Bad Jello effect on recent video shoot

[WildcatDave]

Last summer I did a bunch of video pans (with the pan knob) of a high-dollar property for a client. Everything turned out wonderfully. I did not do anything special with neutral density filters or adjusting shutter speed. I simply set it to 4K mode and off I went. Today I went out to the park to do some practice shoots for another high and property that I have to shoot tomorrow. Everytime I used the pan knob on my typhoon H controller st16, the video when I looked at it in either powerdirector or Lightroom had a really bad Jello wiggly affect from left to right. There were mutiple wiggles in the video, not just one big one. Whether I went slow with the pan or fast with the pan, it was present.

If I used the cruise control to slide along parallel to buildings I did not have this affect, whether I went slow or fast. It was only when the actual gimbal camera was rotating. Does anyone have any idea why this all the sudden is happening, when I never had this issue previously with many many videos?

I do have the three pack of Polar Pro ND filters. I have just not used them yet and really don't want to play, "how does this work" on my shoot tomorrow. But everything I've read says I need to slow my shutter speed down, even though I did not have this issue at all last year and it was the same time of day with a similar light level just using it on auto. If people think that's the way to go, I'll pop on one of the ND filters and get the shutter speed as close to 1/60th a second as I can, since that seems to be the rule of thumb, going twice the frame rate.

Any other input would be greatly appreciated. It should be a pretty non-rushed shoot tomorrow. So if I need to do a few flights to get it right, that's not a problem, I have four batteries. I also plan on doing a bunch of parallel slides using the cruise control feature (which I find amazingly beneficial) of the property to try to get all of the views in addition to some panning shots. So hopefully if the pans don't turn out I can substitute those. The client doesn't have extreme expectations, so I may be able to get by, but I would like to get this problem squared away.

 

[Steve Carr]

I don't have any magic suggestions. The first thing to check is the camera gimbal dampers. It's common for one of them to come out of the hole. Remove the camera to inspect the top damper holes to make certain they are still connected.
Another thought. Is there any chance you were actually seeing the prop shadows? That is one of the reasons for slowing down the shutter speed. If you post a sample of the video on Youtube it would give the video experts here a better idea of what you are seeing.

 

[WildcatDave]

I don't have any magic suggestions. The first thing to check is the camera gimbal dampers. It's common for one of them to come out of the hole. Remove the camera to inspect the top damper holes to make certain they are still connected.
Another thought. Is there any chance you were actually seeing the prop shadows? That is one of the reasons for slowing down the shutter speed. If you post a sample of the video on Youtube it would give the video experts here a better idea of what you are seeing.

Thanks for the reply. I'll do a quick check of the camera before tomorrow morning. Although I did a quick visual inspection of it earlier tonight and everything looked good. I did have a little bit of prop shadow when facing directly at the early morning sun, however this is definitely a jigglefest that is not prop shado. The clouds were actually wiggling back and forth, it's pretty bad. I'll try to post one of the videos to YouTube tomorrow.

 

[Steve Carr]

When it's in hover do you see the landing gear vibrating and/or the camera?
What does the camera pan look like in hover? Is the video smooth when it's sitting on the bench doing a pan?

 

[NorWiscPilot]

Question: have you tested while having the craft on the ground or a table, not flying?

What you want to do is listen for a buzzing or vibration. Of present during any of your camera movements, that is the source of your “jello”. Fixing it could be as simple as recalibration or as complicated as counterweights. The camera may have developed an issue as well, requiring repair.

Have you tried calibrating the gimbal since this anomaly started? If not, worth a try.

Cleaning the contacts is not a bad idea either.

Good luck!

Jeff

 

[WildcatDave]

When it's in hover do you see the landing gear vibrating and/or the camera?
What does the camera pan look like in hover? Is the video smooth when it's sitting on the bench doing a pan?

It is rock solid in hover. I will test the pan on a bench asap. Thanks!

 

[WildcatDave]

Question: have you tested while having the craft on the ground or a table, not flying?

What you want to do is listen for a buzzing or vibration. Of present during any of your camera movements, that is the source of your “jello”. Fixing it could be as simple as recalibration or as complicated as counterweights. The camera may have developed an issue as well, requiring repair.

Have you tried calibrating the gimbal since this anomaly started? If not, worth a try.

Cleaning the contacts is not a bad idea either.

Good luck!

Jeff

I did not hear any buzzing, but will check for that when I do a bench test with no props going. I did a recal of the gimbal before flying, but I may have forgotten to 'reboot' the drone before flying and shooting (which I just read is necessary). Maybe it will work fine today (crosses fingers). I will retest on a bench after today's shoot if things do not look good. I don't think there is a camera issue since it worked perfect the last time i used it. Would be surprised if sitting in the case fouled it up (although... electronics...). And like I mentioned, using the cruise control to do horizontal slide video parallel to my 'test house" at the park was perfect.

