What capture settings for the HV30?

[Matt Buys]

I'm using 24p and 15 day trial of Aspect. What settings are people using for capturing 24p? I did the high quality and 3-2 pulldown on automatic with deinterlace selected and that seems fine but I have a feeling I'm missing something.

[Matt Buys]

Okay, after more searching I found the answer. If anyone is doing a search on DVI and you're looking for it. Here it is.

http://www.cineform.com/products/Tec...apSettings.htm

[Jeff Anselmo]

Hi Mat,

Thanks for that post! I'm also considering Cineform, to capture from my HV30, for Premiere Pro 2. I have an "old" (non-dual core, Pent. 4/hyper-thread 3.4ghz with 2gigs of ram) computer that I think might be slow in editing Cineform files. I guess that's why there's the trial period :)

Are you planning to down-convert your 24p footage to SD-DVD? (That's my future plan at least). And I think I read either somewhere here, or at the Cineform site of the how-to-do-it strategy without pulling out too much hair.

Also, do you use HDMI out (with some type of BM Intensity card) or just use firewire to capture?

Best,

[David Taylor]

Originally Posted by Jeff Anselmo

Hi Mat,

I have an "old" (non-dual core, Pent. 4/hyper-thread 3.4ghz with 2gigs of ram) computer that I think might be slow in editing Cineform files. I guess that's why there's the trial period :)

Jeff, although slow by today's CPU standards, for HDV editing with Aspect HD/PPro you'll probably get by okay with your machine until you can upgrade. But you're right, that's why we offer the Trial....

[Jeff Anselmo]

Hi David,

Thanks for the reply! Still learning alot (and plenty to go yet :) about Cineform, the HV30, and HDV. I've already shot some footage, but it's sitting idly in the tape until capture. I don't want to start capturing onto Premiere (without Cineform), and start getting crazy and frustrated (like I've read in some threads here).

Part of the reason I'm waiting is that I may be able to upgrade my PC soon. I know there are endless threads about PC specs geared for editing. Is there a link you can point me to for PC specs using Cineform software (along with of course, the Adobe products)?

Best,

[David Taylor]

On our Aspect HD product page. This is a direct link to the specs: http://www.cineform.com/products/Asp...s_Requirements.

[Matt Buys]

Jeff, hope the hurricane isn't flooding you too bad.

I have a computer with similar specs too yours and I'm happy with the three hours of tape I've edited thus far. Well, mostly happy. It's my first time shooting with an adapter/ plus the 24p and sometimes the footage is absolutely jawdropping and other times it looks like my four year old shot the stuff.

I'm using the firewire to capture but I hope to change this soon. BTW the fifteen day promo worked. I'm sure I'll buy it for my next project. If not sooner.

[Jeff Anselmo]

Thanks David for that link.

Matt--The hurricane didn't hit us at all in El Paso; just the usual summer monsoon rains. But we did experience an earthquake in California :)

We recently just got back from San Diego and Comic-Con; and actually took the HV30 with us. I haven't worked out all the "manual" controls and settings quite right yet, but was really impressed with the low light capabilities of the cam. Shooting nighttime in downtown San Diego with just street lamps was pretty good (lots of silhouttes, but little to no grain). I shot mostly underexposed footage as I adjusted the exposure control to -1 or lower, to decrease the grain.

Hope to show some footage when I download the free trial of Cineform soon.

You mentioned an adapter. Is it a wide angle adapter? Is this a 35mm adapter? If so, which one(s) are you using with your HV30?

Best,

[Matt Buys]

Jeff I enjoyed your shots of monument valley. You squeezed alot out of your xl2. I did some shooting there last year with an HV20. http://www.vimeo.com/717584
Though it's not anywhere near your work. Did you go to film school?

In answer to your question, I have several lenses. Several HV's too. Over the last year or so I've bought five hv20's and hv30's because I usually shoot outdoors in difficult conditions. I have two working right now. One stays mounted on the letus and the other I fly on a Merlin. Yeah, I know, three broken cameras. They're made out of plastic but they're well built. I've seen them survive bike crashes, kayaking accidents, falls, etc., etc., They don't do well immersed in salt water without a housing though.

In case your interested here's a quick run down on the gear I have and my opinion. The canon wide angle is a little soft but really opens things up. The canon telephoto vignettes half way through the zoom but fully zoomed it does a great job with wildlife. Then I have a mini letus. It does the job and then some. I choose the letus over the brevis because I was told by a member here that the latter could be a bit noisy during interviews (maybe they've already addressed this?). I've never used a brevis but the letus with old nikon glass is simply heartbreaking shot with 24p. Don't see how you could get better footage for the dollar. Somebody like you could slam dunk it. Having said that, I'm beating my head against the wall trying to downrez it in pp2 to SD. There are some bugs and I've followed cineform's rec's but it still looks bad. I'm sure there's a workaround but I haven't found it yet.

[David Newman]

It should not look bad in any way. However I did notice in your first post that you have deinterlace set and pulldown removal, you only need one or the other, and never deinterlace with a 24p source (you're just lowering you vertical resolution.)

[Todd Barker]

David,

I noticed on your post you mentioned that for 24p you should not deinterlace and perform pulldown removal. Is this a matter of differentiating process flow between "true" 24p and 24p/60i? The "24p" mode on the Canon HV30 is not "true" 24p. It only has a "true" 30p mode. The 24p mode on the Canon HV30 is really 24p(60i). Matt's situation is no different than the Canon HV20's pseudo "24p" mode.

Therefore I believe Matt should enable pulldown removal and select the deinterlace option. This process is explained in the Cineform User manual on page 28: Converting 60i_24p: With conventional 60i material as source, selecting "Remove 3:2 pulldown", combined with "De-interlace 1080i sources" will convert 60i material to 24p at the defined "Resize" resolution.

I own the Canon HV20 and I have been doing this in HDLINK to convert my footage in HD Link to 1280x720/24p. It has been working very well!!!! I have not had to go to 34th street looking for a miracle :):)

Thanks for your assistance.
TB

[David Newman]

Sorry, no the manual page you quote is not relatd to 24p source (even pseudo ones.) Never mix deinterlace with pulldown removal, unless your source is true 60i (i.e. without pulldown.) Using pulldown remove only correctly converts the frames from HV20/30 (and Sony V1) in a true 24p.

[Todd Barker]

David,

Thanks for the clarification.

TB

[Matt Buys]

David, I'm happy with cineform's results. When I watch the HD file, everything is outstanding. Also, thanks for allowing the 15 day trials. I tried Neo first and then realized Aspect was what I needed.

Thanks for the nondeinterlace suggestion. Right now I'm still fuddling around and running into all sorts of trouble when I downconvert to SD in PP2. But I'm convinced this is directly related to my inability to properly manipulate the program as opposed to glitches in your or pp2's software as I'm a computer neophyte.

Thanks too, for all your help on this board. I often go back and look at your previous answers to solve my current problems. To my mind, your answers here are even more helpful than your website