AG-HVX200

[Tomas Koolhaas]

I have been very sceptical of the whole HDV phenomenon and have yet to see anything shot on HDV which doesn't have some noticeable compression artifacts. I think HDV will never rival "True" HD, but I have seen info. regarding the AG-HVX200, which makes me believe that there is a chance that this camera may (although never challenging Real HD camera's such as the F900) be a chance for low-budget film-makers to acheive something better than is currently possible with regular DV cameras (although I mean no dissrespect to the DVX100/XL2 which I have shot many good-looking projects on) on a similarly priced camera. It seems the camera can shoot 1080 at 24p but only can do so onto P2 cards. These cards are very expensive ($1700 I heard) and only store around 18 mins. of footage (not very practical for low-budget productions) however the camera can shoot 720 at 24p onto DVCPRO50, which would be excellent for low-budget film makers as they could buy a camcorder for around $5,000 which is capable of 720 24p shooting. The Lense on the camera would have to be better than SD DV lenses to suport the 1080 footage which is a big plus. What does everyone else think, has anyone heard any more details?

Cheers.

Tomas.

[Ed Nyankori]

So many sceptics... I think in 50 years a $500 camcorder will record f900+ quality images and film will still be alive and well, in a niche market...Until then we just have to figure out where to budget the resources to bring our projects to life...The most memorable quote from film school for me was something like 'cinema will not be a true artform until the cost of producing it is as cheap as pen and paper'. I don't take the coment literally but I think it holds great merit.

 

Now to answer your question I understand that as the technology emerges P2 cards will hold more memory and cost less...I of course remember buying a 2GB harddrive for $400+ maybe 7 years ago. So I welcome the change I hate tapes and its already been suggested that after market devices similar to iPods will be available to capture data. And Id rather download a P2 card onset and have it at my beck and call without tying up my camera anyway...

 

What sucks is that unlike the Cinematographers of the pre-DV era whom could count on their investments to pay for theselves and still retain value; our equipment is becoing more and more disposable. I hear the street price of a dvx100p is under $2000 I think I paid closer to $4000 just two years ago.

[John Sprung]

The biggest problem for this kind of camera is that the CCD's are even smaller than the too-small chips of the 900/Viper generation. They're 1/3 inch. Not only are they DOA for DOF, the number of photons per pixel gets low enough that you're up against the noise floor. They could be useful as a sort of HD version of the Eyemo, grab it like a football and run with it for a chase scene. You may get 1920 x 1080 out of them, but that much resolution won't ever reach the chips in the first place through affordable pro-sumer lenses.

 

The memory cards seem expensive if you think of them like video cassettes. Really they're more like film magazines. You need to "offload" them to a computer or tape and use them again the same day.

 

 

 

-- J.S.

[Brian Wells]

that much resolution won't ever reach the chips in the first place through affordable pro-sumer lenses.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

Right. As I understand it, lenses for smaller formats require far more rigid specifications because of the smaller sensor compared to larger formats. Of course, no prosumer camera would have superior quality lens components than those made available for film aquisition, I would think...

 

Brian Wells

[nchopp]

It's not HDV. It's DVCPRO HD.

[Jon Allen]

It's not HDV. It's DVCPRO HD.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

...which is an important point to make. HDV is 4:2:0 and DVCproHD is 4:2:2 I believe.

However, it's still on a 1/3 inch chip, which does make it inferior for "real" production use. I don't see most of us getting up in arms about that though, so we might be on to something with the HVX200.

One thing about this camera that was the most disappointing about the HVX was the lack of interchangable optics. And JVC's other trump will be the use of square pixels as opposed to rectangular pixels on their new HDV cam.

[David Cox]

Just some more stuff about the Panasonic P2 camera. I had a good look at it at NAB and a chat with the nice people there :-)

 

Yes, this camera is a 4:2:2 device, and so should not show many of the compression artifacts that HDV will. This is especially so for blue screen work.

 

The P2 cards are getting bigger all the time (data wise of course!). So they will hold more and more.

