What's the best way to spend 2,500 GBP?

December 28, 2006

I prefr film but need a DV cam. What's the best way to spend 2,500 GBP? A dvx100a? Is this a good cam guys? I suppose one can shoot 24p and apart from that is it a good cam to choose? Input? Also, could I marry that with 35mm film in a feature - or not possible? Thanks, LondonFilmMan

Michael Collier · December 29, 2006

hmmm, 2500. thats about 5000 US? beer and hookers....

or if your all stocked up on those, you can get a DVX-100 and several nice accessories for it. The DVX is probably my favorite prosumer mini-DV cam I have laid hands on (and I have used just about all of them) Maybe you can get a lightly used DVX with the andromeda upgrade (very cool mod, look into it if you don't know what it is....google and search this forum)

You probably can't get a 35mm feature done with that...well scratch that you can't get a 35mm feature done for that. You could get enough short ends in 16mm for a feature (almost 1000 minutes worth of stock) but proccessing and telecine would cost an extra 5000GBP at least, not to mention actual cost incurred producing the feature.

You could easily shoot a 10-15 minute short film for that in 16mm.

all things considered, I would go for the short film. If your trying to get into cinematography, you would be best served by putting as much as possible into every project.

I would only recomend buying a mini-DV cam if you know you will have paying work to make it worthwile. I only bought a GL-1 back in the day, and it paid for itself many times over, but I would recomend renting cameras and building that into your day rate. Works very well since you can customize you camera and shooting format (and price) to the clients needs. Its why I haven't bought a camera since my GL-1.

Other than that, theres tons of things to do with that kind of money, its hard to say what is best to do with it....unless your beer fridge is running low.

Kevin Armstrong · December 29, 2006

As a DP who started in film and still prefer to work with film whenever possible, i was very suprised to see how nice the footage from my DVX100 turns out. 24p +the gamma curves and some nifty cinematography and this thing can handle itself against alot of the "big-boys". prob is, with most DV, wide shots fall apart, paticularly day-exteriors, on the big screen they look awful, and i've had to shoot some 16mm or s16 for those scenes (usually a stock with a 200asa or higher). so as far as "seamless" cutting to 35mm....forget it. however, no DV camera has shot more features/TV and mid-budget productions than the DVX-100. the fact that the ASC testing of the cam gave it thumbs up, along with several positive AC articles re:the DVX in action, makes it a solid choice for a small amount of dough.

December 29, 2006

Thanks for your input. I have a 16mm and 35mm, but wanted to explore DV... not as an amateur though :) I appreciate that it wouldn't be great for wide shots. I'd shoot film for that. I wanted it for location/docos, but for broadcast. It would but no use if it wasn't broadcast quality. I am assuming its a professional camera.....isn't it? you said prosumer....is this cam HDV?

Edited December 29, 2006 by Robert G Andrews

Jim Feldspar · December 30, 2006

As a DP who started in film and still prefer to work with film whenever possible, i was very suprised to see how nice the footage from my DVX100 turns out. 24p +the gamma curves and some nifty cinematography and this thing can handle itself against alot of the "big-boys". prob is, with most DV, wide shots fall apart, paticularly day-exteriors, on the big screen they look awful, and i've had to shoot some 16mm or s16 for those scenes (usually a stock with a 200asa or higher). so as far as "seamless" cutting to 35mm....forget it. however, no DV camera has shot more features/TV and mid-budget productions than the DVX-100. the fact that the ASC testing of the cam gave it thumbs up, along with several positive AC articles re:the DVX in action, makes it a solid choice for a small amount of dough.

Why don't the wide shots hold up? How about with the HVX-200, particularly shooting 720 24P HD,

would you happen to know? Thanks.

Kevin Armstrong · January 4, 2007

The wide shhots fall apart because of the intense artifacts that DV creates. in the digital realm the images are captured in thousands of "blocks" and in these blocks are millions of "pixels" that ultimatley put together the final image. so even though that rooftop in the distance is a nice straight line in the real world, you just captured it into what the camera's image sensors see as tiny squares. take a still frame of some DV footage in different situations and a 35mm still camera composing the same shot. bring em into your photo software and zoom in as far as you want, and this is easily seen. a comparison to standard DV and 10-bit UNcompressed HD artifacting can be seen at reel-stream.com . They offer an upgrade option to the dvx-100 that allows for 8 or 10 bit 4:4:4 or 4:2:2 uncompressed HD to be "streamed" out of the camera into their capture software. as far as im concerned, they should not call anything that is 720p "HD". i have yet to meet anyone who even desires to shoot 720p at all. especially if its intended for viewing on a 1080 line television. by the way, how many TV's did you see at the electronics stores this year that were 720 line "hd" sets. none.

Edited January 4, 2007 by Kevin Armstrong

Jim Feldspar · January 4, 2007

The wide shhots fall apart because of the intense artifacts that DV creates. in the digital realm the images are captured in thousands of "blocks" and in these blocks are millions of "pixels" that ultimatley put together the final image. so even though that rooftop in the distance is a nice straight line in the real world, you just captured it into what the camera's image sensors see as tiny squares. take a still frame of some DV footage in different situations and a 35mm still camera composing the same shot. bring em into your photo software and zoom in as far as you want, and this is easily seen. a comparison to standard DV and 10-bit UNcompressed HD artifacting can be seen at reel-stream.com . They offer an upgrade option to the dvx-100 that allows for 8 or 10 bit 4:4:4 or 4:2:2 uncompressed HD to be "streamed" out of the camera into their capture software. as far as im concerned, they should not call anything that is 720p "HD". i have yet to meet anyone who even desires to shoot 720p at all. especially if its intended for viewing on a 1080 line television. by the way, how many TV's did you see at the electronics stores this year that were 720 line "hd" sets. none.

Thanks.

What do you think of using the HVX-200 at its 1080 setting? (I know that it does a bit of a math

trick to get it but do you think that's okay?)