An interesting thing on "TV" HDV/HD vs. film-like HDV/HD
 

(Note, I mean TV HDV/HD by the style: more well-lit and 60i.)

I was showing some Sony HDV footage to some non-industry friends and family on my HDTV (widescreen, 1080i). One was documentary-style clips that I had done for fun (60i, well-lit, lots of colors in the shot since it was outside and in South Florida). The other was a short film a friend directed and I produced. Both shot on the Z1 and I displayed both in native HDV.

Their reactions were interesting. More people responded to HDV footage that was shot documentary-style (60i, lots of light, etc.). The film clips I showed they reacted to it by saying they could still tell a nice quality, but they weren't 100% sure it was HD. And that was HDV footage converted from 50i to 24p with more contrasted lighting and some shallow depth of field (and different camera movements). They wondered if it was shot on film and transferred to HD.

My final conclusion? Shooting film-style with contrasting lighting, 24p, different camera movements and shallow depth of field had these viewers thinking film, not HD. When they see HD, it's usually 60i and lit very well. My wife had the same reaction when we'd watch HD docs on Discovery HD and then a movie telecined from 35mm to HD on HDNet.

I'm no psychologist or researcher, but I think the average viewer responds to HDTV when it's 60i and well-lit because that's how it's mostly presented, esp. on Discovery HD. There's defintely more visual pop!

heath

It sounds to me like your case study proved another couple points as well: that you can definitely shoot HDV to look like film and people can't easily tell the difference (a valuable thing); and that there are different looks that people associate with different types of content...in other words, a Discovery doc should be well-lit and 60i because that is the look people associate with that type of program, not moody, high-contrast film-look lighting.

imo, that's one of the up sides of this transitional phase -- most of these cameras have multiple shooting modes, which gives us the ability to shoot a wider variety of projects with the same camera.

And with more high-end movies being shot digitally (Genesis, F900/950, etc.) and this story here, I think we're going to see more digital in our futures, from way up high (the SUPERMAN RETURNS) to us, the indie guys and gals.

heath

I dunno, I recently watched Ultraviolet, which was shot digitally, and I couldn't help but think "video...video...video" the entire movie.

based on the previews I saw, it looks like 24p music video with so many bright, vibrant colors, it reminds me almost of animation.

heath

This mirrors my view. IF I am looking at a documentary or event video where the purpose is education or memory of the event I want it in as much detail and as smooth as possible, just like being there( my eyes don't stutter !!!). I don't want shallow depth of field, high contrast and stuttery motion i.e. I don't want the film look. For a dramatic feature then everything is fair game to create the mood. One size does not fit all. I find it quite annoying that so much is now moving to 24p as a fad. Some of the programs on my cable are just not watchable with the stuttering, panning looks like it was done with image stabilizer fighting the movement, terrible. The problems of transmission encoding and scalars in the TV's lead to some very poor images. Am I a fan of interlace hell no I would like high frame rate progressive 60P or above. Just can't get this economically right now. But you can tell I am not a fan of 24p!!!!

Ron Evans

This is all very interesting. I guess even non-industry people are accustomed to seeing things a certain way. 60i for news, docs, soaps, etc., 24p for narratives (film and TV and even music videos). Remember Stone Temple Pilot's video for Big Bang Baby? Purposely done in 60i and I remember everyone thinking something was wrong. This was 1996 and though I was learning some 16mm film techniques in film school, we focused a lot on video (no digital at the school at that time, so BetaSP mostly).

heath

I started with 8mm film in the 60's, Super8, Super 8 Sound, VHS, 8mm, Hi8, DV and now HDV ( FX1) all as hobby and mainly recording events so the goal has always been to create a finished product as if one was looking though a window( that is even true of theatre, who am I to alter the lighting teams efforts). Main issue for me has always been latitude. Cameras are never as good as ones eyes. So for me the most annoying thing about the film look is the frame rate stutter, something I have been trying to eliminate over the past 45+ years from the 15fps of my first camera!!!! My ideal ( for what I do) is a camera with really large latitude and high progressive frame rate!!!! Now that most is digital the obvious to me is acquire in the best possible way and then alter to taste in post. Depth of field may be an exception for dramatic effect, but dynamic range and frame rate changes are certainly possible.

Ron Evans

How easy is it to adapt 60p to 50p or the other way around? 24p still has the advantage of easily adapting to any world format.

