Phil Aupperle

Lots of factors there, which could be cool or could be crap. I'd try shooting it in HD and then see if you could get the effect you want in After Effects before spending a ton of money on a film experiment. That way you can play with it and tweak it until it looks the way you want. You might even discover something cooler along the way. My .02.

I have several rolls of 7298 negative and 7240 reversal I need to process and transfer to DV. Any suggestions on good quality lab services? NYC area? Thanks!

I have the manual around here somewhere... Check back in a day or two and I'll have the answers.

This is a PS Technik? What did it look like? Did you try shooting with the motor turned off?

I agree. It's also useful to shoot in PN so you can readily change the frame rate with only one setting, IMO.

I went to film school at NYU, and I have an HVX. In my opinion, you don't need either to be a successful filmmaker. Both cost a lot of money, and you're probably better off spending that on your films, imo. Get a decent firewire DV camera (save by getting a used one), a Mac with Final Cut (or a PC with Premiere if you must [shudder]), a mic, an inexpensive tripod with a fluid head, a couple of lights if you want, a copy of Final Draft, and maybe a Netflix account. Then check out some books like Film Directing, Cinematic Motion; and Film Directing, Shot by Shot. Go to the library. Watch the classics and pick them apart with the pause button. Learn how to tell stories through WRITING, ACTING and EDITING. Do loads of experiments, try doing the same scene three different ways. Try different genres. People get too hung up on the tech side of filmmaking, and it really more about ideas, people, style, emotions, design, choices. Maybe it's not as sexy as getting the hot camera (and yes, the HVX is sweet) but you'll know that your training yourself in fundamentals rather than just throwing money at a tool. You have to be like a KungFu disciple and become unstoppable by punching a bag of rice 5000 times a day. Shooting 16 is a huge waste of money at your stage. If you have that kind of money to burn you should put it in a retirement fund, not give it to the lab. If you want to learn how to shoot film, shoot 35mm stills. Shoot tests. Try differnt film stocks. Bracket your exposures, play with depth of field, shoot narratives using stills. (this is what they make you do at NYU ayway) If you want to be a cinematographer, try to get a job as an apprentice in a camera dept. I don't know if people are making films where you live, but there are always people looking for free or cheap help in indy projects. You'll learn more about what to do and what not to do on a few sets than you will in a semester of film school, trust me. Here's a money saving tip that it took me way too long to learn: You'll get more production value from a couple of good looking actors than from a good shot any day. You can film a beautiful actor with a crappy camera and she's still beautiful. You can film a ho-hum looking actor with the most elaborate set up, and they won't look much better than ho-hum. Why do you think movie stars are more attractive than average?

You can copy the files from the P2 card to another drive, but you have to put the data from each card into it's own folder; i.e. make a new folder for each reel. The lastclip.txt file is the key to unlocking the clips on each card, so if that relationship is broken it won't work. In FCP, choose Import/Panasonic P2, then navigate to the folders you created. It will recognize the footage and import it, making a regular DVCProHD Quicktime copy in your Capture Scratch folder. You can choose which clips you want to import, too, which halps save disk space. This is much faster than importing each card to FCP while you're shooting, and also keeps your shots seperated by reel rather than lumping them all together. It's still a good idea to back up your files as you go, though. I like to use two external Firewire HDDs gaffer taped together and RAIDed in OSX for security. I can edit 1080i footage on my G4 powerbook in real time no problem.

My friend reports that the HVX is about 1 stop slower than the DVX when shooting DV. I never had a DVX, so I can't compare, but I shot a lot of concerts with my XL-1 and it always worked very well in low light. I did just shoot a music video in HD 720p at 60fps with the HVX is very dark spaces, and I was able push two stops in post no problem. It looked like push processed color reversal, which worked well for the project.

OK, this is a standard-def question, but I'm hoping someone knows the answer. One nifty thing about the HVX is that it has a TCG and can lay off proper DV masters that start on the hour. I recently layed off a DV project to the HVX from FCP no problem--I did have to put in a 1 sec offset. Well it was late at night, and there was much button pushing. Now, I need to do it again, and I can't remember how I got it to work before. I don't even remember if the offset was + or -. I've got the TC working OK, but I'm not getting pix or audio through the firewire. It seems like it wants to work in Edit to Tape with a blacked tape, but has some problem finding the starting timecode for some reason. I feel like I did it in Print to Video with the "Automatically start recording" box checked before. Any suggestions?

Anything recorded in HDV codec is already ruined, IMO. I do a lot of HD post, so I look at all kinds of HD originated footage. HDV is full of visible artifacts, and the color space makes color correction almost impossible, forget about shooting ady effects shots that require keying or tracking. It is the same data-rate as regular DV, only with many more pixels. Think about that. If the Canon has an uncompressed out, that's awesome--I've always been a big Canon fan--but it's hardly a camcorder if you're using it that way. Why not just rent the new Arri if you want to be tied to a huge deck? The HVX looks great, and I think the shutter angle controls in "film camera" mode coupled with the true 24pn mode + over/undercrank modes make it a far more powerful tool than any comparably priced video camera I've ever seen. DVCProHD is a great codec as far as robust image and ease of workflow. My .02