Brevis and an HV20.

Dennis Wood said:
Elton, I've looked specifically in the posted HV20 footage for signs of the A1 fringing on high contrast vertical areas and I can see none. I still think it's a trichroic prism/filter issue with the 3ccd colour split..which would not affect the HV20 with its bayer filter.
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Very interesting. I would tend to agree that it's the prism, but interestingly enough, owners of the XL-H1 using the new 6x wide angle lens report little to no CA...and this is a cam using the same CCD block. It's a tough one to figure out, but at this point I still think it's more to do with the 20x lens.

The HV20 is testing a fair bit less sensitive to light than the A1 in the camcorderinfo.com review, which means more light possibly for indoor shots, but this is where the HV20 and CF1 will shine with respect to light efficiency.
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I really love the fact that you have different diffuser options. Very nice to have that extra light efficiency from CF1.

Hopefully the HV20 will be here Monday, so I'll throw up some more footage. I had the A1 directly attached to a 46" 1920x1080 Sharp Aquos LCD at a local retailer and the feed from the cam via component was so good, the entire staff came out to look. Several of the sales people commented that it was the best HD image they'd ever seen. I'll have to go back with the HV20 :)
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Funny, I've had similar responses plugging an A1 and H1 into the best 1080 sets. Most of the "HD" looping feeds at various retailers are utter crap. Hopelessly overcompressed garbage. Costco is the worst when it comes to this...but I love their prices, selection and return policy. :)

It's funny how few of these HDTV salespeople actually know what quality HD should look like. They just get used to those crap feeds and do their spiel.
 
Darth Bunnykins said:
No question, the HV20 really seems to hold it's own in bright day light exteriors/well lit, bright interiors. But what about low or selective lit night exteriors or dark interiors.?

If a portion of the frame is perfectly exposed, but the majority of the rest of the frame is dark to black, will the camera struggle to show what is in the dark areas and futz it up with gain, making the black/dark areas really ugly/mushy/noisy?
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Good question, Darth. Once I've got the camera I'll see if I can do some tests that'll give us some semblance of an answer.
 
I've got a small question for Dennis:

You mentioned that the HV20 needed an achromat for use with the Brevis. Are you still finding this to be the case? I think it would make the deal a lot sweeter for the bargain shopper (read: HV20 owner) if the Brevis could function without the $400 achromat. Could an additional spacer ring make up the necessary focus distance without causing the field of view to be too wide?

In short, what would the Brevis bundle look like for an HV20 and how much would it cost?
 
rapsucks said:
I've got a small question for Dennis:

You mentioned that the HV20 needed an achromat for use with the Brevis. Are you still finding this to be the case? I think it would make the deal a lot sweeter for the bargain shopper (read: HV20 owner) if the Brevis could function without the $400 achromat. Could an additional spacer ring make up the necessary focus distance without causing the field of view to be too wide?

In short, what would the Brevis bundle look like for an HV20 and how much would it cost?
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Yes. In short, what would the Brevis bundle look like for an HV20 and how much would it cost?
 
To be honest, I've only had a few hours with the camera, and I've spent all of it without even loading a tape, or attaching it to the adapter. I'm trying to work out a reliable manual way to control aperture and shutter speed with the cam to make sure the test parameters are under control. This weekend I'll do more testing and let you guys know. Some info on early findings here.

The 72mm achromat is $200 when purchased as part of the HD bundle...and alone, it's under $250...so definitely not $400! I know the HV20 is very close to not needing it, so if you were willing to slightly crop left/right sides, you could use the adapter without it. The HD bundle (Brevis, lens mount, 72mm Achromat, charger/AC adapter, Pelican case) is running right around $1k, and you'd only add the 43-72 step up ring set to get started. We just got the 43-72 ring set in stock today.
 
Dennis,

You might shoot me for this (they have guns in Canada, right?) but what if you used a "close-up" adapter, sold for cheap in photography stores as macro adapters. The HV20 has a small enough lens diameter that finding one shouldn't be hard. I know that they are notorious for CA and they're usually cheap pieces of glass (or plastic, uhgg!), but it'd be a heck of a lot cheaper than an achromat. (I appologize for misstating the price of the achromat. On your website it's touted as a $395 part, but I failed to see that you were only charging $240 for it.)

I guess what I'm getting at is figuring out just how close is the HV20 to being able to use the Brevis without an achromat. But if the difference is only between $806 and $1014 (in US dollars) then it's probably worth the little bit extra to do it right. And who am I to question your methods, anyway?

What are your recommendation on rails? It's all probably too much to just hang by the threads, I would imagine.
 
You could certainly pick up a set of 43mm macro filters, for about $25, and they would indeed work. At +2 or so, CA wouldn't be too bad, and there's not a ton of spherical issues generally at that strength either. I used a set of cheap 72mm filters way back when when we were testing cameras to determine their needs. At over +4, CA, SA, and softness become very apparent based on our tests using both the cheap ones vs our 72mm achromats. At +10, we saw a 100 line res hit with the "cheap" macros on the EIA1956 chart.

If you're building your own adapter, or just looking to cut costs, these inexpensive macro filters are perfect for testing as they can stack to increase power. Just be aware of the limitations/image issues as the power goes up. The nice thing about our 72mm achromat is that you ditch the adapter and use it for extreme close up shots with any cam too.

Rails are a really good idea with these small cams. The biggest issue I've seen is the the plastic chassis will flex slightly making locked down footage difficult. We just got our 15mm carbon fibre rails in, and at 26grams per 30cm, we plan to have a super light rig for the HV20 for use on steadicams :)
 
Can you spot the HV20? :)


hv20d.jpg



hv20a.jpg



hv20b.jpg



hv20c.jpg


hv20e.jpg
 
Ha!

I love that the tripod baseplate is longer than the camera. In fact, everything there is bigger than the camera. I also love that you have the Marshall actually mounted upside down. Who needs a flip funtion?

It looks nice, though. Show that to Robert Rodriguez circa 1993 or Roger Corman circa, well, whenever, and they'd blow a gasket. Amazing that something that small can do so much.
 
Dennis, the pictures look awesome and I'm sure the footage will rock too. This combo is a real heartbreaker...in a good way :D
 
Dennis how much would that EXACT setup cost me? Minus the cost of the marshall and the hv20 of course. If I could buy exactly that from you, I'd heavily consider getting an hv20.
 
Why is the footage on the monitor still updside down, even when the monitor is flipped? Isn't that the reason we flip it? To see the video right-side up?
 
icicle22 said:
Why is the footage on the monitor still updside down, even when the monitor is flipped? Isn't that the reason we flip it? To see the video right-side up?
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the image is flipped, but not the on-screen display's text.
 
ecking said:
Dennis how much would that EXACT setup cost me? Minus the cost of the marshall and the hv20 of course. If I could buy exactly that from you, I'd heavily consider getting an hv20.
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Yeah Dennis. You could PM as well.
 
That exact setup is our HD bundle, rails, rails support, mattebox, focus gear, and the yet to be released (currently in manufacture) follow focus. Pricing etc. is at www.cinevate.com/catalog

With a firmware update to show current f stop settings, I'm beginning to think that as an adapter cam, the HV20 could be to HD what the GS400 was to SD cams.
 
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