HVX200 vs HVX200a -- a side-by-side low-light comparison

All I have to say is... whoa.

Talk about night and day. 200A is ultra clean. The second I turned the sucker on my eyes melted.

This is what the HVX200 SHOULD have been all this time.
 
Kholi, I thought you were going for the EX. What changed your mind? I too want to see the real world application of this. 1/2 a stop is pretty darn good and less noise.. SWEETNESS>.
 
EXACTLY Kholi, this is what the 200 shoul'da been, on point.
That theatre room wall looks like vanilla ice cream-cake to me...
:birthdays:

I'd rather get the 200a now but I can't spend the money back to back in six months... but I also don't have any need for it right f'ing now! right mother f'ing NOW!! I WAAANT!!! lol
 
Justyn said:
Kholi, I thought you were going for the EX. What changed your mind? I too want to see the real world application of this. 1/2 a stop is pretty darn good and less noise.. SWEETNESS>.
Click to expand...

The EX had WAY too many mechanical issues to trust. The backfocus, abberations, etc. .. no thanks man. To add to that, dealing with the XDCam EX codec wasn't something I was prepared to do, and neither were a lot of people who still call on me to use my camera.

I know that I can work the 200A into the ground, just like I did my 200. The EX-1? Not so sure. It's a great camera, it isn't an HVX200 and that says a LOT.

I'm playing with the 200A now... I'll have some stills up comparing the 200 and 200A sort-of-following in Lincoln's footsteps. I'm not about to commit to my first thoughts on the camera... but it's worth the upgrade. The 170 is just going to ice the cake.

Barry had a theory about the 200A and it went something like: The 200A @ 6dB will be/could be as "noisey" as the 200 @ 0dB. So, if that's true, then the upgrade from a 200 to 200A is theoretical 1 stop to 1 1/2 Stops faster if you can tolerate the noise of the regular HVX200...

Hold me to this: I wouldn't have a single issue using 9dB and 12dB for the most extreme applications. Add to that a free 16gb card, an improved D4 Component Connector (Don't ask me how, but I tried to drop signal and it wouldn't do it), a slightly wider lens and Spec-Comm's free 6000mAh battery... definitely worth the upgrade.

I'd like to mention that you all ought to just take a look at the 200A image inside of the "not good enough" LCD. No joke, when I powered it up in the grocery store for the first time I had a "wtf" moment.

No EVF detail on and it looked fantastic. Even better when it hit the 42" LCD. Yum.
 
Wait Kholi, I you are confusing me here, you said: "the 170 is just going to ice the cake", and correct me if I am wrong, but icing THE cake is not a good thing to do, icing ON the cake would be great though... or even if "the cake were cold as ice because it actually is an ice cream cake", now that would be a positive thing to say about the 170...
:banned:
...now this is probably just a mistake and an unnecessary thing to clarify, but since I really haven't read all about the 170 instead just the highlights I have to seriously ask you if you mean that the 170 will be better or not?
Cause I thought it was going to be just as good and be sprinkled with fancy toys all over it, and I want to make sure it is now before I wait 6 months.
 
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thanx for the comparison.
i switched from the xh-a1 to the hvx200 weeks ago. i was a bit disappointed sometimes with the noise and strange colored shadows. but the day i decided to avoid cinelike matrix, listening to some dvxusers advices, everything was perfect. no more noise. nice enough to wait for the small 170.
maybe if i was doing some documentary or wedding works i would consider hvx200a.
 
D*mn you all...

You just made my life a lot more difficult! :)

It was either the HPX500 or the EX1 for me...And now this.

You see, I'm 100% commited to Scarlet- but I do need an upgrade this year to my HVX.

Kholi, personal question: sell HVX and get the 200a. Good deal?

Signal to noise/sharpness. Comparisons? (no need for res charts, just the "eyeometer"- any perceivable difference?)

The HVX maintains good market value, so i can sell it for a reasonable amounth to help "soften" this upgrade...
 
I´m sold on the 170. In late autumn we are planning to shoot a feature with several HVX200 and M2 adapters in the Caribbeans. The 170 will fit nicely for some night scenes. (if it is 1 1/2 stops faster than the 200 at the same noise level, that would completely compensate the lightloss of the adapter!!!)

Just hope it will be PAL/NTSC switchable, cause we will shoot at 24p, but later on, back in Europe, I would need 25p... But I´m an optimist concerning that. Also one of the nicest facts about the 170 is, that you already know what the camera will deliver! No much guessing about image quality and features. (well, besides its ability to switch 24p/25p)
 
USLatin said:
Wait Kholi, I you are confusing me here, you said: "the 170 is just going to ice the cake", and correct me if I am wrong, but icing THE cake is not a good thing to do, icing ON the cake would be great though... or even if "the cake were cold as ice because it actually is an ice cream cake", now that would be a positive thing to say about the 170...
:banned:
...now this is probably just a mistake and an unnecessary thing to clarify, but since I really haven't read all about the 170 instead just the highlights I have to seriously ask you if you mean that the 170 will be better or not?
Cause I thought it was going to be just as good and be sprinkled with fancy toys all over it, and I want to make sure it is now before I wait 6 months.
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The image won't be any better. The 200A and 170 have the same exact image supposedly. However, the 170 does have the extras that I want. So it'll be "better" for me not but exactly an upgrade at this point. Those little extras are what I mean by icing the cake.
 
