Framerate and interlacing

[voltage 0]

I've recorded a few tapes worth of footage in the last few months, but mostly used it for immediate review directly off the camera. Now I sit on my computer and try to cut the footage and produce something nice.

Being a newbie, I am not sure what output to choose. I've read up on interlacing and stuff, understand that.

My HC28 records NTSC interlaced, which means 29,97 x 2 half-frames per second. I understand this is how it gets to my computer via firewire.

Now it doesn't look very nice when I play it back as such (on fast movement a lot of mismatched lines), so for producing computer video (youtube format and AVI) I want to de-interlace first.

But what framerate to choose and which compression codec? Just keep it at the present framerate?

Appreciate any advice on how to make it look best on the computer with reasonable filesize. My first try was to convert the framerate to 25 fps, resize the image to 640x480 and compress with Xvid, and it looses a lot of its crisp quality in that step.

Another thing is, being back in PAL land at the moment, how to produce a PAL DVD from NTSC footage. Is that even possible with reasonable quality?

[DSE 3]

last question first: It's extremely easy to make PAL from NTSC, but not the other way around.
Deinterlacing can be done in a variety of ways; the NLE you choose makes the biggest difference. AE does a great job of deinterlacing, premiere doesn't. Edius does a great job of deinterlacing, Pinnacle doesn't. Sony Vegas does a great job of deinterlacing as well.
There are also some 'manual' deinterlacing tricks.

As far as YouTube/Googlevid/Vimeo;
They all like MP4 just fine, they'll take wmv as well. Since your source is DV, I'd upload as 640 x 480, square pixel (1.0 pixel aspect ratio) at a bitrate of not less than 3MBps. If it's HD, most sources are 1440 x 1080 or 1920 x 1080, and they upload best as 1280x720, 30p.

Anyway...provide some info about your NLE and let's see if we can show you the best/fastest deinterlacing method without being too techy.

[dragon2 0]

Quote

It's extremely easy to make PAL from NTSC, but not the other way around.

Because of the extra frames needed? I convert both the same way (using premiere): capture clips in project with the right setting for the original project, import the captured clips in project with the settings (NTSC/PAL) you want to export in, resize the wrong-format clips, set field options of those clips to always deinterlace, burn to dvd.

I think after effects can do this better but this is the quickest and easiest way I know of and the result is a playable and watchable NTSC (or PAL as the case may be) DVD. You know a better way (w/premiere) or have tips on that?

ciel bleu,
Saskia

[DSE 3]

I'll rephrase.
You can convert any framerate to any framerate.
The question is end quality.
If you start with well-shot 60i, it downconverts nicely to 50i.
If you start with well-shot 50i, it doesn't upconvert nicely to 60i, but it certainly does upconvert.

If your source is HD, then the 60i downconvert to 25p will always significantly beat the 50i downconvert to 30p, and the 60i to 50i will always be better than the 50i to 60i.
The extra frames data doesn't mathematically compensate for the additional resolution required in going from NTSC to PAL, but it visually helps. The additional resolution from PAL to NTSC helps with deinterlacing, but it doesn't help with the interpolated frames.
In other words, it's a trade-off one way or the other no matter what.

Trying to avoid being techy after stepping on my own tail in another thread.

I would never use Premiere for framerate conversion. I'd use AE if I'm gonna remain in the Adobe paradigm. For the same reasons Premiere sucks, so do FCP and even Compressor. JESDeinterlacer is great for the cost.
Hardware is still the best means of fast deinterlace, IMO.
Without hardware, thank heaven for 1080 acquistion at any framerate downconverted to 720 at any framerate.
Just another argument for HD acquisition...

[mccordia 73]

Quote

I would never use Premiere for framerate conversion. I'd use AE if I'm gonna remain in the Adobe paradigm. For the same reasons Premiere sucks, so do FCP and even Compressor.

Fully second what DSE says.
If its editing you do, use an editing program.
If its image alteration/manipulations you do, use a compositing package...


Doing an NTSC downconvert to PAL can also be done one frame per frame basis (interpreting 30 fps as 25 fps).
This will mean NTSC footage will run at a slight slowmo, but in skydiving footage this generaly isnt a big problem. And it prevents bad artifacts from frame-blending (which happens in a normal 30 fps>25 fps conversion).

JC
FlyLikeBrick
I'm an Athlete?

[DSE 3]

Quote

Fully second what DSE says.

Now you're just suckin' up to make up for all that other stuff you said the other night.

[voltage 0]

Thanks for the help guys
For editing I have tried Windows Movie Maker (crap), Adobe Premiere Elements and a test version of Sony Vegas Pro 8. I like Vegas best, but not sure if I am willing to pay that much.

A couple of years ago I did some video conversion (from VCR to Xvid) and I remember that there used be alot of good freeware for many tasks.

[KatKnight 0]

According to what you have mentioned, the deinterlacing seems to be not working in the right way. If the output still sucks after trying those methods, you can use VLC https://www.videolan.org/vlc/index.html to play the video which contain the deinterlacing option. Just activate" Deinterlace" in the toolbar and then you will see your video without any horizontal lines.
Or you can use Deinterlacer http://www.videoconverterfactory.com/tips/dvd-interlaced.html to convert your video into a progressive one.