720 vs 1080

D

directedition

Member
Please let me know if I'm right, wrong, or some mutant hybrid of the two.

The total number of usable pixels that come off the CDD is barely enough to fill 720. And 1080 is essentially upscaling for all intents and purposes.
 
This topic has be thoroughly killed over and over. Do a search to get the specifics but here's the basic answer.

no...(just kidding)


The hvx captures everything in 1080 and downscales to 720. Its chipset is made for 1080, not 720. The reason the number of pixels does not correlate with 1080 is because the camera uses "pixel shift" technology to get the higher res.

JP
 
Exactly. The HVX has a 1080p capable chip block. Whole is greater then the sum of its parts type of thing. It does all internal processing at 1080 and then dumps down to what every you want.
 
As a side note, pixel shift doesn't help chroma, so the sensors only have a chroma resolution of 500+ px. But that's more than enough for 4:2:2 subsampling.

And to play the devil's advocate... whether it's the chipset or the glass, 1080p on the HVX200 isn't as sharp as the HPX500. At 720p they're very close.
 
1080 is sharper than 720 on the HVX. It's pretty evident to my naked eye. It's also a cleaner image with generally less noise than 720 mode in my experience.

I used to shoot only 720pn for the extra record time, but once I started shooting 1080... I'll never go back, except in those cases that specifically call for it (I absolutely need the extra record time, or for over/undercrank in camera, etc.)

The difference is apparent to me.

later,
Jason
 
The compression, even though it is the same DVCPro HD codec, is more efficient in 1080 than in 720. Because of the fact that there is more space to fill, in squeezing the data into a larger screen size, the video is compressed with less artifacts.

That is why it is smart to record in 1080p if you can afford to.
 
in my experience, (just mine) 1080p is definetlty cleaner and sharper. I080p in other no cinegamma modes is even sharper, less noisier and cleaner in low light. there is somthing I cant quiet understand, images on lcd's look super grainy compared to crt's and video monitors.
 
You might be viewing images on a 6-bit LCD instead of 8-bit. Or you might not be viewing at the LCDs native resolution. Both could make your footage look not right.
 
Inexpensive and 8-bit LCD are pretty much mutually exclusive. 6-bit monitors only took off a few years ago, it used to be all 8-bit. So most manufacturers don't advertise the color depth of the monitor, or if they do, it's in cryptic formats (since basically they're selling a downgrade). But the 6-bit monitors are what made it possible for everybody and their mom to have an LCD monitor instead of a CRT.

The next LCD I buy will be the 2405WFP, assuming I can still buy one when I get that coin, but it's far from cheap.
 
Jason Ramsey said:
1080 is sharper than 720 on the HVX. It's pretty evident to my naked eye. It's also a cleaner image with generally less noise than 720 mode in my experience.

I used to shoot only 720pn for the extra record time, but once I started shooting 1080... I'll never go back, except in those cases that specifically call for it (I absolutely need the extra record time, or for over/undercrank in camera, etc.)

The difference is apparent to me.

later,
Jason
Click to expand...

What flavor of the hvx200s 1080i do you use?
 
Well, your choices are 24pA, 24p, or 30p.

30p = more videoish and can't be transferred to PAL or to film, so <bzzzt>.

24p = filmlike look, embedded in 3:2 pulldown. If you're editing on a 60i timeline, this is the right choice. But if you don't have to edit on a 60i timeline, why bother with this mode?

24pA = pure 24p progressive frames when edited on a 24p timeline in any major NLE (except Avid). 24pA was designed specifically to ease the editing process. If you want a filmlike look, and are editing on anything but Avid, 24pA has significant advantages.
 
Barry_Green said:
If you want a filmlike look, and are editing on anything but Avid, 24pA has significant advantages.
Click to expand...

Hmmmmm, we have Avid and now I know why we did not get the look we wanted in our 24p movie :o(

Buuuuuuut, we also have Edius. Edius OK? (next project then)
 
Yes, EDIUS and Premiere Pro CS3 and Vegas/Raylight and FCP can all strip out 1080/24pA pulldown, on the fly.

PPCS3 can actually do it from 1080/24p footage too, which was very handy when we accidentally shot some stuff in 1080/24p mode... I thought we might be hosed, but David found out that Premiere Pro does just fine with removing the pulldown. Nice surprise, and kudos to Adobe for that!

I believe Michael Phillips said that 1080/24pA pulldown removal was slated for the next big release of Avid software? Might want to search through his more recent posts for that.
 
Barry_Green said:
I believe Michael Phillips said that 1080/24pA pulldown removal was slated for the next big release of Avid software? Might want to search through his more recent posts for that.
Click to expand...

Funny you should mention PPCS3, we just downloaded a trial of it and have been slowly discussing and transiting away from Avid as they seem to be falling behind in the software updates arena, let alone the "fickleness" of the product to hardware and/or other software apps. This was a real selling point of Edius to us. We actually trialed it on an old Athlon IDE machine with 1gb ram with old sloooooow drives and a 128mb ATI video card while drag-dropping full 1080i from an external drive onto the timeline figuring the thing would lock up and burn the old eMachine to the ground but instead it just sort of sat there growling and then an image appeared and as the thing rendered it began to play, sure not mountainous hot but by golly it played with a little burp. Then to top it all off, we decided (again what the heck if the machine burns up we don't care) let's output-print the stuff and IT DID! Took all night mind you for 60 minutes of HVX1080i material in 24p but it did it. That was a major seller for us.

But we need two NLE's and as I say we're contemplating an upgrade at Avid or just a switch to PP and at present favoring the latter.
 
Barry, with a preference of 1080, do you use a 1080 or a 720 monitor? Is the extra sharpness only apparent on the 1080 level of monitor or does material shot at 1080 look sharper on a 720 display as well? Or...is the difference noticed after a transfer to film? I have a 720 Olevia 37 inch....probably a common choice out there now. Will I see a difference 1080 vs 720? Of course as the whole display industry moves toward bigger, cheaper and higher rez..ei: 1080p, I don't want to shoot stuff now that will be ca ca in two or three years
 
I have to say, I think PP has moved forward in leaps and bounds. When working with 1080, I ran into so many roadblocks with Vegas/Raylight that I won't even bother with it anymore. It's PP CS3 for that.

There are still a few things which annoy me about it (why do the video and audio tracks have to be separated by an iron curtain? Why does an audio track have to be ONLY stereo or mono?), but my affection for it is growing, especially as I tweak it to behave more like I prefer.
 
Al MacLeod said:
Is the extra sharpness only apparent on the 1080 level of monitor or does material shot at 1080 look sharper on a 720 display as well?
Click to expand...
Well... the HVX makes its 720 from 1080, so the 720 is downrezzed 1080 already, so there shouldn't be much difference. However, the HVX's 720 is prefiltered from a 960x720 recording, which is another reason why I prefer 1080 mode, so... I guess you'd see a little difference from HVX 1080 on a 720 monitor.
 
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