If I am only delivering 1080 video to the client is there any real benefit in shooting 4K. I realize downsizing often creates sharper images with less noise (I have been shooting DSLRs professionally for 20 years), but it may be overkill for what the client needs.

Also, does anyone know how it shoots 1080 vs 4k? Does it oversample, downsample, crop, or skip lines?

 

[WildcatDave]

Well I haven't had a chance to test it on a bench. I did have that shoot this afternoon and things went very well but here is what I did. I popped on my polar Pro ND16, 4 stop Filter and went to manual mode set it to ISO 100 shutter speed 1/60th. Everything looks good except that wasn't quite low enough on exposure and I have some of the clouds blown out. Otherwise it looks very good no Jello effect at all. The thing that confuses me about this is that I did this last year on default Auto settings with a -0.5 EV to exposure and it looked terrific, I would even say better than today. I also noticed the sky once down sample to 1080 has some noise that moves about in the blue sky looks like nervous pixels for lack of a better term. Anyway, some more testing to follow but I suppose I could live with this. I do need to get and even higher than 4 stop filter at least, so I can get videos with clouds that are not blown out. Can only recover so much in post once you get to pure white, your pure white.

For reference I'm using PowerDirector 16 which I've been very happy with. I did test out a bunch of the different software packages last year as money was not as much of an issue as ease-of-use and functionality. For the price this product is pretty amazing: super simple to use, very clear help and tutorial system if you're trying to figure stuff out. I probably will go back on these files tomorrow when I have some more time and tinker. Maybe use some of the denoise features and see if I can clean up that sky a little bit. Possibly crop into that 4K video since I'm only exporting 1080 and get rid of some of those high top of frame clouds that were blown out. Hate delivering product like that to a client. It's not bad and a lot of people probably wouldn't even notice, but I'm extremely picky coming from a full frame DSLR photo background.

I did some Google searching but could not find any ND filter for the cgo3 plus greater than nd16 4 stop. Does anyone know if there is a six or eight stop filter floating around that fits that camera?

 

[John Hennessy]

Are you sure that the ND filters are not too heavy for the gimbal motors, some times they have to be counter balanced when in use as it only effects some gimbals. There are threads here to that effect, as the filters are on the front of the gimbal balance point . Just a thought, I will search for the threads also. Johnno Hennessy.
Keep flying on the green side of the grass.

 

[Steve Carr]

Are you sure that the ND filters are not too heavy for the gimbal motors,

Hi John,
He indicates the jello effect was with no filter or perhaps the stock UV filter. The jello was not a problem after he put on the ND16 filter.

 

[John Hennessy]

Hi Steve,
That is a strange one usually it's the other way round. Maybe there is a counterweight there with not knowing about it. But he probably bought it New.
I wonder if a gimbal motor is Faulty or getting power intermittently and causing the JITTTTTTTTTTER. Just some thoughts.
Johnno.Hennessy.

 

[WildcatDave]

For Steve & John above...

The initial issue a few days ago when testing with the jello effect was with the default UV filter, not the PolarPro ND filters. Yesterday I used the ND16 and set to iso100, 1/60 & I got decent footage (no jello, but a bit choppier than other's footage I have seen). My older footage from last year (same time of day/year) using Auto mode, iso100 and -0.5eV is much better (much cleaner blue sky). The footage from yesterday is quite noisy in the blue sky - whether viewed at 4K or downsampled (not sure why at iso100 should be pretty clear). Also the ND16 filter is not quite enough light reduction as some of the higher clouds got blown out, and that is as low as I can go. The only option would be to switch to 1080 & 60 fps so I can set the shutter speed to 1/120.

For reference: I carefully checked all settings on the camera prior to shooting (4k, iso100, 1/60 shutter, 30fps, manual mode).

 

[AH-1G]

@WildcatDave
I fly the H also;
Not sure if you've tried not using filters, but I have very good success not using them. In fact I had issues using them, my vids were crappy!
So as I said I shoot all my video without using filters.
First, white balance, pointing camera up at the brightest portion of the sky, keeping it there while I also set mostly if not 99% time ISO at 100. Shutter speed adjusted depending how bright or cloudy. Shutter on sunny day 800 to 1000, or more. Semi cloudy less than 800
I have tons of great video not using filters.
I don't touch eV
I use PowerDirect also, I do not shoot 60fps, its takes a lot of memory to render.

 

[rdonson]

I guess many of us have different approaches that work for them.

I usually use a Polar ND16 filter and shoot 4K (3840x2860) and normally at 30fps ISO 100. If I'm feeling "cinematic" I may use 25fps. I NEVER use AUTO anything for video or stills. If I don't feel rushed I will set a custom white balance using my 18% gray target. Otherwise I use a white balance that suits the conditions. I will vary EV as necessary while paying attention to the histogram.

