4:2:2 from DVX???!

Chris Santucci

Chris Santucci

Veteran
A friend of mine tells me he just attended an HD course in Tucson where they said something to the effect that you can get 4:2:2 color sampling from the DVX if you record to a hard drive rather than the internal deck.

There may be software or some additional stuff somewhere in there, but I don't believe this could be possible.

Has anyone heard of this?
 
Chris Santucci said:
A friend of mine tells me he just attended an HD course in Tucson where they said something to the effect that you can get 4:2:2 color sampling from the DVX if you record to a hard drive rather than the internal deck.

There may be software or some additional stuff somewhere in there, but I don't believe this could be possible.

Has anyone heard of this?
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I think this may have something also to do with the way the DV compression works when it is recorded to tape. I believe you can achieve higher quality video if you capture the video via composite cables at the time of the shoot. Because with this you are getting the raw video, not compressed on to a Mini DV tape. (this means Firewire will NOT work for this purpose)
 
hmmm interesting, so you're saying we basically need a device that could capture through composite cables.....anything like that exist?
 
I wish the Andromeda was only around 1500 or so. $3K is just too high. You could get an HVX for the cost of a DVX+Andromeda. Plus even if you did upgrade to Andromeda you couldn't do variable frame rates, right? Or do they have software trick for that?
 
davidpula said:
andromeda uses usb2....why can't firewire be used? usb2 is slower, no?
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"Firewire" (IEEE 1394) is a 400 Mb/s interface. USB 2.0 is a 480 Mb/s interface. The Andromeda modification intercepts the data at the output of the DVX's quantizers (A -> D converters) and formats it to their own proprietary protocol for transmission (via USB 2.0) to their own application running on an attached MAC computer. Both of the analog video outputs of the DVX or HVX for that matter (Y-C video or composite video) are analog streams derived from the 1394 interface and are lower in quality than the 1394 interface as they have gone through additional mode conversion (D -> A). Attempting to capture (quantize) any of these analog streams in hopes of achieving a higher quality signal is an ill conceived concept.
 
Noct said:
I wish the Andromeda was only around 1500 or so. $3K is just too high. You could get an HVX for the cost of a DVX+Andromeda. Plus even if you did upgrade to Andromeda you couldn't do variable frame rates, right? Or do they have software trick for that?
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I agree. The price is aggressive. It's not a new camera, it's a hacked DVX.

No variable frame rates (ie. 60p) with an Andromeda DVX. For the money, it makes more sense to sell your DVX and buy an HVX.

I guess we'll see what the market will bear, but a lower price (ala the Redrock M2) would've put this in more of a mass sales category. They would have a long waiting list.

The Andromeda is really interesting. Maybe the price will come down a bit as they roll out the product.
 
So if you already own a mac...you can pick up a used DVX, add the andromeda, and you're looking at some serioius firepower for $4500. And if you want super slow motion you can use really old people as your talent. Now if you'll excuse me I'm going to start selling my blood.
 
at $4500, a camera capable of recording 4:4:4 HD 24p is a steal, as far as I know until recently the next camera up that could do that was the $100,000 cinealta (watch ppl prove me wrong)

It's true you're not getting variable frame rates, and its not a native 16x9 chip, but these are a far trade off for a set up which costs less than the HVX (let's say if you wanna add a mac mini for recording they cost about the same)

and also remember that most of us put in the investment for a DVX years ago, so for those interested in upgrading we're looking at $2500, rather than $6-7 for HVX

I'm seriously considering this route
 
Barry_Green said:
Got a note today saying the Andromeda is now $2500, so that's a noticeable price decrease already.
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That's sweet, Barry. But it looks like I'm making my commitment to RED. :)
 
I understand what you're saying...and from my viewpoint during a shoot i was watching the monitor...the field monitor...and thought it looked really good. then played back the tape and it wasn't the same. so if what's going out s-video is the same as what's playing back because they go the same route...then why the difference. we were doing a green screen shoot and the live shot looked great, but when i played back the tape there was some bleed around the edges, not just spill, but the green was well you know. so right then and there i thought geez what if you could capture/record the live feed without it being sent to the tape.

i understand the whole end of the line thing, but if it's really routed like that why would the live signal look better than the recorded signal?

oh and just so you know i did capture from the s-video, uncompressed, and the coloring was different, but it's 4:2:2 so it's not that different. i recorded DV at the same time and compared frames. they pretty much looked the same except on blow-up/zoom the DV was a slight more blocky than the uncompressed...however the DV due to it's compression algorithm and anti-aliasing edges were i guess more refined. the uncompressed was just that, no algorithms, no anti-aliasing (per se), but overall color space was a bit better...but seriously there's really not much of a step between 4:1:1 and 4:2:2. now if it was 4:4:4 then i'd be writing a totally different piece...ah the thing i need to try is capture s-video using the decklink and really get 4:4:4 10-bit uncompressed.

by the way there's a card "video advantage PCI" by turtle beach and it says that it captures 10-bit uncompressed...which it might, but then it encodes it as DV. that's kind of a wasted statement on the product box. :)

anyway i captured s-video uncompressed into YUY2, but i need a way faster computer. i dropped a hefty amount of frames 100+ out of 17 seconds and i need a faster codec ( i know what some of you are thinking - if it's uncompressed why do you need a codec) don't ask me ask microsoft. for those of you with PCs look at the registry you'll see that YUY2 is being read/written by MSYUV.DLL. i changed it to IR41_32.AX and got better results. i'm thinking of trying huffYUV any thoughts on that?

oh and if you want more info on my whole experiment i'll be posting a new thread on that in a day or so. still trying a couple of things.
 
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