Are these Facts True????

Well there's certainly some exaggeration going on there. The six-month life span on the P2 cards, for example. Or needing 20 cards per day per crew. Or only getting two minutes of footage in 1080i on an 8gb card... need I continue?

Really, it seems that this camera isn't geared towards the use these people intend anyway. Many of the posters seem accustomed to much, much more expensive cameras, intended for news events, etc. I can see how P2 could be annoying if you wanted to do a two hour long coninuous shoot...

My favorite quote was the guy complaining that he couldn't make his footage look more like video: "One problem that we are having is the video kind of looks like film and we have checked all the setting and can't figure out why." Clearly they don't see the value of having a camera that would make video look like film with so little effort...
 
You can't be everything to everyone. This list seemed like a very specific corner of the market, namely news and sports. I don't think this camera would be very great for those either. Also, and this should be of no offense to anyone it's just an observation from experience, but the long time owner operators of Betacams, or any other big body camera are not exactly what I think of as early adopters. P2 is new, untested, untried, untrue. Yes, it's been beta tested, yes there's been p2 camera out for a little while now that work and are 'proven', but it's still new. It's a new workflow, a new way of thinking about media, a new way to learn. Guys/Gals that shoot day in and day out and have developed their workflow and have become really good at it, are not going to give that up easily. I wouldn't take this, or any other user forum, as the final word. I think most people buying or are interested in this camera are interested in it for very specific reasons, namely, the film like quality, variable speed rates, small format HD camera body, and relatively attainable price. Not everyone fits into those categories.
 
Another thing that everyone failed to ask the OP was - Is the station shooting HD? If they are shooting DVCPro25 then the amount of cards needed for typical news/sports shoot days would go down considerably. I agree with a lot of what they said though - the HVX is not a daily News/Sports "HD" camera. It's too bad that Panasonic is really pushing it this way to TV stations.
 
Michael:

There's two issues in those posts: one has to do with suitability for certain tasks, which is indeed relevant and useful, and one has to do with factual details about the camera. Many of the facts and details are wrong; many of the observations about utility in certain applications are right. The big deal about replacing P2 cards every six months... figure it out yourself - Panasonic says at least 30,000 inserts; at 8 minutes per card (1080 or 720p60) or 20 minutes per card (720p24), or 32 minutes per card (480) ,how long will it take you to get to 30,000 swaps? If you're shooting continuous coverage of 5-hour sports events (including pre-show, post, etc) every day, maybe six months could happen. If you're shooting narrative work, likely much less footage will be recorded every day; you're talking a few years. Anyway, with P2 capacities doubling every year (and prices for similar capacities dropping), both the "number of inserts" will drop, and you'll likely want to replace 'em. By their calculations (which I'm not saying are even right), a 16GB card will last a year, a 32GB card 2 years, etc. But, hey - what's the tape cost for 6 months or a year's worth of such intense shooting? 5 hours a day/5 days a week of even crappy MiniDV tape is about $6500 a year - and I'm sure they're shooting on much more expensive tapes. So the whole argument is sorta dumb on that issue.
 
yea but thoes guys were straight up Fox NEWS channel lets go shoot a press conference News camera men.

The HVX is not designed for that. They are trashing a camera that costs less than the lens of their normal full size shoulder mount camera. Of course they dont like it.

I wouldnt either if i were a ENG cameraman.
 
Too bad that thread had so many inaccuracies. As Ullanta mentioned, it's one thing to disqualify the camera for your specific use (network ENG), but to base its suitability on erroneous info about features/capabilities etc, is inaccurate and misleading.

Surprising those guys with the $20K cams, know so little about P2 technology etc.
 
The bit about P2 lifespan cracked me up... with 30 000 inserts a six-month lifespan would mean doing inserts about every 8 minutes or so, 24 hours a day, for six months straight. If shooting tape that would mean shooting about 4300 tapes, for 3,5 bucks a tape its over 15 000 dollars :) DVCPRO-HD tapes? Laughing at the mere idea of it :D

Not that anyone would shoot 24 hours a day for six months straight, constantly rolling!
 
it's a funny thread, and all they're really saying is it's not a good camera for tv news, especially where lots of footage is needed. That's absolutely true.

the funny this is how they're complaining their news looks like a hollywood movie and they "cannot figure out how to get rid of the filmy look..."
 