SPZ said:
D*mn you all...

You just made my life a lot more difficult! :)

It was either the HPX500 or the EX1 for me...And now this.

You see, I'm 100% commited to Scarlet- but I do need an upgrade this year to my HVX.

Kholi, personal question: sell HVX and get the 200a. Good deal?

Signal to noise/sharpness. Comparisons? (no need for res charts, just the "eyeometer"- any perceivable difference?)

The HVX maintains good market value, so i can sell it for a reasonable amounth to help "soften" this upgrade...
Click to expand...

Panasonic gave you your Latitude back. You have to really think about what's been done here: Less noise = useable latitude. CineD can be used now and looks fantastic. Add to that how fast it is, I say for anyone that's working NOW the extra ground gained by the 200A over the 200 is worth it.

There's absolutely a perceivable difference between the 200 and 200A's noise floor and you're gonna see it the second you turn on the camera. I used to use EVF detail all the time, it's now disabled on my 200A.

I know the 170 is coming out in six months and believe me, I'll have one... but right now I needed to have something that I could actually use with my adapter. For those of us who use adapters ritually this thing is perfect. You don't have to go EX-1 (unless you're just dying to have the extra resolution) and at that, you don't have to spend the extra 1600 - 2000 just to migrate to another camera and format.

So, yeah, it's worth it to me at least.
 
joe 1008 said:
I´m sold on the 170. In late autumn we are planning to shoot a feature with several HVX200 and M2 adapters in the Caribbeans. The 170 will fit nicely for some night scenes. (if it is 1 1/2 stops faster than the 200 at the same noise level, that would completely compensate the lightloss of the adapter!!!)
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I'm not even kiidding about this. I mean, i'm crazy so someone else should also try the noise comparison but I'm pretty dang sure that the 200A @ 9/12dB is as noisey as the 200 @ 0dB.

And, even if it's @ 6dB that STILL gives you much more light to work with. I'm pretty confident that it's 9/12dB though, man. You seriously have no idea how clean it is until you see it for yourself.
 
USLatin said:
joe, that sounds like a dream... friends in the Caribbean playing with 170's... I'm in!
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Very hot and dusty. We will shoot in a big town, in Santo Domingo, where it´s even worse. We will get really fried there. At night it´s MUCH better. So the 170 will safe us!:smile:

And yes, Kholi, if it´s 9-12 db that would be almost too much to stay sane.
 
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it does? I haven't realized that, but I do remember seeing it will be a 72mm instead of the 82mm


Kholi, I too use the detail on the camera for focus, why is it you might not use it now?
 
Kholi said:
You seriously have no idea how clean it is until you see it for yourself.
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Yep, he's not exaggerating. I have always been amazed at the quality of footage the HVX can provide. But the 200a provides so much of it...out of the box. I've never even started tweaking it using the manual settings, and already, having done nothing but turn it on, it is about as good as I could get from my standard HVX even after tweaking...

As I mentioned, the test I did was with only two standard 100watt light bulbs. That's it. That's what I have in my bedroom. Even weddings are lit better than that. I really can't see the 200a providing unusably grainy footage in any environment other than almost total darkness...

Someone asked if I black-balanced the cameras before the test. No, I didn't. I didn't even manually white balance -- I let the cameras do that automatically. That was the point of the test: to compare both cameras in their "point & shoot" capacity. And the 200a basically reached the ease of use level of a consumer camera -- I didn't have to do anything, and the picture still looked good. I never had that experience with my original HVX.
 
TwistedLincoln said:
Yep, he's not exaggerating. I have always been amazed at the quality of footage the HVX can provide. But the 200a provides so much of it...out of the box. I've never even started tweaking it using the manual settings, and already, having done nothing but turn it on, it is about as good as I could get from my standard HVX even after tweaking...

As I mentioned, the test I did was with only two standard 100watt light bulbs. That's it. That's what I have in my bedroom. Even weddings are lit better than that. I really can't see the 200a providing unusably grainy footage in any environment other than almost total darkness...

Someone asked if I black-balanced the cameras before the test. No, I didn't. I didn't even manually white balance -- I let the cameras do that automatically. That was the point of the test: to compare both cameras in their "point & shoot" capacity. And the 200a basically reached the ease of use level of a consumer camera -- I didn't have to do anything, and the picture still looked good. I never had that experience with my original HVX.
Click to expand...


You guys are killing me! Wow... I want to see more please! And do some sene files on that baby too! please :D
 
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