Seth Melnick

Hey all - finally I can post about a project I have been working on (as DP and one of the producers) for sometime now. We are doing a soft launch so please feel free to have a look , register (claim you login names now) and comment on videos. The concept is a place to have indie bands be able to have their music shown as well as the personalities in the band. There is a tv show element (the full ep 1 is available on the site). have a look see www.showcaseone.com

This past week Panasonic let me test their new HPX2700 Varicam - you can read my initial review here http://www.slmproduction.com/mainsite/2008...ricam_revi.html enjoy.

EDIT - this is in reference to overcranking (slow motion). I think this feature is not as widely used BECAUSE so many cameras dont offer it. It is another tool and by having that tool available you can consider using it creatively. Its a feature that allows you to do things that you might not consider if its not in front of you. Subtle slow motion for emphasis - or 2.5 times slower (if 24 frame timebase) for more dramatic motion. Needed? no - but certainly a great tool in the toolbox.

P2 is fantastic for shooting features - instant review - instant and free (cost of hard drive) dailies. And the cards are easily large enough for narrative work. Having shot over 3000 p2 cards worth of footage, never having lost a clip and utilizing many of the benefits I am very much in favor of the workflow. And with the coming 64 gig cards allowing over 8 hours of shooting on a a 4 card load - its beginning to look attractive for documentary work. But they are bandwidth limited in the sense that 4:4:4 uncompressed will never work with those cards - unless Panny develops some smart buffering (a la phantom) - but 4:2:2 is really enough for nearly all purposes.

the p2 gear will not play back avc intra clips - it will show thumbnails however

its very simple - you should NOT have been importing into final cut - you should have COPIED to your hard drive and verified using p2 viewer - importing modifies the files - your masters should not be modified workflow issue

Mitch - the P2 gear is a great device - but i have one question i know it creates a new partition for every p2 card downloaded like the camera does when you offload directly in host mode. what happens if you have more then 26 cards offloaded - doesnt windows have a limit to the number of partitions that can be accessed? Or what if you have many drives mapped on your pc - will this limit how many cards you can acces with a drive used with this?

come on man - you arent staying on the same subject - you initial post was about getting bitten by p2 footage imported into FCP. That is clearly a workflow issue - you shouldnt be importing your only master You are correct that for a long doc/ENG style that workflow wouldnt work - you would need a bunch of P2 cards and then copy them later.

I think you are missing the point of p2 then as well. You SHOULD be copying to at least 2 destinations to prevent what you are talking about - the chance of error on 2 copies is statistically zero. You dont need 2 arrays - you just need 2 off the shelf hard drives the big point is that P2 is a huge money saver. DO you need a 12,000-20,0000 dvcpro deck - no. DO you need to pay for transfers before post can begin - no. Do you need to wait to start editing - no. DO you need to log shots - no. Can you instant review without fear of overwriting - yes. When you shoot a feature you copy all footage to 2 hard drives - you can repurpose one set for editing and keep the others as masters. Another point - you should not be copying into FCP to check the footage - there is no need for that time consuming and SLIGHTLY more error prone step - check your footage in p2 viewer - its fast and usable immediately after copy. I stand by my statement that this was a workflow issue.

well it is a problem with your workflow - your masters should NEVER be an import into FCP - they should be simple file copies that you verify - import into you editing system later

I have shot nearly 2000 p2 cards worth of footage and never lost a clip - create a solid workflow and there wont be issues. To me it sounds like the original posted had an issue with importing the clips to FCP - not with the card itself - this is a workflow issue. The cards are rock solid - they "never" error out. (99.99999) - workflows however can have errors.

Doesnt anyone have a link for the requirements to join local 600 in NYC as a DP? Been searching and having trouble finding a reference. thanks

I have a bit of blogging and reviewing on my site http://www.slmproduction.com

I am not really sure what you are trying to say. The two points: - the cameras can be made to look like each other and - the HVX200 rears its ugly head to me seem contradictory. If the cameras are more similar than different as you say then how does the HVX200 rear its ugly head?

I am not sure that the consensus about this camera is that it makes a soft picture. And the "look" of a camera is very subjective. Many people think the hvx200 has the most pleasing image of the cameras in its class - many people dont. Its all subjective.

Pixel shift is not used to "simulate" HD. It is a mathamatical way of getting more resolution from less pixels by shifting each color channel and using the differences to interpolate. And as for panny not working from ground up - this is the flagship camera of theirs for the P2 workflow which is gaining a tremendous amount of popularity. Not only was that a risky (albeit successful) path for thier product line but it was also very innovative

I still disagree - for every frame rate the varicam records there is a different cadence to fit it in a 60P stream. As you ramp the frames the cadence changes. So while each individual frame is temporally correct for the frame rate you are set at - it is showing for different amounts of time to fit in the 60P stream. At times its a whole number - each frame twice for example - at other times the pulldown requires a candence like 2:3:2:3 - so if you ramp and record but then play back at 60P then the rhythm of the frames change so you will not get the smooth motion you think you would. Add to all this that 24 frames is the likely rate the film will be shown at and then all this extra thought and work with the frame rates is irrelevant. I think more work should be put into realizing that 24 frames per second works for 99 percent of the films (action or not) that exist so should be just fine for nearly all projects

one other point is that you cant playback at 15 frames per second and expect it to look the same as 24 frames per second - the image will not refresh enough to approximate motion - there is a reason 24 frames or more are used to show films

once again this will NOT give you the effect you are looking for - when the camera uses the frame twice or three times it is the same exact frame so there will be NO motion between the frames. so as the frames get repeated more it will look studdery but not smoother - you will not be capturing more or less motion i say again to get the effect you are looking for you need to playback at variable frame rates

I dont think your analysis is correct. when you play back the footage you play at a constant framerate - like 24 frames / sec so if you ramp while recording and then play back at a constant rate you will see fast and slow motion but not smoother rendition of motion. To accomplish what you are talking about you would need a variable playback speed in addition to the variable frame rate recording.

Varicam does not shot to files - it only shoots to tape

Thats interesting - I tend to rate my 500 at 320 - and about 2 stops better then the 200 - 2 stops is really an apparant not actual amount. THe darks get noisy quicker on the 200 so even if you have detail its not as good so 2 stops has been safe for me

Then we probably should remove this thread - I will be updating these and I dont want to have multiple versions out there to keep current - that is why i link to a central location

I have had some people ask me about p2 workflow to help protect the data. I have published the procedure I use on sets and have recorded over 2000 cards and never lost a clip - although straighforward, having a concrete procedure helps to avoid errors. You can find the procedure and p2 card log here: http://www.slmproduction.com/mainsite/dire...aphy/resources/ hope this helps someone.

thanks for all the replies there is a little conflicting info here - If an operator is not required then do you need to get a waiver for that?