I need a Frame Rate guru!

I have a project I would like to submit to a couple of festivals.

The project was filmed on a variety of HD PAL cameras at 25fps, and edited in a 1080 25p project in FCPX.

So far so good.

However, some of the festivals require the movie to be delivered in DVD 24p, and other festivals require the movie to be delivered in Blu Ray.

So firstly; there are a number of workflows I believe for converting 25p to 24p in FCP7, but how to do it in FCPX? I gather the project will need to be slowed down, and the audio pitch adjusted. Also, what would be the best way to down convert HD 1080 to DVD without getting a lousy result?

Secondly; the powers that be decided not to support HD PAL with Blu Ray, so no 25p. Again I need to convert to 24p, or I have heard that a better result is to output to 50i (whereby the 25p becomes 25psf in a 50i wrapper). I have seen some workflows on Avid boards, but how to do it in FCPX?

Lastly, I don't yet have a BD burner for my Mac, but I understand BD burning is now supported. Any recommendations for a reliable external BD burner that is compatible with FCPX?

CONVERSION

First, Export with Cmd-E to a QuickTime file. Change "Export:" to "ProRes 422" to insure we keep all of our great visual and audio quality.

Take that into Compressor and do the frame rate conversion there for best results:

• Use the "ProRes 422" preset.
• In the Encoder tab of the Inspector, click Settings for the Video parameter, then set frame rate to 24.
• Set Audio in that tab to "Enable", not Pass-Through.
• In the Frame Controls tab, turn on Frame Controls, set the "Rate Conversion" setting to "Better", and "Set Duration to" at 100% of source. Don't set it to "Best" unless you are increasing the frame rate.
• Submit, and use this resulting ProRes QT file to author your Blu-Ray DVD.

As an alternative, you may want to do a second pass with the Rate Conversion's "Set Duration" differently, just as an experiment. You can click the menu arrow to the right of that percentage field, and chose "24@25", which will set the percentage to something around 96% -ish. This changes the duration so that no new frames are created or removed, it only uses original frames. One method may be more to your liking than another.

Do a test encode of each quickly by placing In and Out points in Compressor's Preview window. The encode will only happen to that part of the total video. Select a 6-7 minute section, see how it looks, when you've picked which way you prefer setting the Duration's percentage field, remove the In/Out points, encode the full video.

Don't worry about audio, Compressor automatically speeds up or slows down audio to match the video, without changing pitch at all. It should be a non-issue.

BURNING

As for a Blu Ray burner, pretty much everything out is good. I'd highly recommend getting Bruce Nazarian's book "Fast Path To Blu Ray For The Mac". It'll give you all the info you need, no fluff, easy to digest.
www.thedigitalguy.com

If you want to use the Share menu to create your Blu-Ray disk, in Compressor go to File > New Batch from Template > Create Blu-ray disc. Then in the job, right-click the empty Source well and from there chose File, and find the 24fps ProRes you created. Then with the job (not a target) highlighted, in the Inspector, the Job Action tab, you'll set up things there for the build/burn.

For a reliable bluray burner, I always buy Pioneer Bluray Burners, MacSales.com has a great external one, that has firewire 800 and esata. But its rock solid.

Thanks guys; once I get the BluRay burner I am going to try this out.

Just a quick question,. What runtime is the project?
I've been doing Bluray using the superdrive and either toast (lately directly from FCPX and the Share menu as BenB details) for projects under 25minutes. Just using good quality DVD discs and creating BR compatible discs
Been doing that for 12/18 months and no issues from it.

Hi,
Thanks, that is quite interesting. Are you saying that I can use the regular DVD drive in my Mac (MacBookPro 2011 model) to burn BluRay compatible movies on a DVD? Would they be 1080p?

The first project is less than 10 minutes.

Thanks,

Simon

Yes:)

Internal DVD burner does Bllu-Ray compatible AVCHD DVD's. Your time is limited to less than 30 minutes. Older blu ray players may not recognize them.

Please ask them to confirm "DVD 24p".

The DVD standard does allow 25 fps or 29.97 fps (interlaced or progressive), but not 24.