Then you may get your wish very soon in the form of the Silicon Imaging or RED cameras. If you haven't been following the development of those two cameras, might be a good time to start.

regards,

-gb-

Yes I have been following the new camera developments with interest. Thomas, as far as converting progressive 60p etc once all the displays are true progressive it shouldn't matter, the display will respond appropriate to the input, though display refresh rate will need to be the same or multiple. Problems only arise when trying to convert to older interlaced displays with fixed scanning. IF one needs to produce for the past then interlace at 50i and 60i is the what is needed to cover the world. The 24p fad is useful if moving video to film. I am sure that in the next few years we will see the end of film in commercial cinemas and we will then be able to screen productions with appropriate characteristics for the subject matter rather than clinging to the past limitations of projection equipment. We will be able to have high frame rates for nice smooth pans, shallow depth of field even stuttering( drop the frame rate) at will, even within the same production.

Ron Evans

In my opinion the "film look" is absolutely ludacris, people buying 2000$ adapters just to get a shorter depth of feild, and spending hours deinterlacing to make 60i 24p. The reason 60i will never be a digital movie standard is because no one is gonna stop going after the film look thus keeping 60i shunned as a sort of doc/reality tv show look. I for one love 60i's look, the motion and fluid look it has, when I turn on Discovery HD and see them flying over a rich green forest or blue ocean in 1080i I love the the look it gives, heck when I see short films shot on fx1's where its straight 60i I still love it.

I think people are gonna go after the film look no matter what I or anyone says or does, eventually though I think everyone will end up with 60p, I know 60p is gonna replace 60i eventually.

I agree I detest 24/25P it has too many limitations.

The major flaw with this "test" is that you were playing from source. In order to really see the perception of viewers you would need to dump it, dub it, copy it, squeeze it down for broadcast, decode it and THEN input it to your TV. This is why acquisition in HD is actually growing faster than delivery. Even if your ultimate source is a cell phone, it will look better shot on 35MM than on a cell phone.

Also, even though Discovery and others broadcast in 60i, a GREAT deal of the programming is shot on high end HD cameras in 24P. 24P is like everything else, a TOOL. Some programming it is great with, other programming it ruins the live intimate feel. I think some of you are improperly deciphering what is 24P and what is 60i.


ash =o)

I think its all about subject and framing, frame rate is something we decipher as (some of us) kids the movies were 24p so we got used to serious things being 24p, so when a commercial came on in 60i it looks insubstantial, but lets say movies growing up were digital and 60i, and only commercial and news were 24p, then we might all be doctoring our footage to look like 60i.

I've suggested the same thing and 24p advocates don't buy it, so save your breath on that one. What I still don't get is if 24p is so great, why weren't TVs designed to display 24 images per second? What makes people want smooth high frame rate motion on their TVs but expect juddery 24 fps motion in movies?

I just think people go a little wild with 24p, and DOF. Im a big supporter of just keeping everything native, if your camera is 4:3 and 60i run with it make it work, instead of making it what its not.

I think the 24p thing on video started by people who can't afford film but want to submit to film festivals and thus have to print video to film !!! Projectors are stuck in the past at 24fps in the main. However the film look is a lot more than 24fps. This limitation drives how the film is shot, limited or no panning, angled shots of action to limit movement all aimed at managing the inadequacy of the frame rate. Further action is taken by limiting depth of field, this focuses the attention on the object in question and masks the fact that movement in the backround will be stuttering badly. Lighting is chosen to enhance this effect too. This is what we all perceive as the film look. On the positive side film has high latitude and thus has the ability to show big dynamic range with glorious colours. My only complaint about the film look is the stuttering. We don't have to have this with modern technology and to deliberately use it on modern documentaries etc is stupid. I don't want the cameraman/directors view of the event I want the event as close as possible to how it was in reality, smooth motion, big dynamic range, large depth of field,lots of detail, just like I was there and could see with my own eyes ( even in my 60's don't stutter etc etc). For a theatrical film use anything at your disposal, if the audience likes it they will watch, if they don't they will walk out and they'll do that almost completely on the content NOT the film look.

Ron Evans

This is a VERY interesting thread for someone who spends most of there time in the "Alternative Imaging" board working on DOF converters...

Someone asked why TVs weren't designed to display 24fps if it's so great.......


It's important to point out that no one chose any of the frame rates used throughout the world (24p, 25p, 60i, 50i) because they looked good or had a preference.

NTSC TVs are 60i because the North American power grid runs at 60Hz. For the earliest tube cameras, it was unreasonable (and still is) to but an oscillator into every camera and display device just to change to some other frame rate. The frequency of the electricity coming right out of the wall works just fine.

