Scanning 16 fps film

[Gary Davis]

Hello, I've been shooting film since the early 1960s but this is my first time on this forum!

I'm shooting a new movie at 16fps (16mm magazine camera) but it doesn't seem that 16fps is a standard rate for digital video.

I was thinking that scanning the film at 30 fps and playing each frame twice might be a good solution!

comments?

thanks!  (picture of my "new" rig below!)

--Gary Davis

 

[Raymond Zrike]

I assume no sync sound? Because if it’s MOS, you could just slow the footage down to 15fps (a minor slowdown) and then double it to make 30fps. If there is sync sound, you might have to use software to create frames to bring it to 24fps, or else there will be skipping during pans/tilts and movement.

[Joerg Polzfusz]

You should be able to stick to 16fps. Most playback devices will then take care of the rest on their own. The only frame-rate-limitations left in the digital realm are for DVD, Blu-ray or certain video-platforms (YouTube, …) or for certain (outdated) codecs. In any case: Simply doubling the frames will result in some jitter. Hence, most video editing softwares will use interpolation or even AI to create the missing frames.

BTW: Keep in mind that there’s no 30fps frame rate for video. It’s still that strange NTSC frame rate with only 29.97fps (even though most software or devices will show the rounded value of 30fps).

 

Good luck with your project!

[Perry Paolantonio]

Any modern scanner can create a 16fps file from your film, so just scan it at 16fps. Most edit systems will allow you to work at that frame rate as well and export to 16fps. Then when you're all done, if you need to deliver something at a more standard frame rate, you can pull up to that frame rate. If you're only going to upload the file. just upload the 16fps, because all the standard web-based video sharing sites can handle that.