Telecine Pattern: Determining what is used in the Hogan's Heroes [SOLVED]

[vhelp]

[SOLVED] -- the telecine pattern is the product of TEC (time expansion/compression) -- 07.19.2008 Sat

Hay everone, hope you all are having a good weekend..

I'm usually pretty good at working with this stuff and determining what the telecine sequences are and all but I'm pretty busy with juggling too many projects at once and I can't get to it right this second. But I'm really interested in knowing in any case what it is. Well, let me explain..

I was wondering if anyone knows what telecine pattern are the Hogan's Heroes seires in. I was exploring a small capture session of this show (nick has them on back-to-back for several hours on saturdays, i think) and when I ran them through virtualdub I saw that they did not contain the usual 3:2 pattern for film. So that got me to thinking that this program was a PAL source (lot of english blokes in the show) and I thought for sure that it is prob a PAL->NTSC type conversion, so I went to IMDb and it says that the show in USA. So, now I'm confused because at first glance, the pattern is illregular.

I realize that there are prob tools out there that can prob help in this area in determing the type or sequence of the telecine patterns, (but I don't feel like learning those tools just for this one show) but if I were going to figure it out for myself, I would just just use my own tool, the one I partially completed for just this type of work in determining the TEC (time expansion / compression) type programs used in todays broadcasts.

If you want to see for youselves (since I'm on dialup, its too much trouble for me to upload small clip) you can capture a small piece (its on the Nick channels, ch 34 in new york) and maybe one of you guys can review the telecine and determine what pattern (if any) it is or if it is a PAL->NTSC or some other conversion or telecine process, I don't know at this time, as I only just sample a small and quick segment.

Still, it would be an interesting (though prob quick for some of you guys) project.

Anyway, I was considering either capturing these as they air (too much work, imho) or recording this to my vcr in EP mode. But then after reviewing IMDb, I saw that they consist of 6 seaons. Wow. They must have been very well liked. I know I loved them when they were on. I used to watch them even way back in '78 when they were on, then. As for the DVD Recorder route, thats not for me. Too much cable noise outways my vcr's EP recording mode. Does something funky to the final mpegs.

Later, if I come to my senses (i'm still in the middle of other mult-tasking projects) I'll try my hand at it and if I figure it out, I'll post the telecine sequence(s) here.

You have plenty of time to try HH since Nick has them on till 7:30pm tonight. Plenty of time to test this show. Its a great and halarious show, truely!!

Thanks for whatever interest you might have in this discussion,
-vhelp 4760

[jagabo]

Hogan's Heros was a USA series. According to IMBD it was shot on film. I'll record a little later and see what's up.

I recorded a few minutes. It's basically normal 3:2 pulldown. But there are many breaks and some field blending. It has probably been through some time-compression that tosses out fields/frames and sometimes blends what's left. You could try one of the automated IVTC functions of AviSynth (TDeint+TDecimate, Yadif, etc) but there will still be some artifacts. I would just leave it interlaced.

[vhelp]

(I googled for anything on the pattern but nothing came up, not even any of our forums, or I suck at coming up with the proper search terms)

I'm still overloaded with my projects and things. I think I might have added one too many things to my list and possibly blown a few but I couldn't help it, as I was channel surfing -- just to take a brake, you know. Then.. well, you know how it goes, you get into another pickel of nonsense. Man. I didn't even know they were airing these series till now. So now there's another thing to think about. Anyway.

I thought about a dvd rip but I never seen any dvd releases in stores that I've ever been to. Topping that with the fact that since these are broadcast we are talking tv vs. dvd, and the two would yield different results because one is tainted for various reasons we are already familiar with. So using a commercial source is out of the question.

jagabo, unless you've captured a few seconds or so worth already (but are too busy at the moment to compile your review of this series telecine pattern) I do appreciate the help. But, the last show was at 7:30pm, and now the Hillbillies are are. I have a bunch of captures of the last 1hr and a half, bits and pieces of small segments for test purposes.

If I can muster up enough energy tonight or what's left of this weekend I'll try my hand at it. I am mearly curious if it is a pattern I can lock onto or else not, but that it may require an avisynth script that I have to put together (more than likely) and go the distance with these series. Something I have to consider if I want to go the distance in recording and capturing these. I don't know. Lots of things to think about

Actually, I've tried a little (while I was eating dinner) and it looks like a bunch of mixed types. It has 3:2 patterns and blends. Much like a PAL conversion type, though I take you word for it, that it is USA and not PAL. Still, the mixture of patterns (more interlace mixed) then film telecine, is madness already. It'll be fun to disect this series with the tool I mention earlier about. I'll see if I can write down a few segments that I come up with. Until then..

..I'm stuffed from all the spaghetti I just ate, thanks.
-vhelp 4761

[jagabo]

Note I added a little to my earlier post (the series is on later here so I was able to capture a bit).

