Wild ,crystal or PC jack?

[Pedro]

sorry people, cameras never hold sync, any result you get in wild sync is only occasional. When you set your camera to 24 fps, it may shoot at 23, or 23,2 or 23,7 or 24,1 or.... any variation is possible. Each camera has an other ABSOLUTE shooting frame rate.
Same with analog sound recorders and projectors.

Now, when one of you says, that his camera can hold sync for 15 seconds or an entire cart, is is only that his projecor OCCATIONALLY runs at a similar absolute framerate as the camera.
You can optimize wild sync, when you adjust the projector as exact as possible to the camera speed. Shoot a scene and stop the time of the scene. Develop the film and stop the time the scene needs to be projected. Then adjust the projector pitch until the time of projection matches with the shooting time.


If you want constant results without try and error, you must use real sync technology. Record a sync track off the flash contact of the camera to register how the camera is running during sound shooting (frame rate, aberations, temperature, battery charge and load influences).

For projection or sound transfer to the film, feed this sync track into a synchronizer that is able to adjust the projector´s frame rate using a feed back control circuit. Then the projector automatically runs striclty in camera rhythm and only starts when the sound scene is played back. Align the first frame and play back the sound scene audio, and the projector will start and keep in sync automatically.

For live sound transfer to computer, you need a crystal camera, because computers run in crystal clock.
If this is not possible, you can first transfer your dialog sound to the magnetic sound stripe of the film as described above, then transfer the complete film with dialog sound from the projector to the computer. Of course, the projector must run in crystal sync mode, controlled by a synchronizer with crystal time base.

Pedro

[mattias]

sorry people, cameras never hold sync

[...]

Each camera has an other ABSOLUTE shooting frame rate.

eh, ok?!? whatever you meant by that you're missing the point. we're talking about nle syncing, and for that purpose the only variable is the camera speed, so if you have a camera that doesn't vary its speed much you'll have sync whether it shoots at 23.4 or 24.1 fps.

/matt

[MovieStuff]

People that say that their cameras will hold synch for 15+ seconds are full of it.

mine holds sync for entire carts, easily, if by holding sync we count drifting by a predictable amount. many electronically controlled cameras do.

/matt

Yes, I have found this to be the case quite often. I shot many, many of my earlier films projects with wild sound, long before I was ever editing on a NLE and I was able to hold synch for quite a long time.

Roger

[downix]

I'll try doing sync on my wind-up K3's, just to see how they'd do.

[audadvnc]

I remember loading my Bolex with slug film and figuring out 24fps with a strobe light. But the beginning of a wind would run fast and the end slow as the spring ran down.

[avortex]

If I need direct sound, I record it with a miniDV camera. It's very easy to sync it in post, because you can see the same action in both film and video.
And the sound quality on a DV camera is better than Minidisc.

[mattias]

And the sound quality on a DV camera is better than Minidisc.

neither is likely to be even close to being the limiting factor in a diy setup. what mic and mixer are you using? who's operating? you can't just look at the number of bits and hz.

/matt

[avortex]

you can't just look at the number of bits and hz

You're right. I was talking about a basic setup with just a good mic connected to the camera or minidisc. In same conditions, DV performs better.

For a better job, I would look for a DAT and better equipment...

[namke]

you can't just look at the number of bits and hz

You're right. I was talking about a basic setup with just a good mic connected to the camera or minidisc. In same conditions, DV performs better.

For a better job, I would look for a DAT and better equipment...

Hmmm, I dunno - the audio on MiniDV is 48kHz, 16bit uncompressed; and you can grab it into the computer via firewire... Ok, a DAT machine may have a better mic preamp, but you'll need a decent soundcard in order to get a digital input which doesn't resample the digital data...

DAT decks are also a little less affordable in my experience

[avortex]

Yes, but if you're working on a professional project, money at that level is not a problem... Anyway, the sound of DV can make the job very well.

[david]

I'm going to shoot my first short next week-end, and I'm wondering if this setup would work: two mics placed next to the camera, one pointed towards the actor, the other one to the camera. mics are two akg c1000, hypercardiod. Both will record camera noise from capsule side (90°-270°), but one will be pointed to the actor (0°), the other one opposite way (180°). Theoretically, if the capsules are at the same distance from the source, inverting the phase on one of the two tracks should cancel the camera noise. Anyone tried this? My first plan was to record sound later, but I'll try this too, I'm really curious...

Sorry for the slightly off topic post.
david

[Pedro]

synchronous running is alway a question of matching the absolute "speed" of two devices, one of them is the camera, the other anything that can record and playback sound.
Technically, there are only two possible ways. The first one is to relate each of the devices to a common, very exact frequency standard, like crystal is. This avoids any feedback or cable connection between the devices. It is ideal for NLE.
The other possibility is not even to care about any exact speed base, but to force one device to adapt itself to the speed of the other, technically realized with a closed loop regulation with feedback. This is not applicable for NLE, or only in some rare cases where the playback speed of the software can be alterated continuously by external control.

Every electronically controlled camera will hold it´s own, natural speed for a limited time, but this can not be called "sync", because there is no relation to a standard speed. Of course, the audio recorded without sync in parallel "can" be stretched to match that time in nle. But the more the camera is off the absulte crystal standard frequency, the more the sound must be stretched to match the scene.

BTW, a very good and handy audio recorder is the brand new flash/mp3 recorder of m-audio (avid). It records in wav files to flash disk and has balanced, phantom powered microfone inputs and manual setting for recording gain. It´s available in musician´s stores.

Pedro

[Actor]

I'm going to shoot my first short next week-end, and I'm wondering if this setup would work: two mics placed next to the camera, one pointed towards the actor, the other one to the camera. mics are two akg c1000, hypercardiod. Both will record camera noise from capsule side (90°-270°), but one will be pointed to the actor (0°), the other one opposite way (180°). Theoretically, if the capsules are at the same distance from the source, inverting the phase on one of the two tracks should cancel the camera noise. Anyone tried this? My first plan was to record sound later, but I'll try this too, I'm really curious...

Sorry for the slightly off topic post.
david

I've had the same idea and have been told it will not work indoors because so much of the sound is from echos off the walls. These arrive at both makes in a random fashion and thus do not cancel. It might work outdoors. I'd be interested in hearing how it works out for you.

[mattias]

Every electronically controlled camera will hold it´s own, natural speed for a limited time, but this can not be called "sync"

of course it can. i understand your point completely, but that's not what we're talking about.

/matt

[mattias]

You're right. I was talking about a basic setup with just a good mic connected to the camera or minidisc. In same conditions, DV performs better.

i still don't agree. i've had much more problems with noise and dropouts on dv recordings than i've ever had on minidisc. the compression on minidisc is rarely a problem, and other than that it's also 48khz 16 bit.

/matt