I.M. Sinclair

Hello again, Thank you for all of your comments and I look forward to passing the information along to my peers and fellow staff members at the studio. However If I may please direct the question back to HD camera preference and not necessarily post concerns (albeit very important as well). There were some comments made by Mr. Gross about his preference to the Varicam over the CineAlta and wonder if anybody else shares his experience, concerns, etc. (I highly respect the opinions of Mr.Gross having worked with him first hand, but I will of course honor all additional comments on your experiences of working with HD camera systems). The material that is produced out of the studio I work with only ends up on the small screen (TV and corparate board rooms) and cost is as always a top concern for the accounts. So with those conditions in place what would you look to as your HD camera preference? Cheers, IMS

Thank you Phil and Mitch for the replies. I look forward to more! So if the Varicam looks better by the time it ends up at 40Mbps then the SDX900 at 50Mbps, what is the Varicam sampling at (4:2:2 for SDX, ??? for Varicam)? And thankyou for clearing up the Megabit verses Megabyte. There have been many discussion here at the studio I work for about the post end of things as it pertains to going HD or not. However the answer is inevitable, and it's great that Panasoinc and Apple have developed this "no brainer" approach to moving forward together with HD on both the camera and post fronts, but our editors have a voice in all of this desicion making as well. And they like their Avids. Back to the camera... Albiet the CineAlta may have higher resolution than the Varicam our company does not make feature films so I'm less concerned about an image being projected on 50' screen. I'm more concerned about user friendliness and something that isn't going to cost us every employee's arms and legs. I would still like some cash left over for some well needed grip and lighting gear (wink to Mr. Gross). "...but you may still need to invest a big chunk in a deck." I see that Panasonic has released a smaller (half rack?) HD deck with a price tag around 20K. So that make the jump to HD so much more appealing to the accountants. If you have a preference for any or one of the current HD cameras out on the market today which would it be? Thanks! PS - And a special thanks for Mr. Gross for his voucher! :D

Hello All (long time listener, first time caller); Where do I begin? Okay first off, as much as I have been learning from all of you on these posts it always leads to more questions, of course right? Second, a little background for you so you know I'm legitimate and I'm not out to sell or discredit any of you or your information that you all so willingly and graciously supply; I work for a small production company in none other than Fargo, ND (no, I'm not from ND and thus I have no "accent" made famous by the movie of the same name, sorry). I'm a transplant, orignally from the West and arrived in Fargo via Boston and NYC. I can hear the jokes coming! HA! Alright, on to the question... I have yet to shoot with HD so natually I'm excited and nervous all the same. There is a commercial shoot scheduled and our client wishes to shoot with HD However I suspect they'll change their minds once they see the pice tag on the rental. Regardless, it could still happen. I'm leaning toward the Varicam (due to reasons I'll get to later) and I'm curious to know what issues to look out for durring checkout and on the shoot. And is it possible to pull this gig off without an AC (Not that I would want to, but "productions" are run much differently out here, using a gaffer? unheard of.)? My next question is, and I'm sure you've all answered this one more than once (and if so please let me know where I could find your answers), what HD camera should a small town production company get themselves into? I come from a gaffing and film shooting background so I need some help understanding this ever growing forrest of HD products (I have been reading up on plenty of this but a lot of it seems biased). Say you had 100 grand to spend updateding your camera department, which way would you lean (post equipment excluded)? We shoot everything from commercials to corparate communications. I've also done a lot of reseach on the SDX900, which seems like a positive choice however HD is breathing down our necks more and more each day. As it pertains to bit rate (25Mbps verses 50Mbps, right?) the Varicam, as one posting read, said by the time you get to 24p on the Varicam, your at 40Mbps (down from 100Mbps). So would this mean that the SDX900 at 50Mbps looks better? What am I missing in this equation, the color sampling or compression or something else? Also, at risk of sounding completly naive what does Mbps stand for? Mega bits per second? Or...? I would really appreciate your answers as I would love to continue learning this medium to stay employable. Thanks!