Quest for HDV

[dprgb]

If you're looking to composite by shooting green/blue screen with HDV, I'd look elsewhere - the compression can create lots of edge artifacts. Also, the Sony and Canon do not do any progressive shooting modes - Sony's excuse for 24p is pretty bad, and Canon cheats it by recording 24p using interlaced CCD's (so it's not true 24p - that's why their marketing geniuses came up with 24F - just to fool everyone).

Also, your existing decks won't work, you'll need an HDV deck (even though it's still a 25 mbps stream). Pretty much all non-hotshoe camera add-ons will not work, as the lens diameter is larger than existing Sony DV cameras.

They both have firewire out on camera for capture. As far as direct-to-disk, you can check out Firestore's website for more info.

JVC also has an HDV camera, Panasonic has the new HVX, and Grass Valley has an HD camera coming out soon (though I think it's around $20k).

[bism]

Wow, that’s pretty disappointing. Well are you recommending these other cams over the sony and canon? I think our budget will cap at about 10k and if we need to buy new decks then we’ll have to factor that in as well. (unless we can figure the straight to disk option) And yes, we need to be able to do green screen work.





Thanks for the reply btw

[dprgb]

I personally would go with the new Panasonic, since it doesn't use MPG compression, and it's also well under your budget. www.dvxuser.com (http://www.dvxuser.com) has a forum on it with a link to some footage shot with it. It would also solve your tape problems since it can't record HD to tape - it records either to a Firestore (coming out in the spring), P2 cards, or through the HD component out.

If you're doing greenscreen work primarily, I'd say get the camera and an analog HD card for a computer. That way, you can monitor through the computer and record direct to the hard drive. For $10k you could probably get the camera, an HD card (like the Blackmagic or Aja cards) and a Medea RAID that would easily record HD. Then, when the Firestore comes out, you could pick that up for location work.

Of course, if you order one now you prob wouldn't get it till the spring anyway, by which time the Firestore's should be out (word is around March?).

And no, I'm not recommending the JVC cam - heard bad things about it. Also, it starts at right around $10k for the camera only.

But I'd most recommend going to a store and seeing if you can get any test footage, then pick it apart and figure out what works best for you.

[bism]

I am pulling some of that footage now. That dvx link is great. We were hoping to get rolling with a cam for a late Dec shoot, I guess that wont happen. Maybe we can push the schedule back a little. The idea of HD straight to disk is VERY attractive, a great thing to think about, though I wonder if it is one of those things fraught with unseen difficulties. One thing that made sense in the AC article was the guy was skeptical that the drive was even working so he would record onto tape and the hd at the same time. Said that was a good feature.

Anyway, thanks again for the reply, very helpful

[Daniel-B]

I've researched all this camera EXTENSIVELY, and I can tell you that you definately don't want to go HDV if you plan on doing visual effects work on it.

However, I would definately look into that Panasonic camera. It's the HVX-200 I believe. It records a 4:2:2 color space which is much better for stuff like bluescreen and greenscreen. I've also seen demo videos from the camera and it has an amazing picture quality.

It costs about $6000 for just the camera. But they have bundles for the P2 cards that take it from $6,600 to about $10,000. So this camera would be perfect for your needs. The camera ships December 29th. More info here...

http://catalog2.panasonic.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/ModelDetail?displayTab=O&storeId=11201&catalogId=13051&itemId=93120&catGroupId=14616&modelNo=AG-HVX200&surfModel=AG-HVX200

[bism]

ok, that is looking pretty exciting. The question now is how will it integrate into what we have now. How will adobe products react to all these different formats? Can they handle it? Is the P2 card a self destructing medium? In other words will this card wear out? Is there such a think as a P2 card reader? At 6k I am almost convinced I want one NOW. It is listed in the B&H catalog and they are usually pretty good about shipping... I am looking right now for compatibility charts and info..
Thanks again

[bism]

Loaded some of the demo footage into premiere and was not getting real time playback without rendering. There was no way to get settings that matched that of the source material exactly. Are there plugins that will allow you to work with this stuff real time or are we talking about going back to offline files?

