4k 60 fps downsides?

[SabrToothSqrl]

I'm not sure if I've been filming at 30 or 60 fps. I know it's 4k, but I'd have to walk upstairs to look at my files.And the couch is comfy.

Anyway, they look great, I play them on a 4k TV hooked to my gaming PC that's running the screen at 120hz (so 120 fps?). (it's the only 4k tv I have where I can feed it a 4k signal). All of my other TVs are run from computers that can only push 1080p. (I do IT work for a living, so yeah, I got the computer part covered).

Anyway; other the file size, which I assume is bigger at 60fps vs. 30fps... is there any downside to the higher frame rate?

If I just film everything at the best the camera can do... why not?
For what it's worth, I'm planning to use it this summer to get video of us on a boat.
I think 30fps would be just fine, but hey, more = better?

Would filming something at 60fps ever make it worse than had I filmed it at 30fps?

Thanks!

 

[Meta4]

Don't make the common mistake of assuming that a bigger number is automatically better.
Instead learn a little about frame rates or try shooting a few samples and comparing them.

Frame Rate: a Beginner’s Guide | The TechSmith Blog

Learn all there is to know about frame rate, from understanding the definition and why it matters, to choosing the best frame rate for your video project.

www.techsmith.com

 

[Howard70]

Hello SabrToothSqrl:

If you plan on viewing most of your video without doing much editing, then you might want to record at the rate you like to view. The guide referenced by Meta4 could help you decide what rate you prefer for viewing.

If you plan on editing most video then you might consider recording at your viewing rate or an integer multiple of that. Say you like 30 fps for viewing. Then you might record at 30, 60, or 120 (the last not an option for 4k on our drones). When you edit and your finished product will be at 30 fps, you can slow 60 or 120 fps down for nice effects and they will reduce to 30 easily with smooth results. If you decide you want some of the 60 or 120 at recorded speed (not slowed) but you want some motion blur, you just convert them to 30 fps in your editing software and they will look identical to natively recorded 30 fps because the editor just drops frames to get the 30 fps. If your recorded fps is not an even multiple of your viewing fps then converting down to 30 fps can get poor results because simply dropping frames isn't sufficient and some interpolation is involved.

I usually shoot at 60 fps so that I can slow down my clips a bit if I want. If I really want some noticeable slow motion I'll shoot at 120 but that means dropping down to 1080 which is fine unless I'm cropping to make the finished image larger.

Howard

 

[GadgetGuy]

I'm not sure if I've been filming at 30 or 60 fps. I know it's 4k, but I'd have to walk upstairs to look at my files.And the couch is comfy.

Anyway, they look great, I play them on a 4k TV hooked to my gaming PC that's running the screen at 120hz (so 120 fps?). (it's the only 4k tv I have where I can feed it a 4k signal). All of my other TVs are run from computers that can only push 1080p. (I do IT work for a living, so yeah, I got the computer part covered).

Anyway; other the file size, which I assume is bigger at 60fps vs. 30fps... is there any downside to the higher frame rate?

If I just film everything at the best the camera can do... why not?
For what it's worth, I'm planning to use it this summer to get video of us on a boat.
I think 30fps would be just fine, but hey, more = better?

Would filming something at 60fps ever make it worse than had I filmed it at 30fps?

Thanks!

Depends. If the question is "ever", then certainly. The slowest video shutter speed available at 60fps is 1/60 sec while at 30fps it is 1/30 sec, so you gain a full stop of exposure at 30fps when you have maxed out the ISO capability to compensate for low light as it gets darker. 60fps will get to ISO 3200 sooner than 30fps. The maximum bit rate is also 100 mbps, so each frame at 60fps will contain half the data that the same bit rate at 30fps will contain, so if you are wanting to use still frames extracted from your video, at 30fps, they'll be twice as large as those taken at 60fps. Everything is a series of compromises. If you make lots of high speed turns in your videos, a higher 60 fps frame rate will make them appear less stuttery and smoother. You also cannot use digital zoom at 60fps in 4K. You have to lower your frame rate to 30fps.

 

[tck444]

For a more cinematic look, 24 FPS is considered to be a better format as it is aesthetically more pleasing. Perhaps someone mentioned this above.

This guy is my favorite at explaining things,

 

[SabrToothSqrl]

Interesting. So at 60 fps, it technically can't record more data than at 30 fps. Looks like it's about 733MB/Min at 4k 30fps. (I checked all my shots so far are 30fps).

I'll take some quick videos at 60fps and just verify it's still 733MB/Min.

And good to know low light would work better at 30fps. I'll do some reading.

According to the video - use the lowest one you can, for your needs.

thank you everyone!

Youtube is my distribution platform - not really a movie making guy lol. long as it looks good to me, I'm happy.

 

[Pappy]

The other caution to know about is the MA2 records 4K@60 using the h.265 (HEVC) codec. Editing this footage can be a chore if you don't have hardware that's up to the task. And if you're just viewing straight raw footage on the tv the device may not be able to support it.

 

[brett8883]

Interesting. So at 60 fps, it technically can't record more data than at 30 fps. Looks like it's about 733MB/Min at 4k 30fps. (I checked all my shots so far are 30fps).

I'll take some quick videos at 60fps and just verify it's still 733MB/Min.

And good to know low light would work better at 30fps. I'll do some reading.

According to the video - use the lowest one you can, for your needs.

thank you everyone!

Youtube is my distribution platform - not really a movie making guy lol. long as it looks good to me, I'm happy.

60 fps will technically be more compressed because even if it is a higher bit rate it isn’t double the bit rate of 30 fps.

But here’s where this gets complicated. HEVC encodes the changes from frame to frame not every frame. With a higher frame rate you have fewer changes from frame to frame so there’s less to encode from one frame to the next even though you have twice as many frames. HEVC also uses algorithms to predict motion from frame to frame to further reduce the file size and having more frames allows this work even more efficiently. So while technically this is more compression that doesn’t mean it necessarily reduces visual quality to the extent most people think.

Besides 120mbps is way higher than any delivery codec from a video editor so if you aren’t editing the video this will make no difference what do ever.

As far as the feel of watching 60p vs 30p or 24p it’s all in the eyes of the beholder. I personally think humans look odd at 60p but shots of nature and scenery look better at higher in 60p. One thing that happens as a result of using a higher frame rate with a 180 degree shutter is things that are moving will seem to be moving slower due to reduced motion blur. This can be good or bad depending on what you want to portray in the video.

Also, What most people don’t realize is that one major difference between Cinema and drone videos is that, in Cinema, the camera is stationary most of the time. You see very little camera movement and the things in the scene are moving. Whereas with drone videos the things in the scene move hardly at all but the camera is moving constantly. A low frame rate like 24 fps have a detrimental effect on the camera movement. You must pan much slower with a lower frame rate so that the whole doesn’t get blurred out.

So many words to say that if you like they way 60 fps looks then just continue to do that.