 

In order to get over the problem of your cards filling up on the shoot, Panasonic are making a neat little 80Gb portable hard drive with a P2 reader in it, so you can copy your card contents across significantly faster than real time and so reuse your card(s) on the set.

 

The cards are expensive at the moment, but Panasonic do point out that you will never need to buy a tape again. Fair point - if you shoot alot. Although that does assume that you probably destroy your rushes after your edit, rather than archive them (though you could archive your rushes to a big fat firewire drive I guess).

 

I think Panasonics offering is designed to be a higher quality unit than the HDV equivalents, and has a higher price tag to match. The addition of a DV tape recorder in the camera as well as the P2 card is quite a nice idea. However, I think everyone has to bare in mind the effects of the optics on the front of these lower cost cameras. Simply remember that these entire cameras cost a geat deal less than one decent lens for a "proper" digital cinema camera. As such, one can expect the picture quality always to be compromised accordingly.

 

David Cox

Baraka Post Production

www.baraka.co.uk

[Josh Bass]

It's been announced, I BELIEVE, that you can use any old harddrive with the camera, instead of the P2 cards. That reduces cost a lot.

 

If this thing is the HD equivalent of the DVX, then it'll be very sweet.

[Tomas Koolhaas]

From what I have read (which isn't much) I can't tell if the camera will have interchangeble lenses, I assume it won't, does anyone know for sure?? If it did it may expand the possibilities for this camera, for me I would probably only use this camera with a mini-35 adaptor, if I had to use it at all (if the budget didn't allow for an F900).

Cheers.

Tomas.

[Tomas Koolhaas]

Never mind, the lenses aren't changable, Oh well. I understand that camera manufacturers can't afford to put expenesive glass on a cheap camera, but then why don't they give us the option of taking there cheap glass off and using adaptors to utilise better lenses instead of being stuck with their crap integral one. For example the DVX100 is at a disadvantage to use with the mini-35 adaptor because you have to focus it's existing rubbish lense onto the groud glass of the adaptor. Is it really that much more expensive/difficult to make a camera with interchangable lenses??????

[Jon Allen]

It's been announced, I BELIEVE, that you can use any old harddrive with the camera, instead of the P2 cards.  That reduces cost a lot.

 

If this thing is the HD equivalent of the DVX, then it'll be very sweet.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

I talked to a panasonic rep yesterday and he said that the only thing deterring the use of an external harddrive on the x200 was a harddrive that could write fast enough. I find this a little fishy, since even old dma harddrives can write at 66MB/s, while DVCproHD only uses ~12.5MB/s.

I read an article in Millimeter that said that BlackMagic-Design had streamed HD from an iPod... did I not suggest this last fall??? External Disk Recording - Aug '04

[Balazs Rozsa]

In the Kinetta one 1.8" 40MB HDD records 110Mb/sec sustained (50g iPod HDD).

[Tenolian Bell]

'cinema will not be a true artform until the cost of producing it is as cheap as pen and paper'.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

Sounds like something they would say in film school. More idealism than practice. Architecture is an artform also, building a skyscraper will never be cheap.

 

There are problems with interchangable lens on prosumer cameras, the XL1 as an example. There is no backfocus so there is no way to hold focus through the zoom.

[Josh Bass]

"Is it really that much more expensive/difficult to make a camera with interchangable lenses??????"

 

XL2 started out at around $5000. . .

 

Think of what would happen if this very fancy (yes yes, I know, low-end) camera, in addition to the DVCPROHD, also had interchangeable lenses. Mucho dinero.

[Tomas Koolhaas]

Hello everyone,

now that there is slightly more info. available about the HVX200 (including the price $5,900 which I think is pretty fair) does anyone know for sure if the camera can shoot onto a hard drive as well as P2 cards?

Cheers.

Tomas.

[David Mullen ASC]

It can go into an external hard drive but needs to pass through a laptop first to control the drive.

[Tomas Koolhaas]

Hi David,

Do you know what kind of program you need for the laptop to process the footage from the camera? is it compatible with apple or PC or both? does it use firewire as an output?

Thanks a lot.

Tomas.

[David Mullen ASC]

No, I don't know those answers -- Phil?

