Extremely obvious horizontal 'flickering' - terrible video quality

[twhitehouse83]

Trying to figure out what's going on here. I'm something of a newcomer to video, but I know plenty about DSLRs and still photo. I own a Vixia HF R700 camcorder, and when playing back videos, everything seems okay as long as the camera is steady. As soon as I pan up or down, or left to right, I get screen-wide flickering "bars" which almost look like bad tracking did on old VHS tapes. I've tried filming in MP4 at 17, 24, and 35mbps, as well as with IS off, in dynamic mode, and in powered mode, and the results are always the same- fine as long as I don't move the camera.

Interestingly, if I open the MP4 in Quicktime, and scroll through the video using the arrow keys, the horizontal bars will flash as the frame shifts, but then disappears, almost as if there's an error between frames. Thus, I can't grab a screen shot to show exactly what I'm seeing. I've also tried playing the video back on different monitors, and the flickering remains. I'd like to try and diagnose this here before asking Canon to figure out if this is a faulty camcorder.

Does anyone have any idea what's going on here? Thanks in advance!

[Richard]

Hi Twhitehouse83,

Thanks you for posting.

To allow us to better assist you, please reply with the following information:

• Do you notice the flickering when you playback with the camcorder or only when playing back with software?
• Have you noticed the artifacts when using any other software?
• When you're shooting and panning, are you using a tripod?
• Does the flickering that you've encountered occur when you shoot AVCHD too, or just in MP4

[twhitehouse83]

Hi Richard,

- I checked out playback on the camcorder, and it didn't seem to be flickering.

- The artifacts do show up in Quicktime, VLC, and also if I import into iMovie '11 (version 9.0.9). Interestingly, the location of the artifacts seems to be different in iMovie, vs Quicktime and VLC.

- No tripod, just handholding, but no stabilizer grips or anything.

- I hadn't recorded in AVCHD until now, so I recorded a quick test video in AVCHD at 60FPS and the same artifacting is present.

In case it helps any, the SD card I'm using is a SanDisk Ultra PLUS, Class 10 U1 rating.

[twhitehouse83 · Accepted solution]

Well, I just figured it out, there's nothing wrong with the camcorder, SD card, or my computer.

I'm an illustrator, and when I livestream, I use OBS to broadcast my desktop. Turns out, last time I streamed I never closed OBS as I usually do. I was going to try to restart my computer, after discovering that I was actually suffering from what seemed to be Vsync tearing even on windows that weren't video. When I opened my dock, I found OBS still up and running, and I assume, using up loads of GPU resources. As soon as I closed OBS, my computer stopped having screen tearing, and video playback appeared hi-quality without any issues.

I do appreciate the feedback, however!