Frame rate while shooting

[mark-mvs]

Hello all, so I've been wondering about what frame rate you prefer to shoot at. I have been shooting HD at 60fps because it's clean and when I decide in post to put certain sections in slow motion the movement is very smooth. 

However, I recently talked with a couple of wedding videographers on ONLY shoot hd in 24fps. They said it makes the video look more like film and they like that quality much better. I certainly prefer the look of film to video but will shooting at 24fps REALLY make video look like film ? (I mean they're entirely different mediums.) Also, while I don't overuse it, I do like having some things in slow motion on my videos.

Thoughts?
Mark

[DavidPartington]

I used to shoot quite a lot in 25p (I am in europe) but recently changed to shooting almost everything in 50p for the reasons of better slo-mo.   Slo-mo from 24p/25p can look pretty nasty.

Too many arm chair commentators on the web read and then repeat the myths about the correlation between 24p and 'the film look' without really understanding what they are talking about.

There is much more to a 'film look' than just recording at 24p / 25p.  You can achieve a lot of 'film look' by color grading, without needing to shoot at 24p.

In my experience (and I'm always willing to listen to others and see examples), footage shot at 60p and well color graded will look far superior to 24p without color grading.

[ampsonic]

Just shoot 60p and drop into a 24p timeline!

[HankCastello]

How are you finding enough light to shoot 60fps?  24p will not give a film look.  There are a lot more differences between film and video than just frame rate.  Lattitude, for instance.  And the look of film grain vs video grain.

If you have enough light to shoot 60fps, go for it.  Much better slo-mo, as you've noticed.

[DavidPartington]

How are you finding enough light to shoot 60fps? 

Shooting at 50p on an HMC151 is no problem for all but the first dance (or other dark evening shots) etc, when I usually drop the frame rate to 25p and shoot at a shutter speed of 1/25 if I need to. Since I never slo-mo the first dance it's no longer a problem.

[mark-mvs]

Thanks for your speedy replies, guys! I think what I'll do is some experimenting before my next gig this Sunday. I'll experiment with frame rates and shutter speeds and see what I get.  I've never tried shooting at 24 with a shutter setting of 1/48 so that will definitely be on my list of things to try. I make sure to get light and dark environments as well as things moving by the camera and the camera moving by things. Then I can look at the footage and see what a like best.

What do you think?
Mark

[BillGrant]

What camera Mark? That has a alot to do with it. I have been shooting either 24f or 30f on the A1 since August of last year. Since the 5D got the 24p update, I have been 24p almost always.
Bill