[Peter J DeCrescenzo]

Hi David,

Do you know what kind of program you need for the laptop to process the footage from the camera? is it compatible with apple or PC or both? does it use firewire as an output?

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

Of course, the devil will be in the details -- which we'll know more about when the HVX200 eventually ships in several months -- but the files it creates are likely to be standard DVCPRO-25, DVCPRO-50 and DVCPRO-HD ("100") digital video files. Applications such as the current version of Apple's Final Cut Pro HD are able to readily edit these filetypes today. Apparently FCP-HD can also work with P2-based media today, too.

 

One of the major selling points of the HVX200 will supposedly be it's relatively straight-forward post path, compared to HDV. But as I said, we'll have to wait until the HVX200 is shipping to know exactly how smoothly everything works.

 

All the best,

 

- Peter DeCrescenzo

[David Mullen ASC]

But do you need an HD editing software to just move DVCPROHD files off of the camera or P2 card reader, through a laptop, and into a firewire drive? It would seem that you could use something simpler, program-wise, if all you are doing is file transfer.

[Peter J DeCrescenzo]

But do you need an HD editing software to just move DVCPROHD files off of the camera or P2 card reader, through a laptop, and into a firewire drive?  It would seem that you could use something simpler, program-wise, if all you are doing is file transfer.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

I wonder if a P2 card in a HVX200 will mount on the desktop using Mac OS X alone (if the cam is connected to a Mac via Firewire)? I don't know.

 

15" & 17" Mac laptops have a PC Card (CardBus) slot, so a P2 card can be installed in them directly; the camera isn't always needed. However, I don't know if OS X will mount a P2 as a drive on the desktop, but FCP-HD can access it regardless.

 

But if (if) Mac OS X doesn't mount a HVX200's P2 card as a drive, or if it doesn't mount a P2 card installed in a laptop, then I guess you'd need some sort of utility to do it.

 

I'd be surprised if Mac OS X couldn't do it already or by around the time the HVX200 ships. But that's a guess on my part.

 

Jan Crittenden of Panasonic would know the answers to these questions ...

 

All the best,

 

- Peter DeCrescenzo

[David Cox]

The P2 card is designed to slot into a computer and mount itself as another drive. Certainly this works for Windows, so for file transfers you just use the normal windows stuff (explorer) and drag and drop as usual. I'm not sure about Mac though, but I would be surprised if Panasonic didn't write a utility to read the card if it isn't natively accepted by Apple.

[Phil Rhodes]

Hi,

 

> However, I don't know if OS X will mount a P2 as a drive on the desktop

 

A P2 card is really just a big, fast PCMCIA memory card. As far as I'm aware, each P2 card is effectively a RAID of four of Panasonic's SD memory devices.

 

If I'm right, and I think I am, it does rather raise the question as to why they changed the name, other than the commercial need to produce something that appears new (and the fact that PCMCIA is a bit of a mouthful).

 

Phil

[David Mullen ASC]

Phil, maybe you can explain why you can't just plug an ordinary firewire drive (as opposed to something like a FireStore) into a camera and record data, if that's correct.

[Alvin Pingol]

>>it does rather raise the question as to why they changed the name, other than

>>the commercial need to produce something that appears new (and the fact that

>>PCMCIA is a bit of a mouthful).

 

Hah... P2 is much easier to say than Extended Quad-SecureDigital RAID PCMCIA Memory System, or the EQSDRAIDPCMCIAMS as I like to call it. :D

 

 

>>Phil, maybe you can explain why you can't just plug an ordinary firewire drive

>>(as opposed to something like a FireStore) into a camera and record data, if

>>that's correct.

 

I think this was answered in the past, but essentially, the HDD needs an interface to manage the data it will be receiving (the FireStore, obviously, has this built-in). If connected directly to a camera, the 1394 cable would carry the 1's and 0's to the disk, but without an interface to tell it what file system to write as, where to put the data, how to write the data, what to name the data, and so forth, the HDD is lost and cannot write anything.

 

I'm sure Mr. Rhodes can explain this in a much more technical and thorough manner. :)

Edited June 24, 2005 by Alvin Pingol