24p Pulldown necessary in After Effects 7.0 Pro or CS3 Pro?

[Iron_Guy69]

Hey, I've been trying to do some research on the pulldown for 24p in After Effects but haven't really found anything.

Alright well, is it really necessary to do the pulldown at all?

I mean, here's my situation. I want to transfer the video using firewire, then import it into After Effects and edit it, time it up with some audio, then render it out for the web and dvd.

Now, someone said that you could shoot in 24p and then just work with it in 30fps, but then when you render it out does it go back to 24p?

(All this is for After Effects as I use no other editing software such as Final Cut Pro or Vegas.)

Thanks in advance!

[Frank]

I use AE too, and I would recommend decompressing your MPEG-2 to AVI for best quality before rendering from AE. I see a definite improvement in the chroma when I do this. There are at least a couple of tools (DVFilm Maker and TMPGEnc 4.0 Xpress) which will do this plus remove pulldown as well, if you need that done.

Do not render an MPEG-2 to AVI from AE, however. That will lock in the crappy chroma in your footage (see my DVFilm Maker thread over on Software for some examples).

You can actually remove pulldown right in AE, too. Just right-click on the footage, go to "Interpret Footage" and hit guess 3:2 pulldown. As long as your clip is a continuous take, it'll do the job every time (it will have a problem if you stop and start shooting again within a clip, because the pulldown cadence may change).

I used to be leery of the whole reverse pulldown thing, too, but now that I've being doing it a little while, it's no big deal. You definitely don't have to do it if you don't want to though.

[chiplay_hybrid]

I'm also a Premiere Pro CS3 / AE CS3 user and here is my workflow so far (could be incorrect - but it looks good to me)

1) Capture via Firewire in Premiere - 1440x1080 1.33 aspect ratio 29.97 fps
2) Import to After Effects
3) Interpret Footage - Use the Guess 3:2 Pulldown to convert to 23.976 fps
4) Create a 1920x1080 1:1 aspect ratio composition
5) Add footage to comp and edit

I also have had success with RE:Vision DE:Noise plugin for removing HDV artifacts - settings are:
Spatial Noise Reduction: Diffuse
Spatial Radius: 0.50
Spatial Threshold: 0.00
S Process Mode: Average
Temporal Quality: High / Super
Temporal Threshold: 50.00
Post Processing Controls:
Contrast Using Global Avh
Contrast: 5%
Sharpen Amount: 200.00
Sharpen Radius: 2.00

Still playing with those settings, but good results so far - subtle, but good. Takes lots of cpu horsepower, so only turn on when rendering.

Anyone have any suggestions on my workflow? I'm I missing anything important? I've thought about getting a Blackmagic Intensity Card for capture with Cineform Codec - but will I see any improvements? I'm not planning on dragging my Mac Pro to any shoots for live capture.

Another slightly unrelated question - when I export out of AE, I've been using the lossless option, which of course gives me huge files that look great but qont playback in realtime. I've then exported from lossless to H.264 in QT but the color and gamma gets extremely washed out after this. I'm I doing something wrong here? Is there a better way to export my videos out of AE?

Thanks!

[chiplay_hybrid]

Here is a link for some test footage using the above work flow. Encoded to H.264 for smaller download. Please note that the gamma looks fine when the .mov is imported back into AE - but when played back from QT, looks washed out. Tried doing some research on why with no success. Any ideas?

http://www.hybr-id.com/hv20_test_H264.mov

[Frank]

A discussion of AE color should really be a thread over in Software, but have you considered your working color space? Under File / Project Settings you can enable color management by choosing a working space. I use HDTV (rec. 709). With color management enabled, you can convert the output file on render to whatever color output profile you want (Output Modules / Color Management tab). I fiddled around with this to get my colors to stay true for TMPGEnc Plus when I downconvert HDV to uncompressed standard def AVI to make standard def DVD MPEG-2 files.

[Westcroft]

So let me get this straight, you can perform a pulldown just with After Effects CS3?

I hope so because my film class has access to Premiere and After Effects

[T_Bone]

I have After Effects that has a Remove Pulldown function in a clip Interpolation selection. But somewhere in this forum I recall reading that this AE pulldown is at best a guess of the proper pulldown and that other methods are more reliable or preferred.

I've watched video with and without remove pulldown and I just don't see the difference. But I was also told that I did not see a difference because my videos did not contain fast movement. Oh, and I was informed remove pulldown was only "necessary" for PC or web based footage.

Don't know how true this is but worth a more knowledgable member's comments...

[Frank]

So let me get this straight, you can perform a pulldown just with After Effects CS3?

