I am a fool.

[becomedeath]

gentlemen,

I have a couple of questions. Some time ago I shot 4 rolls of Pro8/74 (Super8Sound's 200 ASA Tungsten balanced film), the results were lovely. Now, for lack of knowledge, I had them transfer my footage to 1/2" video. I shot the film at 24fps, by the way. I own an IMac and I imported the footage. Again, because of my lack of knowledge I am doing some basic editing on IMovie2. Most of the rolls were interviews in which I recorded sound on a Sony TCD-D8 portable DAT. The sound does not synch up at all. The images go far faster than the sound and so, obviously, synching is impossible. I am not too familiar with all the aspects and terms of editing film on video, but here goes. film is 24fps, video is 30, or, 29.97 technically...I think. Do the images appear fast because my 24fps are being played back at 30 or is it because my footage is 30fps now that its on video and I need to do a 3:2 pulldown back to 24? I really don't know what I'm talking about. I'll try to sum it up. I shot 4 rolls of film at 24fps. I transfered those rolls to video. I imported that video into my computer. The imported video does not synch up at all with the sound that I recorded on my DAT. what is the problem?

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[MovieStuff]

My immediate guess is that your camera was not crystal synched and ran a tad slow during the shoot. The DAT sound is playing back at exactly the speed it was recorded at but the film is not. Since the camera was effectively "undercranked" then it is now playing back fast. Try finding a synch mark for picture and sound at the head and tail of each clip and stretch or shrink you sound clip slightly to make them line up. Once you do, then all the sound in between will line up in synch.

Beyond that, there is always the possiblity that they transferred it without the pulldown, which would indeed mean you are displaying the film at 30fps. Change the scale on your timeline to single frame and drag your cursor one frame at a time. See if every fourth frame is doubled. If it is, then the 3:2 pulldown is present and your camera was shooting slow.

The other thing is how did you import your audio? I'm not a DAT expert but I've heard of other people putting raw DAT files on the timeline and having a speed change show up do to the sample rate or something. If that's the case, trying digitizing the DAT audio via the analog inputs.

Roger

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Roger Evans
MovieStuff http://www.afterimagephoto.tv/moviestuff.html


[This message has been edited by MovieStuff (edited March 11, 2002).]

[S 8 Booster]

I think Roger already gave you enough information to sort it out but I just wanted to add that in Adobe Premiere that I use it is no problem to adjust it the way he describes. I do not know the iMovie but I recon it should be much the same.

In AP, if you find the a start sync point you can attually stretch and drag the soundtrack to make it fit to the movie part.
This may be easier if you cut your movie into takes/sequences/rolls

If you find the key to the speed deviation you may be able to sync it all the way.
Does you film run at "normal" playback speed?

In AP you can drag the arrow/mouse along the frame ruler to hear and see if the sound fits in a "realtime" preview window without making a preview movie. Drag the film forth and back as many times as you like to check and test.

Try and go.

iMovie will offer the same option I guess.




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Vidar

[8th Man]

imovie2 doesn't give you too many options in the audio arena. I don't think you can stretch dialoge in such a simple free program.
You may have to try dividing your audio at the pauses in speach and sliding them around to keep pace with the picture.
Not easy in iMovie but possible.
I really doubt that the transfer is the problem.

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PRM

[mattias]

imovie doesn't give you many options at all. i know a lot of people love it, but for for an experienced editor it might actually be the suckiest program there ever was. even pinnacle studio is better. stay far far away if you're used to be able to perform l and j cuts for example...

/matt