In PAL countries, the wall power is always 50Hz, so cameras and TVs were designed to display at that rate....

...and I'm sure the origin of the frame rate used in cinema is equally as arbitrary.

My point is, we've all had these choices thrown at us... until everything is progressive, everything simply has to be a multiple of something, if you get my drift.

So I guess in the end it does come down two what the individual truly believes has greater aesthetic value. I would like to point out that if some lab created a 74i or 52p or whatever camera, there might be as many people who fall in love with those two formats as with 24p or 60i.

I personally prefer the feel of 24p for what I do and I do feel that this is an unbiased statement (having grown up with 24p in movies and 60i on the news)... but who knows?

In any event, I think the one thing we could probably all agree on is that we don't like interlaced! For all we know, displays 50 years from now will be 1000p, but at least it wont be interlaced!

It's way more difficult to make great action films in 60 fps than it is to make them in 24. 24 fps hides stuff. You don't need to stage elaborate scenes, you can use smaller stuff and use telephoto a lot. Then just shake the camera, use a high shutterspeed and suddenly you have an action scene. But these little tricks don't work anymore when you film in 60 fps.

It will make moviemaking A LOT harder.

I haven't heard anyone not buy it. If the first images we ever saw were all constructed at 60i, that's probably what we'd value as "quality". But the fact of the matter is that we've got over a hundred years of cinema, big-budget high-dollar productions from the best in the world, and it's all 24fps. That's what's been programmed into our heads as what "quality" looks like. You don't see big-budget films being done at 60i; instead you see Uncle Elmer's home movies, or weddings, or the news, or soap operas, or live events. Whereas when someone has a budget (whether a film or a commercial) they shoot film or 24p. It's just the way things are.

Is this a serious question? When TVs were first manufactured they were tied to the electrical cycle, so 60Hz (i.e., 60i) in the US, 50Hz in Europe.

Today's TVs can display 24fps. 720/24p and 1080/24p are both accepted broadcast standards by the ATSC (even though as far as I know, nobody's broadcasting those signals) and so any ATSC-compatible TV has to be able to display 24fps. And 24fps encoding is supported on DVDs too.

I think you've got the cart before the horse on that one.

I mean, seriously -- look at what's happened in the production world since 24p was introduced. How many big-budget movies were shot on video prior to the introduction of 24p? None. How many now? Not many, but several, including SWII and III, Superman, etc. And the fact that the DVX mopped the floor with all interlaced-only competition, and that every major manufacturer except Sony is offering either legitimate or very-well-simulated 24p should answer that question for you: the market has spoken, and they want their filmlike footage.

You can have the smooth-motion 60i look if you want, that's always been available and continues to be available. But that's not the look that has been associated with big-budget films from the beginning, it has certain connotations to it. It is, quite frankly, less desirable. Show a 60i "movie" to any distributor and see if they give you more than a couple of minutes of their time... 60i in dramatic production is just not a viable option for most purposes (outside of made-for-TV movies in Japan, where apparently 60i is preferred).

Um, no... the 24p thing started because George Lucas wanted to shoot Episode II of Star Wars on high-def video, since every frame he shot on Episode I ended up being transferred to video anyway. So he talked Sony into developing a 24p system (the F900 CineAlta).

Sure, 24p was adopted by low-budget shooters who wanted the "look" of film without the expense of it. But that's not how it started.


Well, fortunately, you have a choice. For those of us who prefer the look of film we have 24p available, but for those like you who don't want that look, there's 60p and 60i to choose from.

You mean meaningful, insetead of visually stimulating someone with a shakey telephoto shot you actually have to put material in front of the viewers face.

Sorry, I did know that but was just thinking out loud about how we got to the situation we're in today. It will be interesting to see where we go from here if the option for 24p broadcasting becomes a reality.

Barry
The first images I saw ( was born in 1942 ) were film, and that for many years, first saw a TV in 1952 for the Queens Coronation when they were starting to appear in greater numbers!!!!. So I grew up on film, started my hobby on film and am well aware of the benefits ( image masking etc ) that the medium offers. I am also aware of George Lucas contribution to introducing video and computer generated clips. However IF the commercial cinemas had at that time projectors running at 50, 0r 60 or 72 fps THAT is what he would have used. He was driven by the means of delivery to the public, thousands of projectors in commercial cinemas. He was sort of stuck. So I have a different view of quality, those first images are not my view of quality, quite the opposite, they are memories of poor lighting, questionable sound, shaky images and set in me the desire for something a lot better. I agree that if someone is 16 years old and has seen modern blockbuster movies they might have a different perspective. Going to the movies is an experience, the environment, the people around etc. When the cinemas go digital in the next few years I expect we will see a shift from 24p as appropriate for the feature itself. Documentaries will be video versions of IMAX, sports will have high frame rates and dark dramas will have the traditional 24p look. The projectors will not care and won't limit the producer to a fixed output format. This is likely possible much sooner in the home though.

