AF100 Capable of SD recording using a DV codec in an AVI wrapper???

Paul Vicente

Well-known member
Seeing as the camera is 95% now, it may be too late. Would Panasonic consider adding SD recording ability? Sometimes one does not require the resolution and data rates of HD. I wish the HMC150 offered SD.

Barry?

Jan?
 
I am genuinely curious about something here in regards to your question.

I still deliver in SD quite often. But I would feel remiss in not having an HD master of everything I do at this point. What circumstances do you shoot under that you feel that you'd not even want the *possibility* of offering an HD version should one be requested down the road?
 
I have a 1980-ish super VHS camera you can have with plenty of SD features. That is what you are looking for?
SD is dead, move on.:violin:
 
If a nanoFlash is part of your future, it can take an HD signal and record to SD at 50 Mbit so it is acceptable to broadcast outlets that want SD material that is ready for simple ingest. Your stuff recorded to your SD cards in the AF100 can still be in whatever flavor of HD you wish.
 
I have a 1980-ish super VHS camera you can have with plenty of SD features. That is what you are looking for?
SD is dead, move on.:violin:
Well, for a dead format, I've done pretty decent making money with SD this year. I've had
a grand total of ONE HD shoot, and that was for the US Census Bureau.....every other client
I've had this year has opted for SD......but I'm not shooting with a super VHS camera so
maybe that's why......my SD is better than your SD. :happy:
 
That is just it... transcoding takes time, and on an SD job I do not want to spend the time for this step.

it should not take THAT long to transcode to SD with a decent system. or edit in HD and output to SD. i prefer to shoot everything in HD and deliver a copy in HD, even if the client wanted SD. most of them feel they are getting more value for their money that way, and giving them a blu ray disc isnt that big of an expense.
 
I can understand if the SD deliverable is 4:3, but holy cow, if it's 16:9, my workflow once in edit is exactly the same. Any one day SD job is also a 1 day HD job. In fact, with my compression application, I am generally doing 3 encodes at the same time... BluRay, DVD, and Web.

I also have found that my HD > SD workflow produces vastly superior results, but I don't have a $10k SD camera so maybe that's why. But the HD > SD I do from the EX1 blows my DVX SD away. Not even in the same league. In fact, my DSLR HD > SD looks better too.
 
Would Panasonic consider adding SD recording ability? Sometimes one does not require the resolution and data rates of HD. I wish the HMC150 offered SD.
Not gonna happen on the AF100, at this stage, but your request isn't that rare. The HMC150 doesn't record SD, and it caused a lot of consternation in territories where SD is still king -- like southeast Asia. It's one reason why on the HMC80, you'll see that they brought back DV. The HMC80 records AVCHD for HD, but it also has a DV mode.

Sometimes folks want SD. Sometimes they want to shoot SD, sometimes their client requests it. I don't see what it hurts, for the company to offer it.

Okay, let's put it this way -- among the six of us shooting on the AF100 on this Japan trip, I asked -- "okay, who's tried out 720p mode?" The answer, of course, was nobody. They hadn't even considered it. How many had put it in 1080/60i mode? Not a one. But I can make a pretty good argument as to why both 720p mode and 1080i mode definitely should be included.

The HPX170 does HD and SD, so why not have their other cameras offer it too? Most of us would never use it, but for those who need it, it'd be nice that it be there.
 
I assumed AVCHD didn't have the capability to encode to SD, which would explain why the HPX170, recording to DVCProHD instead, could.
 
Okay, let's put it this way -- among the six of us shooting on the AF100 on this Japan trip, I asked -- "okay, who's tried out 720p mode?" The answer, of course, was nobody. They hadn't even considered it. How many had put it in 1080/60i mode? Not a one. But I can make a pretty good argument as to why both 720p mode and 1080i mode definitely should be included.
Did you shoot any 720p? I'm planning on shooting at 720p/60 out the SDI port fairly extensively in our studio/live setup. I was wondering if the OLPF did good with aliasing/etc at 720p.
 
If a nanoFlash is part of your future, it can take an HD signal and record to SD at 50 Mbit so it is acceptable to broadcast outlets that want SD material that is ready for simple ingest. Your stuff recorded to your SD cards in the AF100 can still be in whatever flavor of HD you wish.

Dear Friends,

I am sorry to report that the nanoFlash does not do down-conversions.

The nanoFlash will record SD, in 3,5,6,7,8, or 9 Mbps, and 30, 40, and 50 Mbps IMX.

But, it requires a SD signal, via SDI (Not HD-SDI, just SDI) to record in SD.


I also agree with others, for many it is certainly appropriate to record in HD, then render to SD in post, for many applications.

Of course, for some, HD is not requrired, nor will it ever be required. In this case, the nanoFlash requires a SD signal (SDI).


But, if you record in HD, you have wonderful advantages:

1. If shooting unpredictable events, stay wide, and zoom-in in post. HD has the resolution to do this, SD does not.

A great example is when shooting wildlife, birds in flight, for one. Just stay wide, then zoom in. This allows you to look like the best cameraman (woman) in the world, as if you anticipated every move in advance.

2. For other events, you can stay wide and then zoom in, or pan, etc. to catch things that you would miss otherwise.
 
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