HVX200 vs. XL-H1

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Please show me where people have said the HVX is better in low light because these people are idiots. Ask Barry direct, which camera is better in low light, he will tell you the XLH. Ask Adam Wilt, he will tell you the XLH. Have you actually read the reports about these cameras?
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In the inital under 10k HD shootout, it was commented on that the HVX200 was the most sensative of the bunch. I've also heard Barry comment that it has the highest lattitude. For what I want to do, it is what I would consider the best better when it comes to low light. I've heard from Adam Wilt's test that it produces more noise when upping the gain a lot but I never use the gain in the first place and find the noise more film looking than the others so, for my use, it's what I'd choose in low light.

As far as my reputation, dont have much of one around here. Never affiliated myself with a magazine or organization, too busy working. I have shot with every digital camera known to man and have a decade of experience shooting digital video where I have logged well over 10,000 hours behind the camera and shot over 5,000 hours of footage.
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You want a cookie?

If you havent messed with the camera, maybe you should reserve comment.
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I don't think I've misrepresented what I know. In most of my posts I tend to explain that my knowladge is limited and if I didn't do so on this one I do so now. I've worked with the HVX, HD100, and Z1. I have not, as I've said seen the H1 in action since there don't seem to be any around in the New Orleans area. Most of what I'm paraphrasing is from my own experience and what I've read in other articles. I make no secret of this and no problem admitting if I am mistaken. Especially since my quick list is certainly no substitue for actually reading these in depth articles. It's not worth getting so worked over.

None of this really matters if your story sucks. It's all just tech talk. You can debate facts and figures until the end of time. People are still going to shoot both because we can. Becasue everyone will see something that they like in the other, and thankfully we can do this.
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My I get tired of someone wanting to post this in every thread. We know buddy. If you don't realize that story, acting, and directing are all a lot more important than what camera you use than you are an idiot. Can we please stop having kids posting this thinking they're being profound. The fact is though that we are on a board called "DVXuser" in a thread that is discussing the pros and cons of various cameras. That's what we are debating, not what makes a good movie. The technical aspects certainly aren't as important as the content but they're still there.
 
AshG said:
Ask Barry direct, which camera is better in low light, he will tell you the XLH. Ask Adam Wilt, he will tell you the XLH.
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We didn't test for "low light", we tested for ISO sensitivity. In that test the HVX clocked in at 320, the XLH1 at 200. For sensitivity there's no contest, but a comprehensive "low light" test would have to take into account the effects of gain and noise. That's a test we didn't perform.
 
I would like to take another point of view if I may.... It seems that most people here put a lot of empahasis on just the camera and how the footage looks to the naked eye. My background is post production, and thus what matter the most to me is what can I do with it once it's shot. I don't care if one camera has nicer chroma than an other, or if one camera is sharper than the other...

What I care about is how much latitude i have once it's shot.I should be able to choose the exact color look (Grading) I want, key a color if i need to, manipulate the characteristics of a scene, etc... But you can only do that with 4:4:4 or 4:2:2 at 4:2:0 or 4:1:1 the picture start breacking down, you are stuck with whatever you have. Also no matter how great the electronic in a camera is, there is so much info you can put on a mini-DV. The mini-DV is a bad format for HD, especially prosumer HD... Which is why I believe Panasonic decided on an alternative, the logic being if you can remove the only obstacle (mini_dv tape), you will end up with a better camera.


The other comments i am really tired of hearing about, is how well a camera does in the dark... If you want to shoot in the dark get yourself an infrared camera. A camera, any cameras are design to capture light... bright light. Even HIGH ISO film gets very grainy in low light situation. Why do you think all feature film's night scenes are shot "Day for Night"??? Sometime we tend to forget the very basics of photography: A square box with a tiny hole that capture and register light over a period of time.:thumbsup:
 
SomewhereinLA said:
Why do you think all feature film's night scenes are shot "Day for Night"???
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I doubt that. But they often use tons of light, so the night becomes almost day-bright.
Is that what you mean?
Otherwise good point...
 
SomewhereinLA said:
I would like to take another point of view if I may.... It seems that most people here put a lot of empahasis on just the camera and how the footage looks to the naked eye. My background is post production, and thus what matter the most to me is what can I do with it once it's shot. I don't care if one camera has nicer chroma than an other, or if one camera is sharper than the other...

