 on top of my editing software/camera costs and 2)
>>>snip

.

Hi Peter

I believe the price for Cineform Aspect HD is $500. :-(
http://www.cineform.com/index.asp?Pa...PROD&ProdID=85

I was hoping (with my new uber computer) that I wouldn't have to purchase Cineform HD. With this Canon 24P pulldown "issue" though........ ???? ........ perhaps I'll have too. :-(

Thanks to the OP for starting this thread
JohnG

[Solomon Chase]

Canon shouldn't be calling it "24p Cinema Mode" if they refuse to flag the footage as 24p.

They say "Only Canon's XL series models would have the
ability to adjust this setting"

It's NOT a setting. It's just the standard way to flag a "24p in 60i" stream so the NLE can display TRUE 24p. Nobody is asking for 24p Advanced or anything along those lines...

[Mike Dulay]

It's a pain without pulldown flags. You need a lot of space and extra processing time to work around it. I'm looking for free workarounds in the interim but they're not perfect ... struggling with audio sync issues right now.

http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/showthread.php?t=92893


Peter,

So what's the next phase on this endeavor? Just keep at it?

[Peter Frollo]

John,

Why don't you give them a call and let them tell you how to utilize the features described in the manual and see what they have to say to you.

I am not the expert but I think you can edit 25p (PAL) with cheap Vegas and view the clips straight from the cam progressively. If all you care is HD (quite frankly who would care for PAL/NTSC SD with this cam) ask them for a replacement for PAL version.

If they get you trouble open a case with bbb.org as the first step. If enough people complain they will get it fix sooner.

I don't see why one should spent another $500 on NLE or use some hacks and cracks!

Mike,

Return the cam...


Also, I would suggest that you contact the authors of cam web reviews to clarify the issues with NTSC cams. These reviews drive canon sales...this give you more visibility then just emailing canon.

[Robert Ducon]

As a Mac User, free or simple work a rounds are proving difficult - it's my area of least experience. I have G Film by Nattress, but it's done nothing good for me when used as a deinterlacer/cadence changer - I simply don't know how to setup the cadence properly I assume, or choose the fields to 'blend', etc.

I'd use Neo/Cineform, if it actually existed for the Mac OS. The Beta hasn't worked for me - just a white screen! Steve Szudzik said his Windows version also didn't work.

Anyhow, got a reply from the e-mail I sent as well.

[Peter J Alessandria]

Originally Posted by John Godden

Hi Peter

I believe the price for Cineform Aspect HD is $500. :-(
http://www.cineform.com/index.asp?Pa...PROD&ProdID=85

I was hoping (with my new uber computer) that I wouldn't have to purchase Cineform HD. With this Canon 24P pulldown "issue" though........ ???? ........ perhaps I'll have too. :-(

Thanks to the OP for starting this thread
JohnG

I think their Connect HD (now NEO?) is what we need for Vegas users. It was $250 last time I checked. Premiere users need Aspect I think? (Could have it wrong...) Either way, not to knock Cineform as they are deserving of praise, Canon could resolve this pretty easily by including the flags.

[Peter J Alessandria]

Originally Posted by Mike Dulay

So what's the next phase on this endeavor? Just keep at it?

Well I think we don't take "No" for an answer on this. With all due respect to the Canon tech support folks, right now we're getting canned responses from people who are mostly likely trained to respond to simple questions from folks who have no idea what 24p is. The idea is to move the issue up the foodchain inside Canon to get to the engineers/high level techs who understand the issue and most importantly, can implement change. It's not like we're asking them to include 24p recording in their camera - they've already done the hard part. All we're asking is to have the flags included. Of course I don't know for sure, but I'm guessing they omitted them thinking there'd be a lack of demand. But regardless of the reason, our job now is to make our position known.

So... I think calling is next. Here are some suggestions:

A. If we call their regular Customer Service number, the only goal is to get to the issue passed on to a higher up. The person you speak to is not going to be able to "resolve" the issue. But that's OK since 1) if enough of us call, they'll have to start paying attention and 2) they will email you a customer service survey after the call where you can highlight the issue again. Even better however is if we can get the phone number or email address of someone higher up in the organization who can deal with the issue. So ask your customer service rep for that info.

The toll free customer service number in the US is 1-800-828-4040. For those outside the US check the back of your owner's manual.

B. Call Canon headquarters directly. Their US headquarters is on Long Island (Lake Success, NY) The number is 516-328-500 (use those cell phone long distance minutes you've been saving up!) Here are the other contact numbers: http://www.usa.canon.com/templatedat.../ciwofloc.html
They're going to tell you to call Customer Service. Tell them you've already tried that and now want to move the issue up within the organization. Persistence (and politeness) will pay off heavily here.

