Apple Final Cut Express 4 User Manual
Page 1092
1092
Now, instead of using a five-letter code to uniquely tag each frame, consider using an
address code in the format 00:00:00:00. Remember that these numbers don’t reflect
time; they are simply unique identifiers. The first frame of NTSC video will be labeled
00:00:00:00. The 29th frame will be labeled 00:00:00:29 and the 30th frame will be
labeled 00:00:01:00. Again, just because a frame is labeled 00:00:01:00 does not mean
that one second has passed. The frame could just as easily been named AAABD, in
which case there would be no temptation to read the label as a time value. Only the
frame rate of the video can determine how much time has passed by the 30th frame. In
the case of NTSC video, 0.999 seconds have passed by frame 30. By frame 1800, 60.06
seconds have past.
Frame Count
Timecode labels
(30 fps)
Time passed
(29.97 fps)
Error between
timecode number
and real time
0
0
0
0
1
1/ 30th second
1/29.97th second
Negligible
30
= 30/30ths of a second
= 1 second
= 30/29.97ths
of a second
= 1.001 seconds
0.001 seconds
60
= 60/30ths of a second
= 2 seconds
= 60/29.97ths
of a second
= 2.002 seconds
0.002 seconds
1800
1800/30ths of a second
= 60 seconds
= 1 minute
=1800/29.97ths
of a second
= 60.06 seconds
= 1.001 minutes
0.001 minutes
0.06 seconds
1.8 frames
18,000
= 18000/30ths
of a second
= 600 seconds
= 10 minutes
= 18000/29.97ths
of second
= 600.6 seconds
= 10.01 minutes
0.01 minutes
0.6 seconds
17.9 frames
108,000
= 108000/30ths
of a second
= 3600 seconds
= 1 hour
=108000/29.97ths
of a second
= 3603.6 seconds
= 1.001 hours
0.001 hours
3.6 seconds
107.89 frames