What I care about is how much latitude i have once it's shot.I should be able to choose the exact color look (Grading) I want, key a color if i need to, manipulate the characteristics of a scene, etc... But you can only do that with 4:4:4 or 4:2:2 at 4:2:0 or 4:1:1 the picture start breacking down, you are stuck with whatever you have. Also no matter how great the electronic in a camera is, there is so much info you can put on a mini-DV. The mini-DV is a bad format for HD, especially prosumer HD... Which is why I believe Panasonic decided on an alternative, the logic being if you can remove the only obstacle (mini_dv tape), you will end up with a better camera.


The other comments i am really tired of hearing about, is how well a camera does in the dark... If you want to shoot in the dark get yourself an infrared camera. A camera, any cameras are design to capture light... bright light. Even HIGH ISO film gets very grainy in low light situation. Why do you think all feature film's night scenes are shot "Day for Night"??? Sometime we tend to forget the very basics of photography: A square box with a tiny hole that capture and register light over a period of time.:thumbsup:
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I very much agree. I've worked with HDV in post and it's just a mess. As I've said many times before, DVCPro is just a joy to work with. You can push the color so much farther. You also don't have to worry about fake frames, dealing with fields, or any of that crap (or digitizing). After using P2s with the HVX, it's SO hard doing tape projects. If one was using the Canon for uncompressed output, I think it'd be a great option but I can't afford that.

Another thing I have a problem with in these tests is that the attempt to make all the cameras look the same seems to make them all look like crap. I mean, I see the stills from the HVX in these tests and they certainly don't look like any of my HVX200 footage. I tend to look at the BEST stuff I've seen produce from each camera. From what I've seen, the prettiest stuff is from the HVX, then the XLH1, then the HD100, then the Z1. I think the comparison stuff just doesn't do ANY of the cameras justice.
 
i think something should be said for what camera the operator (whether it be a novice, intermediate, or expert) is most comfortable with.

with the amount of manual controls on each of these cameras, more than half the battle is the personal knowledge one possesses about the specific tool they are using. getting the most of the cameras is not as easy as point and shoot. it's almost like choose the axe, know it well, and go make something...

i went back and forth about what camera i should invest in for my own personal work and for my specific situation, the HVX made the most sense... i simply feel the most comfortable with it coming from a DVX background.

this is something else to consider for low-light purposes, and this is something that i also thought about as well... truth be told no 1/3" camera is going to perform that great in low light situations when compared to larger cameras... i absolutely loved the idea of being able to rent what now looks to be the HDX900 for those few shots i might need that require lighting situations that my HVX can't handle... since they are both the same format, it requires very little extra effort to cut them together with the added insurance that, chances are, the two camera will react fairly similar in the same situation.

it's a lot more than just the camera. it really matters what the projects calls for, the personal experience of the crew involved, and all that jazz...
 
LearningVideo said:
Of course, using cineform. My trouble with this is the following: why cineform is not considered by many here as a VIABLE solution for HVX200 and Vegas? there are so many, including myself, who would love to use Vegas and HVX200 but cannot do so. Why don't these people consider cineform as a viable product? Is the intermediate format too slow to be viable?
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CineForm is signicantly faster than native DVCPRO-HD, so it is not "too slow to be viable". And speed is not its only advantage. We have many HVX users quietly and sucessfully doing productions on NLEs that they otherwise be very limited in their workflow. Forums tend to have more reports of problems rather than successes, so CineForm users are quietly having very few problems. :) Also there are more Apple owners with the HXV, so the PC NLE traffic is reduced. When CineForm completes its port to the Mac and FCP, expect a lot more heated debate. The thread where most of the discussion has occured is here : http://www.dvxuser.com/V6/showthread.php?t=57522
 
David Newman said:
CineForm is signicantly faster than native DVCPRO-HD, so it is not "too slow to be viable". And speed is not its only advantage. We have many HVX users quietly and sucessfully doing productions on NLEs that they otherwise be very limited in their workflow. Forums tend to have more reports of problems rather than successes, so CineForm users are quietly having very few problems. :) Also there are more Apple owners with the HXV, so the PC NLE traffic is reduced. When CineForm completes its port to the Mac and FCP, expect a lot more heated debate. The thread where most of the discussion has occured is here : http://www.dvxuser.com/V6/showthread.php?t=57522
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Thanks. I am planning to try this. If it works, you just have won a customer :)
 
