Better than Portable DVD Player as Client Monitor

[eddavid]

Hi guys,

Because I didn't want to spend a bundle on a portable monitor for run and gun work I bought, per the suggestions of some people here, a Poloroid 5in Portable DVD Player to use for my clients to give them something to look at.

Well one thingL it can only do widescreen and I don't shoot widescreen. Secondly the resolution is pretty damn horrible, it makes everything look bad.

As a workaround I had a brainstorm:
use my 2nd little one chip Sony camera as a second monitor, the TRV19, have it hooked up via a very long 4 pin to 4 pin firewire to my DvX and the thing is great.

The image is small, but it's sharp, also this guy runs on M batteries and those things last a lot longer than the DVD Player batteries.

Finally the thing that also makes it better is that it has a EVF so when it's really sunny, the producer can look thru that little thing.

Anyway it's been working great, and the reason why the thing is a good value is because I also use it as my editing deck with Avid Xpress Pro and Final Cut Pro.

So it's my deck and now my portable field monitor when I'm really out in the field.
Not bad for a $300 toy.

 

[DVX100Shooter]

You could have always purchased a small 5-7 inch monitor that you could have attached to the camera by various types of mounts. I recently picked up a 7 inch LCD TV in one of those Black Friday Sales for only a little over 100 bucks! It has all the right jacks on it that I can run a video and audio line right out the camera to the monitor/tv. Adjusting the picture on it was a bit funky though. It had a blown out look when I had my DVX hooked up to it but when I hooked it up to my BetaSX camera at work it looked perfect. I have since got it to look a lot better on the DVX.

 

[eddavid]

Yea but how long do those things last on batteries and the LCDs are almost useless outside on a non-overcast day.

Also I don't want to have the monitor straight on my camera.