Any other Varicam HDC27 users out there ?

Mike Krumlauf

Mike Krumlauf

Award Winning Filmmaker
Are there any other HDC27F or H users out there still operating either for professional or hobby purposes? I will have owned my varicam a year next month and I feel like I am still learning from it, it really is an amazing camera. Below i've posted a pic of my rig. :)

IMG_0011.jpg
 
I used to own two but have moved to PX270's. The Varicam has great color and controls but the PX270's have a lot going on as well and are better for my one man band type of work. They have a unique look though.
 
I've owned around 50 cameras since 2005 from consumer to professional and honestly, the varicam is my all time favorite camera!
 
Cool shots Mike!
Most of these shots were in my backyard. I live right off of Michigan north of Trump tower.
thanks for sharing!
 
It has that Varicam H, SDX900, HDX900 color 8-bit look. Rich color skintone texture. Still has that Panasonic secret sauce color.

The heavy 2/3" HD glass (Canon or Fujinon) and back brick battery (~5.5 lbb) will blow away any HPX250 or PX-270. Picture quality is superb. Precision focus servo tracking with minimum focus breathing is the best I've ever seen. No 1/3" can beat it. I'm not at all impressed with the new 1/3" Panasonic 2015+ models. Their biggest bottleneck is the optical performance. Weight is a huge factor with 2/3" cam. After the heavier load tripod, it'll be about 25-30 lbs. But precision image quality is what you get for the extra bulk weight.



Mike Krumlauf said:
Are there any other HDC27F or H users out there still operating either for professional or hobby purposes? I will have owned my varicam a year next month and I feel like I am still learning from it, it really is an amazing camera. Below i've posted a pic of my rig. :)

View attachment 117355
Click to expand...
 
My rig actually gets 10-bit 4:2:2.. i shoot from the HD-SDI onto the AJA KiProMini.. and The field of view is higher than the BMPCC..
 
Has the same aesthetic quality to the image...that soft/vintage, Super16-looking footage. Not a bad thing; just saying.
 
I'm sure part of that has to do with the lenses i was using and the way i graded it given i shot in film rec but i get what your saying.
 
Mitch - Yeah, I seem to run into a lot of issues with the backfocus.. do I have to change it everytime I put a different lens on and given i only have a 28 and 80mm and no focusing chart, what would be a surefire way of me making sure the backfocus is set with limited options? Thanks.
 
Loved my 27H. It was an "ENG" and "feature" camera all in one. Remember, this camera was well before s35 sensor digital cams. But I actually shot more 60P "video" with it than 24P. It made(makes) beautiful images and made me a lot of money. As far as I was concerned though, as soon as I got my first 2700, I wanted to shelve my 27H. The 2700 just had so many advancements, features and conveniences over the original.

I'm actually pulling the 27 out of "retirement" for a shoot next week. They want tape(WHAT?!). I'll probably slap my nanoFlash on it, just in-case.

It's kind of scary, though. I paid about $45K for it brand new and you can find them used for around $1000, now.
 
To set backfocus on the Pro35 you should absolutely have a decent monitor connected to the camera. It can be hard to make out detail in the B&W viewfinder.

- Mount it to camera, properly supported.
- Remove PL port cap and WITH NO LENS MOUNTED, point at bright light.
- Do not turn on motor to spin the ground glass.
- Adjust the backfocus until the grainy surface detail of the ground glass comes into focus.
- Lock down the backfocus, you've nailed it.

Now you need to make sure your lenses are set to the correct flange focal distance. The best thing to do is have a local camera rental house with a collimator check them, but that will likely cost you money. he poor man's solution is to use a tape measure, some high frequency detail like some printed newspaper and your nice monitor to check where focus lends at several distances. If the distances don't match up with the markings on the lens, you can use some chart tape to cover up the old marks and label your own. Always do this with the lens set to its widest aperture. And make sure that you can actually focus to infinity, because if you can't turn the lens far enough then it's time to get to that rental house.

BTW, this method works because you're using primes. You can't do this properly with a zoom. The focus marks would be all over the place at different focal lengths.
 
Awesome! I will give this all a try when I get back to my place in the city tonight. I own a Marshall Monitor for my varicam so that should work just fine.
 
Not sure if your Marshall will do something similar, but on my smallHD DP7Pro, I have one of the on-screen buttons set up for focus-assist and it's set to switch to a black & white image with red-peaking. Makes setting back focus a lot easier.
 
What's the resolution of the Marshall's screen? Some small monitors are only 800x60 pixels, and that's not enough to judge properly. Mind you the camera's native resolution is 1280x720.
 
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