DR18 doesn't read timecode from A7SIII clips shot at 100FPS

Hello,

After the firmware upgrade to version 3.00 of Sony A7S III Davinci does not read the timecode from the clips that were shot at 100FPS and does not place them at the timeline at all when using "Insert Selected Clips to Timeline Using Timecode", it adds only the clips that were shot at 25 and 50 correctly.

The timecode seems to be recorded properly, but Davinci cannot read it or something ...

The issue is reproduced on MAC OS and Windows.

Does anywone else experience this issue?

Example clips shot at 50 and 100 FPS:
https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/ ... sp=sharing

I have the A7SIII and timecode at 100 fps works in Resolve Studio 18.6.6 on firmware 2.10. I am afraid to upgrade to firmware 3.00 because there have been several problems reported. I'm not sure the timecode issue has anything to do with Resolve. If you can upload a test clip I will test your timecode on FCP and Premiere.

Is the problem you observe limited to "Insert Selected Clips to Timeline Using Timecode", or does Resolve just not see source timecode from that clip? IOW on the Media Page, at the upper-right corner of the viewer, if you right-click and select "Source Timecode", does it show expected timecode values?

I suggest you use the third-party MediaInfo tool, examine the MP4 file metadata, and select View>Text, scroll down and look for the item "Time code of first frame". Does that have an expected timecode value as shown on the camera LCD?

Does the camera show timecode for the recorded clip? Play the clip in the camera and press the up position on the circular control to enable the on-screen display of timecode.

Does the camera present the expected timecode when recording? To inspect that make sure you have these settings in the A7SIII menus (below are the pre-3.00 menus; if they have changed you'll have to find them).

Set TC mode to free-run TC. That's in Menu>Shooting Menu>TC/UB>Time Code Run>Free Run.

Set LCD display to display free-run TC. That is in Menu>Setup Menu>Finder/Monitor>TC/UB Disp. Setting>TC. This lets you observe the TC counting and verify it's as expected.

Hi Joema4,

The camera is properly set to record timecode (exactly as you discribed), it does record timecode when I am shooting at 25 and 50 FPS and they work as expected in Davinci. It is just the 100FPS clips that are failing.

You can find the attached 100FPS clip and 50 FPS clip here:
https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/ ... drive_link

When right-click and select "Source Timecode", shows 00:00:00:00. I have attached a screenshot at the first post.

I confirm that the time code was recorded properly when shooting 100FPS prior the upgrade of the firmware.

Your 100 fps clip works in Premiere Pro 24.3.0 running on MacOS Sonoma 14.4.1. No Sony MP4 timecode (at any frame rate) works on FCP due to a lack of standardization, but the files can be patched to work using the below-mentioned utility. Timecode from the 100 fps MP4 files does not work on Resolve Studio 18.6.6, but just displays sequence timecode, not clip aka source timecode.

Are you certain this began with the A7SIII firmware update? Do you have 100 fps clips from that camera recorded *before* the firmware update which work in Resolve? If you're not sure, could you please test those, and send me one to test?

There is a fundamental issue when dealing with timecode on 100 fps or 120 fps video. To my knowledge the timecode representation has never been finalized by a standards body like it was with 60 fps and below. E.g, the timecode data is represented as Binary Coded Decimal, and I believe they only allocated two BCD digits for the frame rate. So without some hack there is no way to express three-digit frame rates.

The XML from the A7SIII has some odd notation that may be a metadata workaround for part of that. However I don't know if Resolve can import and use XML clip metadata, or if it understands the dialect used by Sony.

Due to the lack of > 60 fps timecode standardization, there are apparently different incompatible timecode implementations which can create situations like this: works on one NLE not another, works on one camera firmware, not another, etc.

There is a utility called QTChange (Mac and Windows) which can patch the A7SIII 100 fps video files without reencoding so they work on Resolve (according to my tests). It's the same procedure required for timecode in all Sony MP4 files on FCP. The default action is to rewrite the timecode in a working format; you must press to "Do it" button. The camera files should be backed up before doing that: https://www.videotoolshed.com/handcraft ... /qtchange/

Thank you, joema4! I really appreciate it!

I'm sending a clip that was shot prior the firmware upgrade and timecode works properly on this one:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1Zt6DdD ... drive_link

I am looking at this. I confirm that timecode on the 100 fps Sony HEVC clip works OK on Resolve 18.6.6 on Sonoma 14.4.1 on M1 Ultra.

There is no visible difference in metadata between that clip and the 100 fps clip recorded after the A7S III firmware 3.00 firmware update -- at least as shown by MediaInfo. Why timecode doesn't work in Resolve on those 100 fps clips recorded with 3.00 firmware, I don't currently know. I'll have to examine them at a lower level, which is more time-consuming.

If you want an immediate workaround, you can probably use that QTChange utility. In my tests that enabled Resolve to read the timecode on those 100 fps clips.

Thank you for your help and the workaround joema4! I will use it for now. Hopefully it will get fixed sometime in the future. I wrote to the support team also and I will let you know if I receive an answer.