The entire series is available at Amazon.com:
http://www.amazon.com/Hogans-Heroes-Complete-Richard-Kinon/dp/B000P5FH4O/

[vhelp]

As I said earlier, I was mearily curious. With the few scenes I had the chance to play with, I knew it would difficult to properly master back to 24p, but because of my earlier google searches turning up nothing, I thought I had something new to tacle around with you guys and test ideas out as well for an interesting remaining weekend. The challenge, you know. Anyway.

I feel I should agree with you on this one that its best to leave it interlaced. But it would be an interesting challenge to see how far I can go with this in my spare time -- I'm playing with it as I write this and google searching around further. Turns out (so it would seem) they released an updated HD version with improved telecine though that fact is still unclear to me -- I only skimmed quickly over the few google hits I came across. Anyway, I don't have HD, so what does it matter

Thanks for sticking it out this far with me on this one,
-vhelp 4762

[jagabo]

Turns out (so it would seem) they released an updated HD version with improved telecine

Well, German war attrocities are always good for a laugh!

[vhelp]

Hmm.. "Hogan's Heroes" was time expanded. This explains why the telecine is illregular. Also, I found that it follow's very similar to the tv series, "Lost".

Now, I don't know when this old tv series made it to the time expansion scene. Could have been applied long ago back in the 70's or else recently, like during the 2000 to present era. This sort of information is not readily available on the web. At least none of my google searches on this issue (time expansion/ compression) for tv broadcasts but came up with nothing fact'wise.

(I made the same comment about this in a previous topic)

And, as far as I'm concirned, as of today, I'm making it more or less official, that the majority of tv series, including MFTV (made for tv) etc, have been run through some sort of time expansion (I often refer to it as TEC, for short) and this explains why our initial captures of these tv series (earlier 2000 's) telecine were thought to be broken or too illregular or EAT. But with the exception that some tv series were actually edited after the telecine, i.e., "Friends" and "Sex and the City" and "Will and Grace" are some examples of edited (or, EAT) during their initial creation, though they are also included on the retail DVD's this way too.

So the moral of all this is that if you run into a video source that you captured and it is not following the standard 3:2 telecine pattern (for hopes of a clean restore back to 24p) then you have a video that was EAT or TEC. If TEC, then you have a chance (though complicated one at that) to restore it to some degree back to 24p. EAT is just that, they are EAT'en up too bad'ly with no chance of clean restore. And those would be best left in their original format.

From the Video Workstation of,
-vhelp 4766

[jagabo]

EAT? Edited After Telecine?

If so, I disagree -- I find EAT is much more easily IVTC'd than TEC. I'd much rather have a poor frame at each telecine break than blended field crap over the entire video.

Shouldn't TEC be called Time Compressed instead? Generally the running time is reduced to make room for more ads.

[edDV]

More likely time compression. Since the 50's-60's these shows have either been edited or sped up to increase the number of commercial/promo minutes per half hour. They wouldn't go back to film for this, they would process the video in some peculiar way. Since the telecine pattern includes repeat fields they can do strange things based on the amount of motion in the clip. Scenes with fast motion retain all the fields, low motion scenes can have fields removed and nobody notices. Sound needs to be altered to keep lip sync. The result is a field pattern that changes with motion. Most of the time these time compression "processes" are patented or held secret.

If they are remastering from film for HD, they are probably editing a version to fit current TV broadcast time limits as well. Older shows would need to be shortened. The first thing they do is edit a shortened show open and run credit rolls in split screen. It would be interesting to see if the number of frames differ from the Blu-Ray release compared to the broadcast version. The Blu-Ray version is most likely 23.976 progressive. The TV distribution release version is usually telecined 1080i on HDCAM.

Maybe somebody here works in a post house doing this kind of work.

[vhelp]

Hi jagabo

EAT? Edited After Telecine?

Yes.

After I wrote and sent that post off to the finisher, I ran into the same points as you just posted. Funny how these things turn out. Oh well.

Actually, you do have a good point, if the source is consistant as you are pointing out. But most of the time I had prefered not to bother with them. I guess the improvements made in these matters could work, with a little work. Anyway, I should prob reconsider this after all. Thank you for bringing this up. I guess in the older days of avisynth'ing around, I had more trouble attempting what you hinting at and I gave up on it. So, I guess I was falling back on that recollection.

Shouldn't TEC be called Time Compressed instead? Generally the running time is reduced to make room for more ads.

You are probably right. But I was under the impression that it could be one or the other, depending on the length of the content and the commerical's exception -- Pepsi, Coke and a few others buy the time slots to sell their products. So, I'm guessing that these sources can go either way, hence the term TEC. If you know for certain that they are only time compressed I'm willing to drop the tec thing because it wouldn't make much sense to use it if it doesn't exist in the first place.