I hope so because my film class has access to Premiere and After Effects

My experience is that AE can remove pulldown from a clip if the cadence doesn't change within the clip. Another option to check out is the "free method" detailed in other threads here.

[bryant]

I have After Effects that has a Remove Pulldown function in a clip Interpolation selection. But somewhere in this forum I recall reading that this AE pulldown is at best a guess of the proper pulldown and that other methods are more reliable or preferred.

I've watched video with and without remove pulldown and I just don't see the difference. But I was also told that I did not see a difference because my videos did not contain fast movement. Oh, and I was informed remove pulldown was only "necessary" for PC or web based footage.

Don't know how true this is but worth a more knowledgable member's comments...

Without removing the pulldown, the framerate is still 30 frames (60 fields) per second but it will look like it is running at 24 frames per second because of how the frames were sliced to fit within the HDV standard.

If the film is staying on the tape and you only plan on playing it back on a TV, this is fine. If you want to do any editing work with it, it would be wise to remove the pulldown.

[Westcroft]

My experience is that AE can remove pulldown from a clip if the cadence doesn't change within the clip. Another option to check out is the "free method" detailed in other threads here.

Sorry if this a noobish question, but what do you mean by 'cadence'?

[Frank]

Sorry if this a noobish question, but what do you mean by 'cadence'?

Pulldown means frames are added to bring 24p up to 60i (30 fps). The extra repeated frames are what you are removing when you remove pulldown. The cadence is the position of repeated frames within the sequence and it can be different in different clips. If you have a video clip where you started and stopped filming more than once within the clip, you may have more than one cadence. In that case After Effects will not be able to figure out the cadence and remove the pulldown.

[TheoO]

I tried to import the mpeg in after effects and it says it does not support that format?

[Kyleman]

I had a thread on on this but it got closed:

Just need some response.


I'm trying to understand this whole 24p thing. OK some basic questions.

1: What exactly is "pull down", what does it do? Only thing I can figure out that it makes the captured 29.97 to 23.976. Correct? In my case, I captured in Premiere CS3 using HDV 1080i 29.97. Then I went in After Effects CS3 and imported my footage. Then went to Right-Click > Interpret Footage > Main > Conform to frame rate and typed 23.976 > Upper Field First > Ticked Preserve Edges (High Quality Only) > Guess 3:2 Pull down > The clicked OK. I'm using the Adobe Dynamic Link. It also seems to slow down my footage and ruin whatever I edited in Premiere CS3. I'd have to re-adjust EVERY clip.


2: When you set your frame rate in 24 mode with TV to 60fps, is that 24p? I thought it had to be 24fps to be 24p. Maybe not. That's why I'm asking. I mostly film action movies and 24fps seems like a pretty low frame rate for my fast-paced running (maybe some slow-motion from time to time) and also muzzle flashes(edited in After Effects CS3 of course).

3: When you create a new comp for 1920x1080 in after effects do you set the frame rate to 23.975


So, is 24p mode recommended for action films? Should I stick to normal HDV mode and keep my frame rate from 60fps to around 500fps(maybe higher, it depends) to still get a good movie look?

[koolpenguin89]

oi, lots o' questions kyle! while i cant comment on after affects, i can say this. What you described ("it makes the captured 29.97 to 23.976. Correct?") is pulldown removal, which is what your trying to achieve with your AE workflow. Pulldown is the opposite, its what the camera does to embed your 24p footage into the 60i stream to record to tape. alot of times on these forums, the two terms (pulldown/pulldown removal) get mixed up because a) they are similair and b)people are too lazy to write "pulldown removal" so they shorten it to "pulldown", thus confusing people like you and (some months ago) me.

Also, you do seem to be a little misinformed on the way video cameras work. shutter speed and fps are 2 very different things. TV mode controlls shutter speed, nt frame rate. shutter speed is physically how fast the shutter in the camera opens and closes. so a shutter speed of 1/60th takes 1/60th of a second to open and close. now, fps, or frames per second, is how often the camera records a picture. on the hv20, you have 2 options, 60 and 24. ill focus on 24p since thats what your dealing with. when set to 24p mode, your HV20 records 24 still pictures each second. now, assuming you have the shutter speed set to 1/60th, your cameras shutter will open for 1/60th of a second 24 times per second.