What exactly would the workflow be from shooting to editing? Also, is this “HDV” with gops or are we dealing with straight frames? Seems like this is not all mpeg footage..

Thanks again for the input and replies, you guys have been great.

[Daniel-B]

No, the P2 cards shouldn't wear out. The are re-recordable up to at least 100,000 times, and probably more I believe.

HDV uses MPEG 2 to write the footage in an MPEG transport stream to tape. This data is written at 4:2:0 at 25mbs.

The Panasonic HVX-200 on the other hand, records in the DVCPRO-HD format, which is 4:2:2 at 100mbs. Also on the Panasonic, you've got multiple frame rates in 720p, which will allow you to shoot all the way up to 60fps. Played back at 24fps, this would give you close to 2.5x smooth slow motion.

Now, as far as software goes, I can't speak for Adobe. I know Adobe is releasing the new Premiere in early 2006. I'm pretty sure they will probably support DVCPRO-HD, but I cannot be sure.

[bism]

Ok, so now the software is what we're hung up on I guess. What software would one normally be using to edit this format?

Also, how is it possible that this one cam is so far ahead of everyone else? What are they doing differently? How can it be so cheap?

Its good to hear about those P2 cards. How would you get footage off the card and onto your machine? Is it a capture situation or a transfer situation?

Thanks again.

[markdc]

At this point you'll probably need Avid express pro HD or Final Cut on mac. Maybe adobe will have something by the time these are widely available. Those p2 cards are just an array of 2gb SD memory cards. I like the price of the cam but the price of the p2 cards...


Nice article here: http://www.dvxuser.com/articles/HVX200/

[Daniel-B]

Well, the reason the Panasonic is so different, is that it's not HDV. HDV is OK, but it's not a professional format. It is highly compressed footage right to tape. Which make things like bluescreen and greenscreen very difficult. It also records as I said earlier to MPEG, which is not good as an aquisition format, if you plan on doing effects work with it. The MPEG stream is also recorded as a 15 frame GOP. So everytime you want to edit it, it must be converted to another format, or your computer has to waste computer cycles trying to uncompress the GOP.

DVCPRO HD on the other hand, is compressed as individual frames. That way, your computer just accesses the frames, and doesn't have to uncompress a GOP.

As far as the P2 cards, I don't believe you capture the footage. I believe you just transfer it off the P2 card directly to your hard drive. These files are stored in the MXF format, which is just the file extention given to DVCPRO HD footage.

Right now, only Avid Express Pro HD and Final Cut support editing of MXF files. However, given that the Panasonic Camera is HIGHLY popular among professional videographers, and independant film makers, I'm sure Adobe and all the others will follow suit.

[bism]

wow, I am glad I checked in here before laying out any cash.. This panasonic sounds great. I will try and get ahold of some Adobe people and see what they have to say about the MXF format. Anyone know if panasonic is planning to realease the next version of this cam any time soon? Last time I bought a cam the new once came out within the month. Anyway, thanks again for the info. Spent all day reading about this camera and related articles. I was sort of supposed to be working... oh well... :)

[Daniel-B]

Well, to my knowledge, Panasonic will not be releasing another camera of this type anytime soon. I mean, but if they did, it would only be minor improvements. Panasonic seems to have pretty much nailed it the first time. :thumbsup:

[bism]

Well, I have an email in to Adobe but I don’t really plan on a reply from those guys. I will try and put a call in this week and see if I can glean some information. Very excited about this cam and looking for ways to make this happen on this next shoot. Hopefully all the pieces will fall into place. I was pretty impressed with that test footage of the staff demo in smoke, looked great. Anyway, thanks for all the help, I am sure I'll need to pop back in for some more hints from time to time.

[Rodi]

Check this website, click HD Beitrage, it contains some examples of HD shot footage from SOny and Panasonic http://www.hd-channel.com/ (http://www.hd-channel.com/)

[bism]

Well, talking to adobe was completely usesless. Circular phone systems, and staff that have no product information at all. I would imagine a file format issue would be a standard and reasonable type of question. But no luck.

Oh well, have to get back to work.

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