Creating slow motion with cinema tools
I’ve been asked a few times about the method used to create slow motion shots using 50p or 60p footage. This process applies to clips from Canon DSLR’s that shoot 50 or 60 fps at 720p, the GoPro Hero HD, Sony EX cameras and pretty much any other camera that will shoot 50 or 60 frames per second progressive.
I use two methods for conforming my clips in Cinema Tools, one way is to select individual clips in Final Cut Pro and open them in Cinema Tools from within the editor, the other way is to run a ‘Batch Conform’ from within Cinema Tools itself and conform a whole folder of clips at once. Both of these methods are described in the videos below.
In the following video I conform the ProRes files but the native H.264 files from the 7D could be conformed in exactly the same way.
Batch Conforming
Please be aware that this process changes all of the files in the directory you define, make sure you keep a copy of the clips with the original frame-rate too incase you need to go back to them later.
Conforming individual clips within Final Cut Pro
This process changes the frame-rate of the individual clips and is non-reversable, make a backup of your clips if you might need to revert them to the original frame-rate!
Sorry about the sound on these videos, the source files are fine but for some reason they are becoming distorted after uploading to vimeo.
Thanks again Paul for this. Really do appreciate it
Interesting, certainly try
Very clear and concise! I didn’t know you could do this right from within FCP. Awesome.
Always interesting to read your Blogs Paul and like your work. Thanks for this tip.
I’m using a Canon 5D2 … What way do you suggest to create slow motion at full 1080P resolution when shooting video on this camera ?
Your advice would be much appreciated. Thanks ! ;o)
Suppose I want to incorporate slow-motion and NON-slow motion 720p footage in the same timeline. What would my ideal workflow be there? Would I need to turn the 720p 50/60p footage into 24/25p without the slow-down effect?
Thanks!
Hi Mark.
I would normally approach that by mixing the 50/60p footage on the same timeline as the slow-mo footage and then exporting at 25p. I did however run into a problem recently where I shot an event at 720/50p and the result after exporting didn’t look as fluid as I would normally expect so you need to be careful. I try to shoot as 720/25p and just engage over-cranking on certain shots.
Hopefully you’ll have more luck, let me know how it goes if you mix it up.
Would I be able to mix 50/60 with conformed slow-mo footage on the same timeline without having to render one “flavour” of footage down?
It depends what format the video is, the settings of your sequence and your NLE. You can certainly mix things like ProRes and XDCAM-EX footage without having to render anything for the timeline to play in Final Cut Pro.
Hi, Paul
I have FCP 6, and tried your method of getting a decent slo-mo…. but when I select ‘open in cinema tools’, nothing happens. No Cinema Tools window opens, so I tried launching Cinema Tools separately, and selecting an ‘open file’ option. That got me to the window, and selected my file (an Apple ProRes 422), but none of the speed options (or any option for that matter) is selectable. Everything is greyed out.
Suggestions?