For action movies with lots of in frame motion or camera motion, you will get motion blur. part of this is due to 24p, but an even bigger part is your shutter speed. If you have your shutter speed set to, lets say, 1/30th, it will give your subject time to move while the shutter is open, creating blur. a faster shutter speed, like 1/500th, will reduce this blur because the shutter is open for such a short period of time, the subject doesnt have time to move. However, higher shutter speeds will result in a considerably darker picture, because of they fast open/close time of the shutter, not as much light is getting in, resulting in a darker picture. So filming action shots requires a precise balance of camera work, directing, and lighting to achieve a good result.

I hope ive helped you understand things a little more, and my best advice to you is go out and try things. see what works best for you, and use trial and error to try and teach yourself a little.

dylan

p.s. if anyone else knows a thing or two about pulldown removal, im sure kyle could use the help.

[Kyleman]

* excessive quote removed *

Thanks!

I feel dumb now that I didn't think about the differences between shutter speed and 24p. I guess I got confused where the number "24" came from. I'm not as familiar with film settings compared to photography settings. Because in photography I'm constantly changing Shutter speeds and the ISO settings. Now I get it, 24 = How many frames captured in one second. And I should have known this one, Shutter speed = How much light is allowed through the cameras lens.

I already know about F-Stops. I think that cleared things up for me. Now that I actually thought about it. Thanks again!

[pringshia]

If you have a video clip where you started and stopped filming more than once within the clip, you may have more than one cadence. In that case After Effects will not be able to figure out the cadence and remove the pulldown.

If I use HDVSplit to split the footage, will I be able to avoid this problem? If not, is there an alternative solution to removing pulldown for clips where you started and stopped filming more than once during the clip?

[Lunchbox]

Read the FAQ. There are threads discussed about 24p Pulldown removal.

http://www.hv20.com/showthread.php?t=3058

[pringshia]

I did, and I ended up back at this thread. Basically, all my question is is that to remove pulldown IN AFTER EFFECTS from a video with multiple shots, could you use HDVSplit to split up the footage and then remove pulldown from each shot individually using After Effects. Sorry if this is a really "nooby" question as I am not very experienced with video editing but have learned tons from this forum over the last couple days.

[Lunchbox]

Theoretically yes. But if you look carefully in After Effect, the caption for the option did say it removes pulldown by "guessing". There are people reported after pulldowns are removed, some ghosting frames are still being found.

There is also the free method hv20pulldown.exe created by Steve that you can follow. Otherwise, the fee method is to pay Cineform for their NeoHDV or AspectHD.

[bytehoven]

Theoretically yes. But if you look carefully in After Effect, the caption for the option did say it removes pulldown by "guessing". There are people reported after pulldowns are removed, some ghosting frames are still being found..

I'm tuning into this thread a bit late, but is what folks are reporting a problem with the windows version of AE?

After Effects will usually guess the correct setup if it's given footage without cadence jumps, ie... raw footage. But if AE does incorrectly guess raw footage, the manual adjustment is very simple. Simply step thru frames to see if any of the are being rendered poorly compared to the others. Switch the 24p pulldown setting (WWWSS) to an alternate and check again. One of them will be right as you continue thru the footage frame by frame.

There are several plugs for adaptive 3:2 pulldown, but I haven't tried any of them yet. Maybe they would solve the problems as well as provide for pulldown of edited footage with cadence errors.

[scotthv20]

AE and most software scans the first batch of frames for field differences to determine the cadence. If there's no motion visible then it may go with a default.

[bytehoven]

AE and most software scans the first batch of frames for field differences to determine the cadence. If there's no motion visible then it may go with a default.

AE definitely will lock on the 1st frames and process from there. You want an adaptive scan or in the case with some AE plugs, an adaptive scan with key frames so you can go back and adjust for any errors then render to output a final, perfect clip.

[Kyser]

I'm also a Premiere Pro CS3 / AE CS3 user and here is my workflow so far (could be incorrect - but it looks good to me)

1) Capture via Firewire in Premiere - 1440x1080 1.33 aspect ratio 29.97 fps
2) Import to After Effects

What's the step between 1 and 2?

Do I export it as a 1440x1080 1.33 29.97 mpeg and then go to step 2?
Or is there a way to import directly from CS3 to AE's?

Thanks!

Mike

[bytehoven]

Pardon my ignorance of Premiere's capabilities under windows...

... but can you chose an alternate codec during import from the HV20?

I ask because FCP under OSX supports a couple of alternate codecs when importing HDV which makes following production steps easier.

[bryant]

Hmm. I just tried doing this, and while AE nailed the guess (WSSWW in that particular clip) and the footage looked perfectly fine in the unfinalized frame by frame preview in AE, when I exported it as a film in premiere it looks as if every frame is 3 parts of one frame and one part of another (i.e. a screwy deinterlace).

I take it I did something wrong?