AF 100 = no 1080 60p TM700 = 1080 60p @ $800, curious..

kprince

kprince

Well-known member
As to why this is.

Just picked up a TM700, and for the price and the fact that it's categorized as a "consumer cam" it seems to be frazzling my brain machine just a bit...

I know the sensor size is fractional in comparison to the AF100 but why 1080, 60p in this $800 cam??? I bought it soley for the slo-mo-jo-ablility alone and so far there is definitely a perceivable jump in quality compared to my happy little GH13 @ 720p..

Anyhow aside from all this jargon I think the AF100 will serve a broad spectrum of visions : ) , but WHY no 1080 60p??

Please don't say it's cost cause it seems the "processor" in the $800 TM700 plays the 60p footage back to me just fine and my PC with SSD and 12gigs RAM gets a bit finiky playing back the native .MTS..

http://www.vimeo.com/17283227
 
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Because it's a broadcast camera from the broadcast division, and there is no provision for 1080/60p in broadcast cameras. The format hasn't been standardized yet. So while consumer cameras are free to go putting in whatever nonstandard new formats they can think of, you're not going to see that happen from the broadcast division.
 
ahhh, that does make sense now.. I forget how big the company is sometimes but I see slow motion being broadcasted quite frequently..... Does this mean cams like the GH2 might see 1080, 60p before a video camera in the broadcast sector?
 
PS : I guess I don't view it so much as a "standard" as I do a "functionality".. Seems like Maximum frame rate should be delivered in any and every processor capable camera : )
 
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Barry_Green said:
Because it's a broadcast camera from the broadcast division, and there is no provision for 1080/60p in broadcast cameras. The format hasn't been standardized yet. So while consumer cameras are free to go putting in whatever nonstandard new formats they can think of, you're not going to see that happen from the broadcast division.
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I thought the AF-100 was aimed at indie film-makers though? Isn't the standard broadcast sensor size 2/3"? Obviously this camera was a response for the DSLR large-sensor market... why limit it to broadcast standards when it was designed for narrative film-making?
 
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kprince said:
ahhh, that does make sense now.. I forget how big the company is sometimes but I see slow motion being broadcasted quite frequently..... Does this mean cams like the GH2 might see 1080, 60p before a video camera in the broadcast sector?
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Most likely. You're not going to see it in a broadcast-division camcorder until there's a standard in place. The VariCam 3700 doesn't have 1080/60p, the Sony F3 doesn't have it, the new HPX3100 doesn't have it, the PMW500 doesn't have it... no broadcast-division camcorder has it. It's not a standard.

So yes, it's much more likely that a GH2 would have it, because it's from the consumer division. The TM700 is from the consumer division. They can invent new formats if they want, willy nilly, like the 28mbps h.264 format that the TM700 uses to record 1080/60p. But the broadcast division complies with standards, and AVCCAM is based off of AVCHD -- and there is no provision in AVCHD to make 1080/60p.

There are lots of things consumer cams can do that the AF100 and most broadcast cameras don't, like auto-gain, auto-iso, automatic audio level control, 300x digital zoom, and on and on. But you don't find those things on the pro camcorders. One thing that did trickle up is the "face detection" autofocus system, which was a little surprising. But the HMC40 and HMC80 have it, so I guess I shouldn't have been that surprised.
 
mrmoonay said:
I thought the AF-100 was aimed at indie film-makers though?
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It is aimed at "digital cinema" and "professional video" users. It is made and sold by the broadcast division of Panasonic (used to be called Panasonic Broadcast and Television Systems, but now is called Panasonic Solutions Company). It is marketed towards the same customers who were using HVX200s and HPX170s and EX1s, and also at those with DSLRs who want to step over to a pro video unit.
 
mrmoonay said:
I thought the AF-100 was aimed at indie film-makers though? Isn't the standard broadcast sensor size 2/3"? Obviously this camera was a response for the DSLR large-sensor market... why limit it to broadcast standards when it was designed for narrative film-making?
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this is where my brain frazzlement begins...
 
kprince said:
this is where my brain frazzlement begins...
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Mine too. Also, why couldn't they just have a non-standard or "free" mode for higher frame rates? Is the processor only physically capable of one encoding format... or is it software based?
 
Barry_Green said:
Most likely. You're not going to see it in a broadcast-division camcorder until there's a standard in place. The VariCam 3700 doesn't have 1080/60p, the Sony F3 doesn't have it, the new HPX3100 doesn't have it, the PMW500 doesn't have it... no broadcast-division camcorder has it. It's not a standard.

So yes, it's much more likely that a GH2 would have it, because it's from the consumer division. The TM700 is from the consumer division. They can invent new formats if they want, willy nilly, like the 28mbps h.264 format that the TM700 uses to record 1080/60p. But the broadcast division complies with standards, and AVCCAM is based off of AVCHD -- and there is no provision in AVCHD to make 1080/60p.