SomewhereinLA said:
What I care about is how much latitude i have once it's shot.I should be able to choose the exact color look (Grading) I want, key a color if i need to, manipulate the characteristics of a scene, etc... But you can only do that with 4:4:4 or 4:2:2 at 4:2:0 or 4:1:1 the picture start breacking down, you are stuck with whatever you have. Also no matter how great the electronic in a camera is, there is so much info you can put on a mini-DV. The mini-DV is a bad format for HD, especially prosumer HD... Which is why I believe Panasonic decided on an alternative, the logic being if you can remove the only obstacle (mini_dv tape), you will end up with a better camera.:thumbsup:
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Unfortunately your comment regarding tape vs P2 is only partially true. I purchased an HDV camera about two years or so ago with the expectation that I would use it to help develop an HD workflow in anticipation of the HVX. As you noted, there's a lot more to all of this than the camera, well there's also a lot more to editing HD than the NLE.

To my surprise, converting HDV from a 25Mb stream to something analogus to the DVCProHD 100Mb stream using AspectHD provided great results. I did not expect that.

What I would like to point out is that Panasonic only partially removed the (mini_dv tape) constraint because the DVCProHD codec is only 8bits so there's really very little appreciable difference in post between HVX footage and HDV footage that has been converted using an intermediate codec.

So if the XL-A1/G1's image is as good as the XLH and the XLH's HDV image is a good as most people claim, then having a $3500 must be a good option.
 
ChuckS said:
So if the XL-A1/G1's image is as good as the XLH and the XLH's HDV image is a good as most people claim, then having a $3500 must be a good option.
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I'm on the boat for an A1 unless another camera with more options in the same price point producing the SAME quality image comes along.

I, personally, wouldn't purchase either camera if I could avoid it. It's the advent of a new generation of cameras around four-thousand dollars. If you aren't getting into a major project and you don't have to make an immediate decision... then I'd do some testing on my own instead of listening to others.
 
Barry_Green said:
We didn't test for "low light", we tested for ISO sensitivity. In that test the HVX clocked in at 320, the XLH1 at 200. For sensitivity there's no contest, but a comprehensive "low light" test would have to take into account the effects of gain and noise. That's a test we didn't perform.
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Dont skirt the question, you know the answer =o) If you had to choose a camera to shoot something that you knew had low light and that was THE only factor... you would choose the Sony first, the XLH second and the HVX last (I have not used the JVC in that situation so I cannot comment.) I only got on this train because he claimed that the HVX was better in low light than the XLH which is simply a false claim made by someone who has never touched the camera and he used you as a reference for that claim.

This is the main thing people just dont get, THERE IS NO BEST CAMERA, there is only the best camera for the specific situation. Dont like HDV editing? Easy, capture it in another codec or uncompressed and work with it that way. For every fault of every camera, there is a workaround, for every strength, there is a weakness related to it. Dont take it so personal when people say camera X is not good in low light or camera Z is poor with fast motion... just tools... nothing more...


ash =o)
 
This is the main thing people just dont get, THERE IS NO BEST CAMERA, there is only the best camera for the specific situation. Dont like HDV editing? Easy, capture it in another codec or uncompressed and work with it that way. For every fault of every camera, there is a workaround, for every strength, there is a weakness related to it. Dont take it so personal when people say camera X is not good in low light or camera Z is poor with fast motion... just tools... nothing more...
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I find it interesting that you say not to take things personally after you said people who prefer an HVX200 for low light "are idiots." ;)

Anyway, we know the various cameras have their own strengths and weaknesses. I don't recall anyone claiming that there is one be all end all camera. I'm simply speaking of for my own uses. As I said, anyone who is seriously questioning this shouldn't read this thread but look at the very detailed in-depth comparisons.

For me, I'd rather have the HVX200 in a low light environment. Every report I've seen says it's more sensative (because of the lower rez CCDs) and I quoted Barry in the claim that it has a higher lattitude. I've heard reports that the XLH1 looks better when you start to put the cameras into the +18 or above gain levels but I never like using gain in the first place so it's not an issue for me.

