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Tuesday
Jun302009

Canon 5D Ma k II - D al
S em A dio he Po -
P od c ion P oce
TUESDAY, JUNE 30, 2009 AT 4:20PM

I am ing he Don Ea l Eng a ed Colo Refe ence S nc Sla e

When shooting with the Canon 5D Mark II, the only way to get great
audio is to record it separately. Once production is finished we need to
sync the audio and the video back together in post.

If you have taken the time to properly slate footage during production,
the process is actually pretty quick and easy. There are, however, a few
tricks with the 5D2 but once you get the process down it does not take
long at all.

This is my process for syncing audio to the Canon 5D2 recorded

separately using the Samson Zoom H4n recorder and Final Cut Pro.
S ep 1 - Find Ma ching A dio and Video Clip

If the camera and audio recorder start and stop consistently it is really
easy to match audio and video clips once you find the first one because
they should progress forward evenly. It is good practice to verbally state
the scene and take number before clapping the slate. This way you can
audibly hear the scene and take and visually see the scene and take
making it obvious which audio clip goes with what video clip.

S ep 2 - Find he S nc Poin & S nc

Q ickl find he nc in o
a dio b looking fo a ha p pike
in he a dio.

Finding the sync point is easy. In the video, find the frame where the slate
closes. In the audio, look for a sharp spike in the waveform and mark in
on the clap.

If I am syncing a bunch of clips I will make a new sequence for each clip
and add the full video to the sequence. The reason for separate sequence
is so I can batch process everything when I bake in the audio (Step 5).
Once the video is in the sequence I will find the sync points and add the
audio to tracks A3 & A4.

S ep 3 - The 99.9% Sol ion

The Canon 5D Mark II does not record at a true 30fps. It is

actually recording at its own funky rate 99.9% slower then 30fps. This is
a problem. If you sync the dual system audio at the beginning of the clip
after about a minute you will notice your audio is way out of sync.

Se ing he peed of o d al em a dio o 99.9 pe cen

ol e he nc p oblem i h he 5D.

The solution is to change the speed of the audio not recorded on the 5D
to 99.9%. Once you do this your audio will stay locked in sync for the
duration of the clip.

At this point we are in sync and could start editing. However, for big
projects and especially multi-cam projects I prefer to "bake in" the audio.
Doing this, to me, is safer and keeps things better organized. Doing this
renders the audio speed change into new synced master clips that I bring
back into Final Cut Pro to start editing. This ensures that the audio and
video will stay locked together throughout the post process.
S ep 4 - Se p A dio O p

Adj he a dio o p o 4 if o an o keep bo h a dio

o ce .

If you want to keep the on camera audio in addition to the dual system
audio you will need to adjust your sequence settings before exporting.
Open sequence settings and go to the audio outputs tab. By default you
will have 2 audio outputs, increase the audio outputs to 4. This will keeps
track A1 & A2 separate from tracks A3 & A4 in the new mater clips. If you
do not do this you will mix both the camera audio and dual system audio
together into 1 stereo pair. If you do not need the camera audio make
sure you disable or delete those tracks before exporting.

S ep 5 - Ba ch E po

There is a window in Final Cut Pro that I have never really had a good use
for until now. The Export Queue.

The Export Queue allows you to batch export sequences. This is why I
create a separate sequence for each clip. Drag all of the sequences into
the export queue and confirm your settings are set to export same as
source, select where to save the new master clips and click Export.

U e he E po Q e e o ba ch e po and c ea e ne ma e
clip .

Final Cut will create new master clips, rendering the audio at 99.9% and
baking it into the new quicktime files. The new master clips will contain 4
audio tracks if you decided to keep the camera audio. Once the export
queue has finished creating the new master clips we are ready to start
editing the project.

This may seem like a lot of extra steps but the process actually goes
really fast once you get the workflow down. It is worth taking the time to
get the project setup properly before you start editing.

Upda e on Thursday, March 25, 2010 at 5:58PM by Donald

Kilgo e
With the latest Canon 5D Mark II firmware update 2.0.3 (now
2.0.4) the camera will now record in proper frame rates that
do not require changing the audio speed to 99.9%. This
update not only adds the huge update of being able to record
24p but also records all frame rates to NTSC broadcast specs
as well as PAL, solving the drifting audio sync problem.

Canon 5D Mark II Frame Rates - Firmware 2.0.4

NTSC:

1920 1080 : 30 fps (changed - actual 29.97 fps)

1920 1080 : 24 fps (added - actual 23.976 fps)
640 480 : 30 fps (changed - actual 29.97 fps)

PAL:

1920 1080 : 25 fps (added - actual 25.0 fps)

1920 1080 : 24 fps (added - actual 23.976 fps)
640 480 : 25 fps (added - actual 25.0 fps)

12 Commen | Sha e A icle | Email A icle | P in A icle

tagged A dio, Canon 5D Ma k II, DSLR, Edi ing, Final C P o, P od c ion in

Filmmaking

E ADE CO M M E N (1 2 )

Why not just go into the 'Modify' tab and 'link' the new audio once you
have sync and have changed the audio speed. I just tried it and it seems
to be holding.
Thanks for the post, by the way!

- john
August 23, 2009 | John

Thank you!
August 29, 2009 | Jenna

I have the canon 5 d mark II but i only can use Pinnacle pro 14 i think i
can not chance the speed of audio in Pinnacle 14 i not can make it 99,9 %
so no use to buy the zoom. i think.?
Nove m be r 29, 2009 | Ca lo

hi, thanks for the useful info. will be helping me a lot

Fe bruary 9, 2010 | Sam

Thanks for sharing wonderful information about canon 5 d mark II , I

really enjoyed this article and wish more contents on the topic.
Fe bruary 24, 2010 | j li

thank you for sharing your useful information

April 17, 2010 | bike

great information thank you very useful to me.

April 19, 2010 | Da id Bille (a i )

The Canon 5D has a digital sensor which is the same size as a frame of
35mm film. This equals much higher quality pictures including in low light
situations. In addition it means the ability to utilize wide angle lenses.
April 19, 2010 | A i a2010
Thank you for sharing useful information.I has visited your web site, a lot
of information I can from your blog, thanks for the information.
May 8, 2010 | icha d

This information is very nice and pleasant.i like it Thank you for sharing...
The Canon 5D Mark is an amazing peace of equipment.

Frank Edens
Dutch Internet Marketing Guru

August 21, 2010 | J RIETH

thanks for sharing this useful information.........

thanks
vparas

O ctobe r 6, 2010 | Da h

hi, thanks for the useful info. will be helping me a lo

Nove m be r 9, 2010 | A LLSMO