There are lots of things consumer cams can do that the AF100 and most broadcast cameras don't, like auto-gain, auto-iso, automatic audio level control, 300x digital zoom, and on and on. But you don't find those things on the pro camcorders. One thing that did trickle up is the "face detection" autofocus system, which was a little surprising. But the HMC40 and HMC80 have it, so I guess I shouldn't have been that surprised.
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Wow!.. this is NEWS TO ME : ) I think the subscribers to this site would greatly benefit from these truths. I would never in a million years think an $800 camera would have a much desired functionality that cameras 5-50x the price wouldn't offer.
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this is why I said "please don't say it's cost".. the "processor" in the TM700 is definitely far inferior to the AF100's.. are standards that set in stone?.. They created the AF100 as a result of the markets response to the Canon 5D2, 7D, GH1, GF1 and so on.... It seems that at this point they would have surely stumbled on the importance of 60p at 1080 to the indy film worlds...
 
mrmoonay said:
Mine too. Also, why couldn't they just have a non-standard or "free" mode for higher frame rates?
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Because, besides for other reasons, making nonstandard formats means that you have to go out and get all the NLE companies to endorse and support your format, or else you're screwed. The first time a professional-level customer (network, station group, whatever) uses the "free" mode and finds out that it's not compatible, and that their whole shoot is now unusable with their chosen editing and post support system, guess what? They are screwed, and their next contract isn't going to go with the supplier who gave them the nonstandard equipment.


Is the processor only physically capable of one encoding format... or is it software based?
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That's a question for the engineers. Although it's certainly likely that the encoding chips are only capable of so much. You don't go buying a 600GHz Intel CPU, for example. There are practical limits to what can be built. Even if you spent a hundred times what they ask for an i7-920 quad-core chip, you're still not going to get it. So the AF100 pushed the quality level up a notch over what the TM700 offers; the TM700 does 1080/60p at 28mbps with who knows what kind of encoding chip, what kind of buffers and RAM and whatnot... the AF100 does 1080/60p at over 32 megabits, I think it's actually 35 megabits, with the top-of-the-line encoder chip and all the IBP structure and everything else that they can throw at it. So is it possible to go higher than 35? I don't know.

Look, here's the difference between the TM700 and the AF100: the TM700 does 1080/60p "at 60p" at 28mbps. The AF100 does 1080/60p "at 24p" at 35mbps. They're both encoding 60 frames per second, the AF100 is just doing it at a lot higher quality. When you go to play it back, the TM700 does it in "live" mode, the AF100 does it in "slow mo" mode. But you can change the playback rate in the recorded file by "conforming" it in Apple's Cinema Tools application, and turn it into 1080/60p "at 60p". Just with higher quality video. And you'd have to record audio separately.

When there's a true 1080/60p standard, their next camera will be able to take advantage of that. For those who don't mind the trouble of recording audio separately, they can use the AF100 right now for "true 1080/60p". But since it's not a standard, they don't market it or supply it as doing nonstandard things.
 
kprince said:
are standards that set in stone?..
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They're set by SMPTE and the EBU and the ATSC, among others. You get the Society of Motion Picture and Television Engineers and the European Broadcast Union and the Advanced Television Standards Committee to jointly develop a standard and codify and certify it, and the manufacturers will then start producing the goods and the TV stations will then start installing the gear they need to support it.

The ATSC has certified broadcast television standards for digital TV and HD. There is no provision for 1080/60p. So you'd have to get them on board with everyone else. There is no television on the market, or in anyone's home, anywhere, that can display a 1080/60p signal. It doesn't exist.

They created the AF100 as a result of the markets response to the Canon 5D2, 7D, GH1, GF1 and so on.... It seems that at this point they would have surely stumbled on the importance of 60p at 1080 to the indy film worlds...
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You are, of course, free to believe whatever you'd like (although, note that the 5D Mark II, 7D, GH1, GF1 and so on, none of them have 1080/60p either...) But look -- go take a TM700, record some 1080/60P on it, and try to play it back on your TV through HDMI. What do you get? Nothin'. Because 1080/60p isn't a codified video signal. Now take the memory card out of your TM700 and put it in your blu-ray player, or in the SD slot in your TV, and play it back. Oh, wait, you can't -- because your TV and blu-ray player don't support it. Because as far as they're concerned, 1080/60p doesn't exist. So, okay, burn it to a blu-ray disc and ... wait, what's that? You can't burn a 1080/60p blu-ray? Why not? Oh, it's because 1080/60p is a nonstandard format that doesn't exist, there's no video standard for it. And the major professional video manufacturers are not going to go making nonstandard products that make can't-be-used footage. It'd be suicide for them.

I'm not telling you you have to like it, or that you even have to agree. I'm just telling you how it is, and what would have to change before you started seeing 1080/60p anywhere near a professional camcorder.
 