Michael Nice said:
So I was browsing around the internet looking for info and came across this thread.

http://www.b-roll.net/forum/showthread.php?t=15082


These guys don't seem to fond of our HVX or Jan at Panasonic!!! Wow
Click to expand...

I had a bit of a laugh in reading the link. The people posting the 3 to 6 month "life" figure never pulled a calculator out. Yes, IF you shoot, download, and repeat endlessly for 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, you will reach the 3 month life for inserts with an 8 GB P2 card. This represents 2,000 hours of recording and is an unreasonable example. Even 6 months would be 12 hours per day, 7 days per week with an 8 GB P2 card. This is VERY unreasonable conditions for a video or film work.

Most of the "facts" stated in the thread were wrong.


Bob Diaz
 
2,000 hours in 3 months? Um, yeah, that's a bit unrealistic, dontchathink?

I logged about 400 hours on the heads of my original DVX in three years of ownership. At that rate an 8gb card would last 15 years...
 
That thread made me laugh out loud a few times - it was a bit Spinal Tap-ish. And the comment about it looking like film instead of video was the best bit.

Tell you something, there's some angry news gatherers about isn't there. Blimey wouldn't like to sit in an OB truck with some of them for very long.

This thing that annoyed me though was the complete disregard for any kind of accuracy in some of those statements. Someone clearly stated that it'd be 32 minutes with two 8 gig cards shooting 720p (correct). But then it was completely ignored and then next person said - "So 16 minutes in 720p..."

And it's like no you complete prat, read the post above he said 16 minutes for 720p 60frames (that's slow motion, why the F would you want to shoot your news interviews in slow motion) :huh:
 
Come on the, funniest thing is the title of this thread: "Are these facts true?"



"Facts are meaningless, you can use facts to prove anything that's remotely true!"
-- Homer Simpson
 
tigeba said:
"Facts are meaningless, you can use facts to prove anything that's remotely true!"
-- Homer Simpson
Click to expand...

From a true sage! LOL

It would seem like those news guys are too busy complaining about a camera they don't own, plan on owning, or ever used to go out and shoot anways. What do the recording times matter with P2 if you're going to be in some forum whining all day?

0 hours + 0 cycles = Zero usage, your 8GB card will now last forever!

:grin:
 
x2mag68 said:
yea but thoes guys were straight up Fox NEWS channel lets go shoot a press conference News camera men.

The HVX is not designed for that. They are trashing a camera that costs less than the lens of their normal full size shoulder mount camera. Of course they dont like it.
Click to expand...

Ah... It's easy to complain about equipment not being up to their specs, especially if they don't have to come up with the cash to buy the equipment. It all changes when you're the one paying the bills.
 
booth said:
he said 16 minutes for 720p 60frames (that's slow motion, why the F would you want to shoot your news interviews in slow motion) :huh:
Click to expand...
Not for news broadcast -- for news broadcast you'd want to shoot 720/60p; that's the "reality" look. American HDTV broadcast in 720p is all shot at 60p (like American Idol, any broadcasts on Fox or ABC or ESPN, etc). 60p is only slow motion if you're playing it back at a slower frame rate, but for "reality" 60fps is the commonly-used timebase.
 
I naively tried to put at least the basic facts straight, but the lynch mob wouldn't listen.
They seem to already have made consensus that it sucks, and wont let anyone spoil their thing :-(
 
I especially likes this portion, posted by a lad called by the name "CameraGod":

"Went to the Panasonic demo of the camera, got every pamphlet they had. None of them actually tell you how many min per gig. But the camera we shot on at full 1080 only did 2min. Now they said they were 8gig but I didn’t check so they may have been 4gig cards, that actually makes more sense. It took them 10min to dump 2min into the data store and they couldn’t get it to go from the data store to the PC for some reason. The 60gig Firestore they had mounted on the camera didn’t work as it was a prototype. I wasn’t feeling a lot of confidence by the end of this."
 
My favorite quote from the thread is by cameragod, in reference to the clip of Jan at NAB: "Did I really hear her say “…so now its data just like my power point…” How does she sleep at night?"

Is it really that hard a concept for him to get??
 
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