I find it interesting that you scold against making a blanket statement like "X is the best camera" but then feel perfectly comfortible about making a blanket statment about which is best for low light.
 
DavidBeier said:
I find it interesting that you say not to take things personally after you said people who prefer an HVX200 for low light "are idiots." ;)

Anyway, we know the various cameras have their own strengths and weaknesses. I don't recall anyone claiming that there is one be all end all camera. I'm simply speaking of for my own uses. As I said, anyone who is seriously questioning this shouldn't read this thread but look at the very detailed in-depth comparisons.

For me, I'd rather have the HVX200 in a low light environment. Every report I've seen says it's more sensative (because of the lower rez CCDs) and I quoted Barry in the claim that it has a higher lattitude. I've heard reports that the XLH1 looks better when you start to put the cameras into the +18 or above gain levels but I never like using gain in the first place so it's not an issue for me.

I find it interesting that you scold against making a blanket statement like "X is the best camera" but then feel perfectly comfortible about making a blanket statment about which is best for low light.
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Wtf? Because it can be proved which one produces a better image in a low-light situation.

It can't be proved which camera is better. Because each can be used in a different form/fashion to acquire what you want.

Please, quote where he called anyone an idiot for saying that the HVX was inferior to the XLH1 in low-light situations, as well.
 
Page 4 right here:

Please show me where people have said the HVX is better in low light because these people are idiots. Ask Barry direct, which camera is better in low light, he will tell you the XLH. Ask Adam Wilt, he will tell you the XLH. Have you actually read the reports about these cameras?
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Both calling such people idiots and insisting Barry would agree with him which he doesn't appear to.

Next time take the time to look the statement up yourself.
 
Keep it civil boys. Both cameras can perform well in low light. It's by far the operator and not the camera that makes the most dieffrence. However the real diffrence comes when trying to do effeccts and correction on HDV, you can do it in a higher bit rate format but that still dose'nt put back the info missing from the 4:2:0 format.
Plus you have to process the HDV adding precious time to you post workflow.

My opinion is that the Canon's will be useful for long form documentary where a lap top is not a viable optioin. But otherwise the offer a less than ideal solution.
 
Sorry I used the term "idiot" but if I set and XLH, a Z1u and an HVX side by side in a low light situation and run them to 3 different monitors I would question the eyesight of someone who thought the HVX picture was "better" than the others. I have shot extensively with all of these cameras and I am very familiar with the operation. The Sony is the best in low light, the XLH second and the HVX easily 3rd. Barry said they didnt really test a low light situation in general but I am 100% confident he would agree with my opinion in such a situation.

You know the HVX well it seems so you can probably make it look decent in low light, probably much better than you could make an XLH. My contention is that a skilled operator can make the XLH look much better in low light than the HVX. That is the issue with many of these "tests" they dont necessarily have a skilled operator for each camera. That being said, I have not seen a "test" that said the HVX was a better low light camera.



ash =o)
 
evinsky said:
Keep it civil boys. Both cameras can perform well in low light. It's by far the operator and not the camera that makes the most dieffrence. However the real diffrence comes when trying to do effeccts and correction on HDV, you can do it in a higher bit rate format but that still dose'nt put back the info missing from the 4:2:0 format.
Plus you have to process the HDV adding precious time to you post workflow.

My opinion is that the Canon's will be useful for long form documentary where a lap top is not a viable optioin. But otherwise the offer a less than ideal solution.
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I dont like HDV either but it is too often dismissed, I see it being captured into other codecs and to uncompressed and it looking terrific. Many are even capturing it to DVCproHD. The thing I dont get, is that DVCproHD is not God's gift... it can get pretty nasty with CC, especially in shadowy reds...




ash =o)
 
When the HVX arrives, Cineform Connect HD and Vegas, which will work in nicely with Digital Fusion.

I agree with evinsky, you can not put back in info that is not there, 4:2:0 vs 4:2:2. That said, to my eyes, some impressive Canon footage floating around cyber space.

Like a monkey, ready to be shot into space. Space monkey! Ready to sacrifice himself for the greater good. (Fight Club) :D
 
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