A lot depends on conditions and what I expect to do with the video. I'm a Mac guy so my videos get run through Final Cut Pro X. I will upload to YouTube for video if I'm not expecting a critical audience. Otherwise Vimeo is better for critical viewing on a 4K or 5K monitor.

For me the H is a flying platform for the camera. I don't shoot into the sun. I'm not flying fast or making fast moves. Perhaps I fly like an old lady. Then again, I'm trying to shoot like the work I see from @Ty Pilot . Always good looking with smooth flying. I like to use "Cruise Control" when possible.

I'm not a commercial pilot and my video is not a product I sell.

P.S. my "Steady Drive" by @Ty Pilot is on its way. I'm looking forward to what I can do with that.

 

[Ty Pilot]

When the CG03+ shoots 1080 @ 24, 25 or 30 FPS I am pretty sure it uses the same sensor image as 4K just re-sampled down, but at the higher frame rates 50,60 (I think it is) and above, it crops the sensor image. One reason to shoot 4K is that you can never scale 1080 back up. I use PD as well and I find that editing 4K footage using the proxy option delivers far superior imagery when you wish to render out 4K footage at 1080 as long as you set your own render settings and do not use the presets that Power Director uses. Also, when you shoot and render at 4K, at maximum size, the 1080 version of that render on Youtube looks better than if you had shot at 1080 and gone through the normal steps.

 

[WildcatDave]

When the CG03+ shoots 1080 @ 24, 25 or 30 FPS I am pretty sure it uses the same sensor image as 4K just re-sampled down, but at the higher frame rates 50,60 (I think it is) and above, it crops the sensor image. One reason to shoot 4K is that you can never scale 1080 back up. I use PD as well and I find that editing 4K footage using the proxy option delivers far superior imagery when you wish to render out 4K footage at 1080 as long as you set your own render settings and do not use the presets that Power Director uses. Also, when you shoot and render at 4K, at maximum size, the 1080 version of that render on Youtube looks better than if you had shot at 1080 and gone through the normal steps.

Thank you very much for this reply about PowerDirector. As I expected a little bit better looking 1080 footage when using Source material that is 4K. Can you explain this proxy feature you're describing as I am new to video editing, mostly a photo guy for the last 20 years.

I'm thinking if I'm only going to deliver footage in 1080 that I might be better off shooting 1080 at 60fps to avoid some of the issues with Jello and stuttering pans. Would you suggest that or does the downsampled 4K look that much better that it's worth working with that.

 

[AH-1G]

Use HandBrake to bring it down from 4 k to 1080.

HandBrake: Open Source Video Transcoder

HandBrake is an open-source, GPL-licensed, multiplatform, multithreaded video transcoder.

handbrake.fr

 

[Ty Pilot]

Actually, jello is exacerbated by higher frame rates especially when coupled with higher shutter speeds (not using an ND filter).

Power Director does not need any external programs or devices to work with any footage for reduction BTW. A Proxy is simply a lower resolution version of the 4K clip. For instance unless and even if, you have a very good computer, scrubbing thru 4K footage on a time line is a big drain and it takes a lot of horsepower in a computer to do it so to speak. In PD when I bring a 4K clip into the library, it will begin to make a shadow (proxy) file of that very clip only at 720 at a fairly high compression. Now I can throw the shadow file onto the timeline and edit at will - effects, color correction , anything but now it will run it and I can scrub back and forth.

When it is time to render out, Power Director renders the full clip not the proxy, so I can select the resolution and all other other specs I want, in your case you would just set it to 1080 and whatever data rate and so fourth and render out.

The subject of ND filters and shutter speeds with video is a deep one and it is not necessarily intuitive. In video; especially like we shoot from a moving platform, motion blur should be present to get a natural look and High shutter speeds and frame rates erode that but I do understand that is becoming a look some want to go for. Here is a frame from a video running 30 FPS, 1/60th and an ISO of 100 which; is what I try to run most times. This is unedited and straight out of the camera. My Plus is orbiting me so everything that is moving in the scene has a natural motion blur while the subject pops into focus.

 

[WildcatDave]

Are you sure that the ND filters are not too heavy for the gimbal motors, some times they have to be counter balanced when in use as it only effects some gimbals. There are threads here to that effect, as the filters are on the front of the gimbal balance point . Just a thought, I will search for the threads also. Johnno Hennessy.
Keep flying on the green side of the grass.

Good thought. However that's not the issue as my testing video was done with the default UV filter that comes with the camera and no other attachments. I will hopefully be getting a chance this Sunday to do a couple more test runs. Hopefully I can get the last details ironed out. I will report back when I figure out.

 

[WildcatDave]

Use HandBrake to bring it down from 4 k to 1080.

HandBrake: Open Source Video Transcoder

HandBrake is an open-source, GPL-licensed, multiplatform, multithreaded video transcoder.

handbrake.fr

I am familiar with that software. However PowerDirector does a terrific job converting from 4K to 1080p. So I have no need for a third-party solution.