24p mode = worthless?

[jwheeler]

Hi,

I'm currently looking at buying a second hand HDC-TM300. It records in 60i or 24p.

Now i understand it's probs better to record in 60i as 24p is sometimes jittery. However, if i find the HDC-TM700 for cheap, should i record in 60p?

We have another camera that records in 60i. Should we stick to 60i across the board?

Also why are we persuaded that 1080p TVs are best when most things are in 1080i (apart form 24p BD and sum games?) - I may be wrong on this sentence?

James

 

[jampat]

Hi,

I'm currently looking at buying a second hand HDC-TM300. It records in 60i or 24p.

Now i understand it's probs better to record in 60i as 24p is sometimes jittery. However, if i find the HDC-TM700 for cheap, should i record in 60p?

We have another camera that records in 60i. Should we stick to 60i across the board?

Also why are we persuaded that 1080p TVs are best when most things are in 1080i (apart form 24p BD and sum games?) - I may be wrong on this sentence?

James

I'm not a video guy, but most people I talk to use 60i for slomo (played back at 30). 24P gives you the theater look where each frame is slightly blurred. 60fps should also require a lot more light than 24fps.

I agree about 1080P TV's, not that useful yet, however the incremental cost is quite low, so there isn't a very compelling reason not to buy it.

 

[psycodriver]

60i = 30 fps. Its called 60i due to there is two interlaced fields of 30 each. You put the two together two make one picture. All cable is interlaced due to the fact that so people still use crt TV's. The must have interlaced, if not they flicker. LCD TV's turns everything to progressive. 24p is like film, this is what Hollywood uses, because it is the lowest frame rate that looks smooth. So a camera that shoots progressive will give you a better picture on a computer monitor and LCD TV and you can interlace it to work on a crt TV. I have both types of cameras and the progressive has a better picture.

 

[jwheeler]

the tm700 uses sum sort of special backlit cmos sensor or summat to counter low light. which must help when its in 60fps progressive mode. However 60fps interlaced only records every other line. So is in essence 30fps progressive (apart from it's not.) I believe theres also special programs that can make them pretty close to 60fps (by interpolating the missing pixels from the frame before and after) I might be wrong about that tho.

anyway my main concern is 24p vs 60i. As i am unlikely to get the tm700.

 

[psycodriver]

I would shoot everything in 24p, it will give you the film look. 99% of people like this look since we all have grown up watching movies. Just don't mix the modes, one will look off. Some people will not notice it, but if you edit video for a living you can tell.

 

[WayneH1]

Hi,

I'm currently looking at buying a second hand HDC-TM300. It records in 60i or 24p.

Now i understand it's probs better to record in 60i as 24p is sometimes jittery. However, if i find the HDC-TM700 for cheap, should i record in 60p?

We have another camera that records in 60i. Should we stick to 60i across the board?

Also why are we persuaded that 1080p TVs are best when most things are in 1080i (apart form 24p BD and sum games?) - I may be wrong on this sentence?

James

My camera will also shoot in 1080i60 (the default) or 1080p30, or 1080p24. The default i60 looks fantastic when played directly to my plasma TV, and is definitely what I would use for everyday shooting. If I want to play around with a "cinema" look, I can do that but it doesn't really interest me much.

BUT, if you're using iMovie '09 to edit your footage, it's worth thinking about p30, or p24 if that's the fastest progressive mode you have. iMovie "thinks" in progressive, and life is generally easier in iMovie if you simply start with progressive footage. (If you search around on this topic, you can find mind-numbing details on what I mean.) It's not a mandatory thing - I've used my i60 footage with fine results - but the ability to shoot progressive might be useful. I'm trying now to do the testing of i60 versus p30 myself so I can decide whether to use 30p from now on.

 

[MisterMe]

... The default i60 looks fantastic when played directly to my plasma TV, and is definitely what I would use for everyday shooting. ...

As psycodriver stated above, flatscreens--LCD and plasma--display everything progressively. There may be a subtle difference between video shot i60 and p30, but it will be subtle indeed.

 

[KeithPratt]

Shoot 60i if you like the "live" look of news, sports and game shows. Shoot 24p if you want your video to look like The Karate Kid.

60i = 30 fps.

It almost always leads to confusion when people say 60i is 30fps. It's true at transport signal level, but misleading when talking about the "look" of video.

There may be a subtle difference between video shot i60 and p30, but it will be subtle indeed.

That depends on the method of de-interlacing the TV uses. If it uses Bob, 60i will retain full temporal resolution and therefore look like 60p.

 

[jwheeler]

cheers guys.

for now were going to shoot in 60i. As ebay doesn't have a TM300 / 350 / 700 in my price range atm. I will decide once we actually have a choice

Edit: Turns out we do have a choice. The other camera we have is a panasonic SD20. Oh dear!