Small market TV station is HVX for us.

M

MtSurf

Member
We are a small TV Station in Steamboat Springs, CO and we are trying to get an assessment of whether this is the way to go for us. I have and use all Panny products and I truly enjoy them. Is anyone using this product in a similar way? If so how is it working for you? Thank you for the help.

Nate
Steamboat TV18 an RSN affiliate
 
Two out of the four network affiliates here in Savannah, GA use P2. Sure there were some hurdles to cross to bring the workflow in to line for each station's needs... but in the long run they are getting great images from these cameras. I believe both stations are editing with Edius NLEs. I hope that helps. It probably would be a good idea to contact the chief photographers at both stations for their thoughts. The stations are WTOC and WSAV.

As an aside... as a documentary filmmaker I find the HVX to be a wonderful tool. I made the switch from a $40 thousand dollar camera/lens combination to the HVX and am very pleased I made the jump.

Jim
 
Although I have not yet actually seen any of the gear, I am told by one my producer contacts the Dallas NBC affiliate is going with P2 workflow and Edius.

Ned Soltz
 
I have worked as an executive producer for a few small stations, and will tell you that the P2 technology and the HVX is going to seprate you from other small stations, as far as quality of picture goes.
 
Two things would be of concern in a news gathering operation, if that's what it's for. One is low light capability. The other is the lack of long lenses for certain types of coverage.

Advantages: compared to tapes, the 100th pass is as good as the first with the P2 card. There's a record-ahead so you're more likely to get that one-time event without having to keep cameras rolling constantly. Figure out what the station spends on tape and work that into your budget. But you'll have to take into account the cost of archiving material onto something other than tape.

You will need to find a way to archive your material onto a RAID system or some other medium. Depending on whether you're shooting HD or SD the price can vary widely. For news I'd recommend some sort of hard drive-based system tied into a digital asset management database for quick access.

Panasonic just came out with a mobile edit station that reads directly off the P2 cards. Handy for deadline work.

And since the workflow is clip-based, one option is to set your timecode to the camera's internal clock. No need to worry about non-continuous timecode as you would when working with tape. The timecode on the clip will be the time of day, which might be useful if multiple cameras are covering a particular event.
 
My wife works for the local ABC affiliate and recently bought 15 HVX's and 40 8 gig P2 cards for their ENG crews.

John
 
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i'm a news photographer and i'm also working on my own doc with my own hvx on my free time. i've have been comparing the experience of shooting in low light with an eng cam at work and with my hvx specifically in night time on the street, on the fly situations.

i think that you should really be aware about low light performance, you probably are already, for such things as breaking news in dark places, etc. not talking about grain but just getting dark images. i've gotten some pretty much unusable stuff with my hvx (what would look like a very small step up from your station being in black) in situations that i know my 10 year old panasonic d700 would kick some ass.

my station is talking about p2 cameras as well but i don't know how confident i would be with my hvx in the many many dark crime scenes, dark buildings, dark rooms, etc. i'm sure you are aware that news shooting in less than ideal lighting conditions is an everyday occurence and it is impossible to light everything (pretty much anything besides interviews) 'cause you just don't have time. i guess you could use your top light but i really dislike how that looks or have your gain all the way up a lot.

sorry i wrote so much but i am very interested in the topic and would like to hear from someone who actually shoots news with the hvx everyday. keep us posted on how it goes.
 
While I dont think the P2 technology has anything to do with quality of footage, I do think it is more about workflow. The HVX itself will definitely have a lot to do with quality of footage comparing it to other cameras in this price range. I believe eventually tape will be phased out of most TV ENG workflows as it is time comsuming to digitize and as you know when news is happening, those who can get it on air the quickest win.
Check the following link to see what the weather channel are using.
http://content.infocommiq.com/affil...TS&contID=73C5A034-EBC0-42B8-AB4CB5C366E98335
 
Thanks again for all the info...fortunately for us we are not cover a lot of news...Steamboat does not have a whole lot of crime...but we are Ski Town USA so we have a ton of high end athletic events. We are more of a channel to inform our guests to the community of what is going on in our town. Again the fact that other small stations and the weather channel are using the HVX is encouraging.
Thanks,
Nate
 
Well that should sell it for you then. if there isn't much run n gun for you in dark areas the HVX seems perfect. It also seems more suited to the type of broadcasting u are doing. The variable frame rates are perfect for sports and athletics.
 
MtSurf said:
Thanks again for all the info...fortunately for us we are not cover a lot of news...Steamboat does not have a whole lot of crime...but we are Ski Town USA so we have a ton of high end athletic events. We are more of a channel to inform our guests to the community of what is going on in our town. Again the fact that other small stations and the weather channel are using the HVX is encouraging.
Thanks,
Nate
Click to expand...

Well news doesn't have to be all about crime you know. Informing tourist of what's going on about town could still be considered newsworthy as would athletic events:beer:
 
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