The Best Frame Rate for Kpop Dance Cover Videos

In this article, I’m going to be arguing why you need to be shooting at 24 frames per second (fps) for K-pop dance cover videos. Over the years, I’ve tried shooting video with many different frame rates such as 30 fps, 29.97 fps, 60 fps, 120 fps, 23.976 fps, and of course 24 fps. Each frame rate gives a dramatically different feel to the video itself and my conclusion is to stick with 24 fps except under very specific circumstances that I will talk about later in the article.

Background

Like many videographers starting out, I used to shoot videos using all the default settings on the camera. My first DSLR was the Nikon D5300 that I used for many of my earlier videos. For many of these consumer grade cameras, highest quality video setting was 1080P at 30 fps. Because I didn’t know any better and I wanted the highest quality video, I kind of left it at 30 fps and never really considered 24 fps. Because in my mind, 30 is bigger than 24, and more frames must be better. Overtime, I began to learn more about cameras and started tweaking various automated settings such as the white balance, ISO, aperture, and shutter speed. This led me to an article that talked about frame rate and how 24 fps is used in cinematography, whereas 30 fps is used to broadcast TV. I also learned about the differences between drop frame (30 fps) vs non-drop frame (29.97 fps) rates. In my mind, I don’t see how 24 fps can look more cinematic. What does that even mean? Aren’t more frames per second just better for dance videos because you can see more of the movement? I was curious to experiment using 24 fps against the conventional 30 fps that I normally used before. The follow video is the result of that experimentation:

In the next few sections, I’m going to be talking about my discoveries.

Sharp Movements

The first thing that I noticed when editing this video is how sharp the movements look. The movements are so sharp that the heads and hands literally snap to a different location from frame to frame. You can’t see every movement and that’s the point! The lower frame rate along with sharp dance movements just makes the dancing look UNREAL. This leaves me wondering, how the heck did his head move like that? If I try to slow down the footage, then there is nothing there! It gives room for my imagination to fill out the missing frames as to how the head just snaps to different positions in each frame. If I had shot the video at 60 fps, then I would have seen how Calvin (Hyuna) did each head twist, and there would be no mysteries as to how it is done and because of that the video wouldn’t be as interesting. Still impressive, but not as interesting.

Cinematic

After experimenting with 24 fps, I completely understand why people say that it is more cinematic. Because our phones and point-and-shoot cameras almost always record at 30 fps, we become so used to seeing 30 fps. The videos that we normally record on our phones and cameras often look like reality realty TV where everything is smooth and looks realistic. Because 30 fps is the frame rate that better reflect what we see with our eyes. It is also the frame rate that is often broadcasted on TV. However, when we switch to 24 fps, now our eyes are processing something completely different. We are looking at videos that is less realistic and that is what makes it more interesting. On top of that most movies that are shown in theaters are also shown at 24 fps. I speculate that seeing things at 24 fps subconsciously elicit the moving going experience rather than the TV watching experience. Faster Editing and Rendering Video files shot at 24 fps results in about 20% smaller file size than videos shot at 30 fps because there are 20% less frames per second. This makes it so that we can record more video with the same volume of SD Card space. This also make editing faster because if we need to Warp Stabilize or track a footage, there is fewer frames to process. There is fewer frames if we want to run a denoiser (Denoising takes a long ass time). The final export is also faster because of all the reasons stated above.

Disadvantages

A key drawback about recording at 24 fps is that most videos, including stock videos and videos recorded on commercially available devices are all shooting at 30 fps. This makes combining footage extremely difficult because you can’t simply turn something that is shot at 30 fps and make it into 24 fps or vice versa. Exporting the video either way will lead to very undesirable video artifacts including blending lines and frame skipping. When you are shooting at 24 fps, you must make sure that all the footage that you want to use in your final video is also shot at 24 fps or 23.976 fps. Otherwise, the final video quality will be a complete disaster. Here is an example of a video where I completely miscalculated the frame rates:

25 fps and 50 fps

To prepare for the video above, I knew that we need to add in an intro video that was shot by someone else with a point-and-shoot camera. Because the video was shot by someone else that I had no control over, I figured that the video was going to be recorded at 30 fps because of the default settings on those basic commercial cameras. However, I completely missed the fact that the camera the other people where using was purchased from China. This is important because Asia and Europe have a completely different standard when it comes to frame rates and video standards that they use. Cameras from Asia and Europe typically default to 25 fps or 50 fps. This is the reason why all the motion blurs in the intro of the video has scanlines. Had we matched frame rates; the two videos would have been edited together seamlessly. The lesson here is that if you are working people with non-US purchased cameras, be sure to tweak the frame rate. 24 fps vs 23.976 fps (24 fps Drop Frame) Technically there are two types of the frame rates, 24 fps and 23.976 fps. They are sometimes both known as 24 fps with 23.976 fps sometimes called 24 fps drop frame. From the perspective of a K-Pop Cover Video, this makes no different unless you are planning to add a bunch of various shots with recorded audio into the video. The 23.976 fps drop frame is mostly used to align recorded audio with the video.

Other Frame Rates

More recently, the cinema cameras that are coming out today can record in off-frame rates, like 22/24, 25/24, or 27/30. I am curious to see what these frame rates would look like if we slowed down/speed up the music for the recording and play it at normal tempo for the editing. If you have tried this technique, please share your experiences with me: kai@mixx-studios.com