(I have found that they're more than one version of the same content. An example of this was with the movie, "The Matrix". In one airing it was standard 3:2 telecine, with restoreability back to 24p without any issues. And in another airing, it was time expanded/compressed. I'm sorry, but at this time, its hard for me to determin if the source was actually Expanded or Compressed. Maybe you have a method for determining this, and we could all use it. Cause right about now, I could use it)

Thanks,
-vhelp 4767

[vhelp]

Hi edDV,

(yeah, you posted while I was still composing in response to another post.)

The result is a field pattern that changes with motion. Most of the time these time compression "processes" are patented or held secret.

You know, I can't agree with you any more. And I've been attempting at deciphering this process myself, though painfully slow. I don't think there is a code -- not after the fact -- because once the introduction of "blends" are factored in this, you prob can't accurately decode it. They may have completely removed a frame and are blending two frames together. And like you said, they could be applying the blending parts only in the low-motion scenes.

In my own code developments, the closest I've come to an algo/routine for deinterlacing any videos (either for pure interlace-to-pc purposes or for the above reasons) is through the comparison of frames (or fields, depending on the logic of routine) and where you see two frames as dups, I have determined that they are either telecine (when you see interlace) or they are the "blends" spoken of. This is the hard part in working out what is what and targeting for a 24p restore or something else, like a deinterlace. These are issues I've been working on in my test beds of videos I'm trying to decode. Its purely for educational purposes.

-vhelp 4768

[edDV]

...

And, as far as I'm concirned, as of today, I'm making it more or less official, that the majority of tv series, including MFTV (made for tv) etc, have been run through some sort of time expansion (I often refer to it as TEC, for short) and this explains why our initial captures of these tv series (earlier 2000 's) telecine were thought to be broken or too illregular or EAT. But with the exception that some tv series were actually edited after the telecine, i.e., "Friends" and "Sex and the City" and "Will and Grace" are some examples of edited (or, EAT) during their initial creation, though they are also included on the retail DVD's this way too.

So the moral of all this is that if you run into a video source that you captured and it is not following the standard 3:2 telecine pattern (for hopes of a clean restore back to 24p) then you have a video that was EAT or TEC. If TEC, then you have a chance (though complicated one at that) to restore it to some degree back to 24p. EAT is just that, they are EAT'en up too bad'ly with no chance of clean restore. And those would be best left in their original format.

From the Video Workstation of,
-vhelp 4766

The way I try to figure this out is look for the on-line post house in the credits and date this to their equipment purchases over time. Most series edited prior to Digital Betacam (adopted 1994-99 in top post houses) were offline edited on NLE's (Avid, etc) or U-Matic window TC tape then onlined from the telecined film transfer in composite NTSC or PAL edit bays. Back then 1985-95, tape machines were usually digital composite D2 or D3. Before that it was 1" Type C analog composite. Before that it was 2" Quadruplex composite tape.

Exceptions in 1985-95 were complex effects sequences that were edited in component D1 suites before conversion to composite for online. After ~1995 series were edited for TV broadcast and DVD release to ITU-Rec601 standards with D1 or Digital Betacam edit masters. Most edit bays remained analog composite (similar to DAD for CD) but gradually component digital (DDD) took over but the editing was still done from 29.97 fps telecine film source.

In the period ~1998-2006 some series upgraded to 1080i HD online following introduction of HDCAM tape but these were still using 29.97 fps telecine source.

It was only last year that 1080p/23.976 online began to take over. This is still rare for TV series. The main advantage is the same edit master can generate both an NTSC and PAL release. Before "24p", PAL was onlined separately from the same offline EDL (Edit Decision List).

For "24p" masters, 1080i NTSC telecine is added after editing so these should be easy to inverse telecine. 720p/59.94 will follow a consistent 3:2 frame repeat pattern and PAL will be sped up to 25p (with audio processing) then interlaced for 1080i/25.

[vhelp]

Because this time compression stuff is very tricky to unravel it can be dificult to determine whether it was manipulated for Compression or Expansion. So I hope you understand this and realize I mean either of the two, though the time does seem to favor mostly on the Compression side. Its probably a coensidence of average film length, and explains partly why film are edited for a certain length of play time.

For now, I can't see how it is only one format, Compression. There has to be two, compression and expansion, and the answer would probably fall on the Length of the video and the Time Slot Alocated and the Commericals assigned during that time frame, though as I noted, it mostly favors the Compression side.

Thanks edDV for your detailed breakdown of the processes that go into making video what they are today.

-vhelp 4769

[edDV]

I guess this differs for TV series vs. movies. Over the years commercial time has increased. It used to be prime time had less commercial break time vs. non-prime so TV series had to be shortened for syndication. Methods varied.

