Policar
03-12-2005, 05:59 PM
Went to a camera expo this weekend:
Not sure if this info is already public, but I talked with a panasonic representative and the form factor is going to be just like the dvx, only slightly larger. The camera will probably begin shipping in the early fall/late summer, not immediately after NAB. HD only P2 cards only, I think.
Panasonic does NOT have plans to release cameras with bigger CCDs for lower price points, and they really don't care about shallow DOF and dynamic range. I think they want to keep the varicam leagues ahead of the DVX and HDX. Apparently, the wave of the future is SMALLER but more advanced CCDs and smaller form factors to go along with them, though development of single foveon-style CCDs appears to be on the horizon, and that could lead to a single 2/3'' CCD, I hope! (The lack of a prism would increase quality/reduce cost, anyhow.)
By the way, Panny's rep was pretty ambivalent about HD. He claimed it really doesn't serve any purpose and is pointless until the market matures and distribution methods develop further than they have.
I also tried Sony's HDV camera. It's pretty darned nice; no compression artifacts during fast pans. For 60i video only, it looks like a great choice and has moderately low noise (better than the DVX) and nice dynamic range. Definitely better than the dvx in automatic mode and probably a fantastic newsgathering camera for the HD era. Bravo, Sony. (But I'm keeping my DVX thank you very much, 480p on the bigscreen didn't look that much lower res than 1080i, and I'm sure cineframe mode reduce the difference even futher.)
I tried an amazing bluescreening system. Not sure of the name but it used some sort of ring that you put over the lense, and they had it set up with a cheap hardware keyer and it was mind blowingly cool, consider they were using a gl2 and getting awesome results in real time.
Not sure if any of the HDV info is new or if it's been contradicted by other info, but there you go.
Also, the Digital Rebel XT is SO NICE. I really want one. If only it show 30fps instead of 3fps.
Not sure if this info is already public, but I talked with a panasonic representative and the form factor is going to be just like the dvx, only slightly larger. The camera will probably begin shipping in the early fall/late summer, not immediately after NAB. HD only P2 cards only, I think.
Panasonic does NOT have plans to release cameras with bigger CCDs for lower price points, and they really don't care about shallow DOF and dynamic range. I think they want to keep the varicam leagues ahead of the DVX and HDX. Apparently, the wave of the future is SMALLER but more advanced CCDs and smaller form factors to go along with them, though development of single foveon-style CCDs appears to be on the horizon, and that could lead to a single 2/3'' CCD, I hope! (The lack of a prism would increase quality/reduce cost, anyhow.)
By the way, Panny's rep was pretty ambivalent about HD. He claimed it really doesn't serve any purpose and is pointless until the market matures and distribution methods develop further than they have.
I also tried Sony's HDV camera. It's pretty darned nice; no compression artifacts during fast pans. For 60i video only, it looks like a great choice and has moderately low noise (better than the DVX) and nice dynamic range. Definitely better than the dvx in automatic mode and probably a fantastic newsgathering camera for the HD era. Bravo, Sony. (But I'm keeping my DVX thank you very much, 480p on the bigscreen didn't look that much lower res than 1080i, and I'm sure cineframe mode reduce the difference even futher.)
I tried an amazing bluescreening system. Not sure of the name but it used some sort of ring that you put over the lense, and they had it set up with a cheap hardware keyer and it was mind blowingly cool, consider they were using a gl2 and getting awesome results in real time.
Not sure if any of the HDV info is new or if it's been contradicted by other info, but there you go.
Also, the Digital Rebel XT is SO NICE. I really want one. If only it show 30fps instead of 3fps.