Barry_Green said:
Because, besides for other reasons, making nonstandard formats means that you have to go out and get all the NLE companies to endorse and support your format, or else you're screwed. The first time a professional-level customer (network, station group, whatever) uses the "free" mode and finds out that it's not compatible, and that their whole shoot is now unusable with their chosen editing and post support system, guess what? They are screwed, and their next contract isn't going to go with the supplier who gave them the nonstandard equipment.



That's a question for the engineers. Although it's certainly likely that the encoding chips are only capable of so much. You don't go buying a 600GHz Intel CPU, for example. There are practical limits to what can be built. Even if you spent a hundred times what they ask for an i7-920 quad-core chip, you're still not going to get it. So the AF100 pushed the quality level up a notch over what the TM700 offers; the TM700 does 1080/60p at 28mbps with who knows what kind of encoding chip, what kind of buffers and RAM and whatnot... the AF100 does 1080/60p at over 32 megabits, I think it's actually 35 megabits, with the top-of-the-line encoder chip and all the IBP structure and everything else that they can throw at it. So is it possible to go higher than 35? I don't know.

Look, here's the difference between the TM700 and the AF100: the TM700 does 1080/60p "at 60p" at 28mbps. The AF100 does 1080/60p "at 24p" at 35mbps. They're both encoding 60 frames per second, the AF100 is just doing it at a lot higher quality. When you go to play it back, the TM700 does it in "live" mode, the AF100 does it in "slow mo" mode. But you can change the playback rate in the recorded file by "conforming" it in Apple's Cinema Tools application, and turn it into 1080/60p "at 60p". Just with higher quality video. And you'd have to record audio separately.

When there's a true 1080/60p standard, their next camera will be able to take advantage of that. For those who don't mind the trouble of recording audio separately, they can use the AF100 right now for "true 1080/60p". But since it's not a standard, they don't market it or supply it as doing nonstandard things.
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Holy crap, I'm confused.

Ok, so the end result I'm looking for is what you get when you slow 60p down by a factor of 40% in a 24p timeline.

Whether it's 60p at 720 or 1080, I'm looking for that organic, clean, slowed down result.

So does the AF 100 write 60 singular images to the card every second at 1920X1080? No worries with playback, I just want to know what it's doing from second to second...
 
Barry_Green said:
You are, of course, free to believe whatever you'd like (although, note that the 5D Mark II, 7D, GH1, GF1 and so on, none of them have 1080/60p either...) But look -- go take a TM700, record some 1080/60P on it, and try to play it back on your TV through HDMI. What do you get? Nothin'. Because 1080/60p isn't a codified video signal. Now take the memory card out of your TM700 and put it in your blu-ray player, or in the SD slot in your TV, and play it back. Oh, wait, you can't -- because your TV and blu-ray player don't support it. Because as far as they're concerned, 1080/60p doesn't exist. So, okay, burn it to a blu-ray disc and ... wait, what's that? You can't burn a 1080/60p blu-ray? Why not? Oh, it's because 1080/60p is a nonstandard format that doesn't exist, there's no video standard for it. And the major professional video manufacturers are not going to go making nonstandard products that make can't-be-used footage. It'd be suicide for them.

I'm not telling you you have to like it, or that you even have to agree. I'm just telling you how it is, and what would have to change before you started seeing 1080/60p anywhere near a professional camcorder.
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Ok, now I'm quadruple confused.. I don't know of a soul in the indy film world that would ever shoot anything above 30P for the purpose of displaying it at it's native standard.. I guess I need to check myself.. Whenever I say 60p, I'm really saying "the lowest acceptable standard of smooth slow motion"....

Correct me if I'm wrong and in no way am I trying to insight an argument but, is it safe to say that if 60p for the purpose of slow motion is nowhere near happening in the broadcast market ( AF 100 = Broadcast Market ), that higher frame rates are worlds away from coming into fruition?
 
This also begs to ask.. Why would the consumer division even put 60p in the $800 Consumer camera the TM700 is?............ Not only is it 1920X1080 60p able, from the internets POV, it's the strongest and most advertised selling point.

These are just things that make me go "hmmmm"..
 
Dude I guess you're talking about something called overcranking, and yes, the Af100 can overcrank. At 1080p, I believe in 23.976, or maybe 30p record mode, up to 60 frames per second. Played back in the camera or on a timeline it comes out as ultra smooth slowmo. Is that what you were asking about?
 
bhdfield said:
Dude I guess you're talking about something called overcranking, and yes, the Af100 can overcrank. At 1080p, I believe in 23.976, or maybe 30p record mode, up to 60 frames per second. Played back in the camera or on a timeline it comes out as ultra smooth slowmo. Is that what you were asking about?
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yep. ok sweeet. gosh that took a while for me to get : )
 
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