Movies have variable lengths. For TV syndication they need to be chopped to fit half our segments and commercial breaks. In that case they may need time compression or expansion to fit in commercial breaks at reasonable intervals.

Research showed that viewers were hooked if commercial breaks were delayed for 20min or so. Once hooked, they would stay even with more frequent commercial breaks toward the end. The first priority is to hook the customer. Once hooked, priority shifts to fitting in commercials to TV station operational priority.

[vhelp]

[SOLVED] -- the telecine pattern is the product of TEC (time expansion/compression) -- 07.19.2008 Sat

Yes, you do have a way with words -- explaning terms and things that we can understand. I do appreciate this gift you have. Thanks.

Movies have variable lengths. For TV syndication they need to be chopped to fit half our segments and commercial breaks. In that case they may need time compression or expansion to fit in commercial breaks at reasonable intervals.

Given the passage, TEC is it.. Time Expansion/Compression, just as I have been acryniminizing all along

But, I do admit that so far, it would seem that coensidentally, the Compression function are mostly used in many tv programs. But, I don't think it is necessarily applied to movies vs. tv series, or how you explained it above. I believe it is based on the length/commercial/time slot alocated that determines the path. And, there might actually be way(s) of figuring out (right away) if a program was Compress or Expanded.. like observing the way the "blends" are applied and laid out, and or some other key elements. I have some clues about these things but I will wait until I have concrete proof of what they are and how they are used in this application before I bring them forth. Course, you all are free to beat me to the punch as you see fit when you find them

For now, I think we can consider this topic resolved in terms of what the Telecine Patterns are.. that they are the product of TEC and not exactly definable. AVIsynth scripting with the right set of plugins can definately help lay out a pattern whether illregular or other, as the pattern would imply it is TEC based.

Thus, the telecine pattern for the "Hogan's Heroes" tv series are based on the Time Expansion function, resulting in the inconsistancies of the elements that go into (in this case) compressing the length of the video to fit the half hour time slot for this program.

-vhelp 4770

[vhelp]

Regarding how to determine if TEC was calculated for Compression or Expansion..

OK. I finally figured it out. Well, you heard it here first. And its actually really simple when you think about it. So, here's how to determine it all:

Compression -- when the source containes "blends" (or blended fields) the source is Time Compressed
Expansion -- when the source containes DUPS, as found in multi-segment keys, it is Time Expanded.

(And, actually, when you think about it, you might probably now be able to determine this just by looking at the movie length from the tv guide. So far, I calculated between 115 minutes and 140 minutes tells me it is Time Expanded)

Also, to add.. any time (after you determine your source is Time Expanded) this would mean (or should mean) it can be fully restored back to 24p when the "keys" (multi-segments) are properly decoded (or worked out) can a clean restore back to 24p be obtained. This is next on my projects list of things to do with these source type medium, originating from the application of TEC -- Time Expansion/Compression.

This the remaining weekend, I tested this on various sources that I captured from my analog cable tv. And the last three test videos (still fresh on my mind) were, "I, Robot", "Transporter", and "Apollo 13" all passed with flying colors.

Beaton from all this debugging work, I close down the workshop

From the Video Workstation of,
-vhelp 4771

[zoobie]

Hoooooooooooooogan....

lmao...I'm supposed to be shooting a movie

[jman98]

vhelp - A 'lot of English blokes" in Hogan's Hereos??? There was exactly ONE among the series regulars - Richard Dawson. I'm guessing that you were not born and raised in the USA as surely you would know that this was a famous old American TV show.

It's good that you figured out what you needed to do. Yes, Hogan's Hereos was shot on film, which was how 1960s TV shows were made. It seems to me that most if not almost all TV shows in this time were shot on film. It was not until the very late 1960s and the 1970s that videotape became popular to use instead of film. Also, note that TV shows in the 1960s were longer. While today typically a "30 minute show" is really about 22-23 minutes when you take out the commercials, in those days a 30 minute show would be 24-26 minutes without commercials, so there is always going to be some kind of severe editing, time compression or something done when these old shows are on TV now.

[zoobie]

yep...they changed the commercial laws when cable became popular due to increased channels
Hogan's Heros is the #1 rerun show in Germany...believe it or not...where they have to blur out the swastikas since it's illegal to display them in public
Rod Serling experimented with videotape during his Twilight Zone series...hated it...because it suddenly turned his production into a tele-play....looked very flat...and was now forced to be all indoors

[vhelp]

Well, actually, at the time I started and finished that post, later it dawned on me that I was in erorr .. I don't know what I was thinking or perhaps on acount of all work I was involved in it might have caught me off guard. Maybe partly because I was thinking that the series was PAL at first, or maybe something else. I don't know and I don't care at this point

Yeah, I have no idea what a "swastikas" is anyway.

-vhelp 4772