smpte~

I'm also interested in getting SMPTE Timecode to work in Max for use with Video and TV production audio.

Here is a good primer on Timecode (not necessarily for anyone in particular, but if you don't know how TC works, it's a good start).
http://documentation.apple.com/en/finalcutpro/usermanual/index.html#chapter=D%26section=6%26tasks=true

Video is shot in the camera at the Dropfame video framerate that is slower than an actual Film rate of 30 or 24 fps.
Since Timecode is an integer counting method that correlates ONE timecode value with ONE frame of video, this fractional framerate must be resolved by dropping whole timecode markers at some point.
By the time 30 frames have incremented in the timecode, more than 30 seconds have passed. So, every now and then frames are dropped from the timecode count to speed up the TC, keeping it perfectly in sync with actual elapsed time.

The standard framerates shot in today's broadcast and movie production are:
24p -- 24 full frame images recorded at the rate of 23.976 fps.
30p -- 30 full frame images recorded at the rate of 29.97 fps.
60i -- 60 fields (half-frame interlaced images) recorded at the rate of 59.94 fps.
60p -- 60 full frame images recorded at the rate of 59.94 fps. This is a specialty framerate for slow motion. No consumer playback of this standard exists widely.
Field sync for 60i is not timed off of timecode as far as I know, as there are 30 unique frame points available, not 60.

True film playback on a projector can take place at a true 24 frames per second. This will never be the case for most of what we are doing in digital land.

23.976 is popular for the "film look" and most cinematic-looking styles, a lot of music videos, movies and DSLR type footage uses the slower framerate with more of a flickering look.

29.97 is popular for the smooth "video look" that gives very good resolution of motion for sports, news broadcast, etc. It is most common for broadcast TV and is the current standard playback rate for over-the-air, cable and satellite broadcast. Since 29.97 is the standard delivery platform, most 24p content can only be delivered by adapting it to fit into the 29.97 format and then resolving it at the other end. It cannot actually be delivered as it is shot.

Over the web and bluray, 23.976 content can be delivered in its native format and will appear as intended and is increasing in popularity.

I just wrapped up production of a major reality show for Discovery Channel and the entire show was shot at 23.976 fps. Even though it will probably enter the editing stage at 29.97 or at very least end up at 29.97 for delivery, it was still shot to have the more cinematic look to the framerate.

I hope that helps. I'm an audio guy not really a video guy, but that is my best understanding of how all this stuff works as it greatly affects the technicalities of how we sort out audio for video. I hope this is all accurate. It's a very confusing topic and any search will reveal the video guys are just as baffled about their own formats as us audio guys.

Hi Mattijs, thank you a lot for this external, it could be a great tool for my patches in the next days!!!! I have only one question: is there a way to build an external that reads an incoming audio smpte ltc and convert it in a 80 bit stream, so I could convert it in midi time code? ...or simply display the timing onscreen? Here's my patch for the encodings (incomplete but with your external just a step forward)
Thanks for your support!
Italo