Time of day into timecode?

March 6, 2006 11:51 PM

Is there an easy way to translate a time of day ("10:50:13") into video time code?

I'm working with some video logs that were made by someone who jotted down the time of day displayed on the footage rather than the actual timecode. The time of day is not displayed on the footage I'm trying to work with.

Assuming I can synch up the first time of day entry with its corresponding timecode (based on content), is there some way I can extrapolate from there? Translate it? I'm driving myself crazy going back and forth between hours:minutes:seconds and hours:minutes:seconds;frames.

posted by brundlefly to Technology (5 answers total)

Are you simply asking, "how do I turn 10:50:13 into 10:50:13:00?" + "how do I add a set value to that?"
And is your log a dead tree (ROFL) or something more convenient like Excel?
posted by forallmankind at 12:40 AM on March 7, 2006

Best answer: Take the time of day in the log, subtract the first time of day. This will give you hours and minutes. Add those hours and minutes to the first timecode. In maths:

TC2 = TC1 + (ToD2-ToD1)

Excel, with cells formatted as times, will do the base-60 arithmetic for you.
posted by cogat at 2:08 AM on March 7, 2006

This will give you hours and minutes since the first timecode.
posted by cogat at 2:09 AM on March 7, 2006

And, in the future, have your camera operator figure out if it is possible to set the timecode to actual time on the camera. This can cause havoc on some editing systems if the tape is not recorded continuously, however.
posted by MrZero at 7:22 AM on March 7, 2006

Response by poster: Wonderful. I'm using Excel, so I'll get on that.
posted by brundlefly at 9:59 AM on March 7, 2006