C. Call the Canon Service Centers (again, use those cell phone minutes) Irvine California - 949-753-4200; There's also a Research/Development facility in Irvine. That number is 949-932-3100.
I haven't been able to locate any other service center phone numbers on-line so ask the Customer Service reps for your local facility and call them too!

It's gonna take a little bit of effort but as long as we don't take "no" for answer, I believe we can do it.

Edit: here's a number to try for the Chicago Canon Service Center: 630-250-6200

Japan: (you're NTSC too right?) http://www.canon.com/about/group/list.html (This link actually has a lot of contact information - even with directions and maps if you want to present your case in person!)

[Thomas Smet]

I think this is starting to get a little out of hand.

There is nothing wrong with the HV20. It does exactly what is is designed to do which is to shoot video that looks like 24p material with 3:2 pulldown. No matter how anybody wants to look at it it is still clocking at 24 fps and recording that to tape. This is why the camera is a 24p camera. It does in fact shoot real 24p frames. I is the recording that causes a problem for some people.

I agree it would have been nice to have some kind of pull down flags but alas we do not have it and that is not a defect but just the way it is.

As much as people do not like it it works exactly as Canon intended for it to work. I like to think of it as more of an enhanced effect in a consumer camera kind of like Black and white or sepia.

Some other consumer HDV cameras such as the SONY ones also give us a fake cinema mode which uses cherry picked fields to create a jerky 24p. This is then placed in the same style of 3:2 pulldown 60i stream as the Canon. At least the HV20 gives us true clocked 24 fps frames.

This is a consumer camera. You can either use it to shoot 60i video or video that has a film like motion look to it which just so happens to look exactly like true 24p material. If you want to edit the true 24p frames then you need to find a solution to work with the material in a way that it wasn't really designed to be worked with. It isn't much different then somebody buying a special tool such as DV Film Maker to turn 60i HDV into 24p material. In the case of the HV20 at least we finally have a camera that gets us to the point of proper clocked framerates. Now all we have to do is use a simple tool to remove the pulldown which is much much easier then trying to convert 60i to 24p.

When 24p DV first came out many people had the same problem. In fact at that time a lot of people just edited the material as the 60i DV stream since many people didn't have a tool to work with the 24p. Eventually more NLE's supported removing the pulldown but even today many years after 24p DV first came out there are still some major NLE's that do not remove the 24p pulldown in DV material.

It was Canon's choice not to add pulldown flags and that of course is their choice to make. It is in no way fair to say the camera isn't 24p because that is exactly what it is doing.

I should also point out that those of us who have been using component, SDI or HDMI to capture uncompressed material have been dealing with this for years. Even the Canon XLH1 when capturing live from the SDI ports ends up sending out the 24p as 60i with 3:2 pulldown. That means we have to use a 3rd party solution to remove the pulldown or capture via a Cineform product which works with Blackmagic and AJA cards. So for me at least the lack of flags in the HDV tape stream is of little concern.

[Chris Hurd]

Folks, please don't post the contents of private email to this site.

Email is the copyright of the sender, not the receiver. It's not kosher to post email in public.

I'm about to go through this thread and remove anything that directly quotes an email.

If you want to convey a message that you received via email, a summation will do nicely.

Thanks in advance,

[Ian Albinson]

But if they can provide flags with the A1 model, why not do the same for this camera?

[Stefan Szabo]

Seriously, you guys are getting so upset about what? I can't speak for all of you, but it sounds like some of you need to try a Mac with Final Cut Studio. It is soooooo easy to convert the captured 1080/60i HDV footage to true 24p with Cinema tools. Only takes a minute or two per clip. And the results are what you would expect.. 24 truly progressive frames. It's not Canon's problem. They are selling this thing for 1 grand! I am truly grateful to Canon for offering this amazing quality at such a low price.

[Ian Albinson]

Originally Posted by Stefan Szabo

Only takes a minute or two per clip.

That can add up quickly though, and the fact that it could be something as simple as a firmware upgrade to add those flags is something worth asking about.

[Stefan Szabo]

Yeah....But no one here really knows how much it would take to add flags to the HV20. This whole Canon Bashing thread is based on the assumption that it is easy as pie to add this feature. I still have to say that for around $1000, Canon has done no injustice, and it is unfair to Canon to expect to have all of the features of a $4000 camera for $1000. No camera will ever be perfect. There will always be something. I say be happy because you have an awesome camera.

[Ian Albinson]

Oh I'm happy with the camera, but I could be made happier! :P

[Stefan Szabo]

I'm sure we all could in some way!!!! ;)