Wich DV camera provide best filmlook Sony PD170 VS Canon XH A1

Yasir Hasby · September 27, 2008

Hello all,

I'm from Indonesia and desperately want to make a film.

I do a wedding video for living and have doing the business about 4 years, and get bored with a style and typical look of wedding video in my town.

I really need help from anyone can guide me to get best filmlook with the only camera I can get in my town, and those are Panasonic HVX102b, Canon XL2, Canon XH A1, Sony PD170, Sony FX1, Sony VX 2100 and Sony Z1.

I've been worked with for these years with Sony PD170 and transfered the video with firewire to my PC and edit it with vegas 7 with magicbullet plugin. And a friend told me that XH A1 will give more filmlook to my video. Is that true? I only use magicbullet plugin for several times and still not satisfy with the look of my video. And Vegas is the only software I can get. Someone told me transferred a video with firewire will drop the quality of the picture. Is that true? So how should I transfer my video to PC without compression. I use AMD Athlon X2, Nvidia 8800 GT, and 2 GB of RAM with firewire link, is that enough?

Any suggestion and knowledge will make me very pleased.

Thank you..

Nate Downes · September 28, 2008

If you have the PD, use the PD. Stop with this illusion of "Filmlook" because, frankly, it's nothing but a gimmick. I've seen great looking footage on cameras without "filmlook" and horrid from cameras with "filmlook." The secret I've found is familiarity with the equipment. If you know what you are doing, you produce better looking results. So, if you know the PD170, use the PD170. Teach yourself every trick in the book for it, and the results will show for themselves.

If having a film-like image is of concern for you, teach yourself color grading and correction. That will do far more to deliver a film like visual than a particular model camera will.

Yasir Hasby · September 28, 2008

Really?

Lots of thing I should learn then.

But why so many people told that highdefiniton camera will give look like film more easy because its has something to do with a skin tone and 24p capturing?

Adrian Sierkowski · September 28, 2008

can one even define film as having a look?

24P helps with motion blur, mimicking what happens with a film camera's roatating shutter and exposure time.

Skin tone... well a lot of that might have to do with grading, but, i've seen good skintones from SD/HD and bad for both; again, that's experience with equipment more than equipment proper.