Ron Evans

Would it be possible to make a projector that you can overcrank for 60fps? The only problem I see with not digitally projecting 60fps is that your gonna buy 60% more film to print on.

The Showscan system I believe used film projected at 60fps. However, the big problem with that format is that your prints cost a lot more... 60fps uses 250% the film that 24fps does (150% more).

Part of the reason why the movie distribution companies are pushing digital projection is that a $100k projector will be cheaper than film prints in the long run.

2- In my opinion, the difference between 60i and 24p are subtle but 60i motion looks kind of weird.

24 fps was a compromise of technology and economics of the world almost 100years ago and has been maintained by the need for compatibility with the commercial movie houses. Initially new projectors were expected to play the old films so they too were 24 fps etc etc just continued to propagate the old standard. Moving to higher frame rates will of course use more film ie more cost and either bigger camera film magazines or short shot times, larger film distribution and storage etc etc. However none of this applies to a digital medium. I look at my PC and the 40 G boot drive is the same size as the 200G video storage drives!!!!! and is in fact the same size as a 500G drive ( just don't have one of those yet). The technology and economics that drove the film industry over the last 100 years no longer apply, life has changed. Home viewing of HD will in the end drive the commercial industry. When people see 720 60P or 1080i with 7.1 sound they will start to see the commercial cinema as somewhat deficiant and will want more. With digital projectors we will then see a change to higher frame rates or effective variable frame rates at will, not hindered by the fixed frame rates of the past.
I still think it is sort of funny that me , a 64 year old is saying "get with the future"

Ron Evans

The very same thing can be said about interlaced TV. It was a compromise of technology and economics 60 years ago. The most basic and primative form of all compression.

It is amazing how long these media standards have survived.

That's funny, I'd say the opposite. In any case, one of the best points raised here is that digital projectors will hopefully be able to support a variety of frame rates, so producers can use whatever suits them for a particular project. Based on all the comments on this subject lately it sounds like 24p will continue to be popular in the future for a variety of reasons, but maybe we'll start to see more acceptance for higher frame rates.

Ken , I agree about interlace TV too. They used the AC frequency to avoid paying for an oscilator, sent half the image at a time and then arranged the phosphors to decay at a rate to mask the image changes. Makes you realize that we now use modern technology, handicaped with scalers so that we can see film technology and TV technology from decades ago!!!!!!. Bit like taking a modern car and installing beam axles, friction dampers and wooden wheels!!!! On a smooth road with the stereo on and airconditioning you may not notice the difference!!!!

Ron Evans

People think film with 24p (plus shallow depth of field, lighting, movements, etc.), TV news/documentaries with 60i (and all that applies).

I showed a short film I did in 60i with all the other features mentioned above that's found in films and most people said, "It looks like film," except it was a little too smooth in that 60i way.

A short I did with Jon Fordham, Release Me, was shot in 30p and it had that slight TV but film-ish quality.

On the other side of the spectrum, a quasi-dogme 95 film I did in 60i (Canon XL1) without any of the film aesthetics was very "home video-ish" until I changed it to 24p. That helped it a bit.

heath

For me its the stutter of 24p that I find very annoying. The other effects are just fine and do create the NOT REAL look that fiction needs. I am all for using any effects available to create the emotion for a feature. But when I am watching something for knowledge or to remember detail a would like NO effects, highest detail and highest frame rate ( I want to be there, like looking through a window at most). This will look like home video to some because there will be no masking of detail and large depth of field just like being there!!!
If the desire is to produce something that is better than the typical home video ( shot on automatic) then clearly better focusing, exposure/lighting, framing will make the video look better than the average home video. If this is an event then steady tripod use, better editing will all make the difference to the average home video. Just like most people can tell the difference between local TV channel coverage of an event and one taken by a spectator with his Handycam. HD will bring even more challenges and create a differentiation too. Focus will be more critical, compression will bring some of the same problems of film at 24p in panning etc...... One doesn't need to cripple the source video with 24p to create a difference.

Ron Evans

You summed it up perfectly for yourself...do what you like.

heath