Canon 24F to DVCPRO HD 24p...IT WORKS!!

[Elton]

Friends, Romans, countrymen. Lend me your eyeballs...I came not to...yadda yadda etc., etc.

Ok, I've finally figured out how to get some of my 24F SDI tethered shots from the DVCPROHD codec, extracting the 2:3 pulldown from the 1080i in Cinema Tools and leaving the progressive frames in the codec, at 23.98 without any recompression. It took quite a few tries until I found the right reverse telecine process.

Anywho, no, I didn't roll HDV at the same time, so later on down the road I'll be able to show a good comparison between the codecs, but for now, look at the clip and judge it for how it delivers 1080p in DVCPROHD. It's a 12 sec. FCP QT clip of raw DV100. I'll put up an h.264 for you non-fcp folks soon.

www.homepage.mac.com/mrbarlowelton

Comments?

 

[Haakon]

I'll put up an h.264 for you non-fcp folks soon.

Looking forward to it.

 

[Elton]

It's uploading right now.

Btw, whatever resolution your monitor is running, I recommend setting QT player to :

present movie>full screen. Loop it too, if you can. You will have choppy playback unless the player scales it to 16x9 properly to your monitor. I have a G5 2.7 with my monitor set to 1600x1200 and it doesn't play smoothly unless I do this. You can view the actual resolution, but unless you have a fast mac/pc and a 1900x1200 display, it will probably be choppy.

 

[Jim Arthurs]

Isn't anyone going to comment on this?

Even from the QT, it's easy to tell that is the best sheer resolution I've yet seen from any prosumer HD camera. This is the first clip I've seen that actually feels like the HD look you get with the big guns. And even if the 24p is "fake" progressive it's still very good.

You mentioned that you pulled this from DVCPRO100? I'm assuming you took a deck into the field and recorded similar to "The Watchmaker" project?

Of course if you have to put up with the pain of hauling a recording deck or NLE around with you to get this, there should be a positive trade-off, methinks.

Thanks for sharing the clip, Elton! It doesn't alter my high regard of the HVX or purchase decision when you factor everything into the equation with frame rates and superb in-camera recording quality, but no one can say negative things about the ability to image lots and lots of useful pixels with the Canon...

Jim Arthurs

 

[Elton]

Thanks for the feedback, Jim!

This was just a shot from my backyard. I ran a long BNC from the camera to my computer equipped with a Kona card, and recorded DV100 straight to a basic firewire drive. I originally tried to record into a 23.98 DVCPROHD preset, but because the SDI only spits out 1080i, and I had no time code reference running from the camera, I had to extract a reverse telecine in Cinema Tools. (part of FCP studio)

Hope people understand that I was saying you can get really good HD out the SDI, into whatever codec you choose.

I totally understand all the reasons to go with the HVX. It's a fantastic camera. I put the clip up so people could see something besides HDV from the H1.

 

[Mr. Blonde]

Loads of resolution there! Very clean. Still, it has a definite video sort of look, never the less:thumbup:

 

[Jim Arthurs]

Hope people understand that I was saying you can get really good HD out the SDI, into whatever codec you choose.

Thanks Elton... interesting that even with DVCPRO100, the codec is limiting you to 1280, but this looks MUCH better than the Canon clips I've seen recorded HDV at 1440... kudos to DVCPRO100.

I wonder if the HVX in 1080 is actually feeding the DVCPRO100 codec as much resolution as it can handle, though I'm admittedly judging from the very few 1080 HVX clips I've seen and comparing to this example.

I can't wait for resolution tests from Barry's shootout to know the answer.

Also, Elton, those sisters look sort of sad. And sort of cold

Jim Arthurs

 

[Stevet]

Man that looks so sharp.
The H1 does produce one nice real quality image.

The highlights have lost some detail in the sky, but other than that, very impressive. I imagine if one took great care on exposure , this camera could produce some great footage.

Thanks for sharing Elton.

Steve

 

[Elton]

I wonder if the HVX in 1080 is actually feeding the DVCPRO100 codec as much resolution as it can handle

I've wondered the same thing. It'll be nice to have other native 1080 clips to compare to Kaku's, but my belief is that the HVX is simply an uprez in 1080. I've resized that 720 60p city clip to 1080 in QT, and it actually looked slightly better than his native 1080 clip. The scaling algorithm in QT is actually quite good, so this made sense to me.

Until I see raw DV100 from the HVX that proves otherwise, it would seem that there's no good reason to shoot 1080 at all...unless you need that frame size for a quick turnaround.

Also, Elton, those sisters look sort of sad. And sort of cold

Yes, they weren't too happy with me. I made them go out in the cold for a couple minutes so I'd have something to shoot besides the field and houses. Anything for art! He he

The highlights have lost some detail in the sky, but other than that, very impressive. I imagine if one took great care on exposure , this camera could produce some great footage.

It was actually a very hazy day, and the sun was just barely poking through to the west, so the exposure is fairly acccurate there. But, I think you're right overall. The H1 requires a little more know-how, but it produces very good results.

I laugh when people say you lose so much resolution in 24F. The fact is, this mode can produce stunning results, and could make a good film-out.

 

[Jim Arthurs]

Until I see raw DV100 from the HVX that proves otherwise, it would seem that there's no good reason to shoot 1080 at all...unless you need that frame size for a quick turnaround.

I think we're all waiting for the results of the resolution chart tests to know for sure. Barry feels there's 25% to 35% more rez in the HVX 1080 footage compared to the 720p. If there is more resolution, then 1080 is useful for shooting plates where you intend to degrade the image is some fashion, thereby better matching the 720p, or getting a little extra boost if you know you're doing a film-out.

My gut feeling is that the HVX is a terrific 720p camera, with 1080 useful as I described above. And then there's the DVCPRO50 for SD work... and that's very good indeed.

It was actually a very hazy day, and the sun was just barely poking through to the west, so the exposure is fairly acccurate there. But, I think you're right overall. The H1 requires a little more know-how, but it produces very good results.

Did you do any adjustments to sharpness, etc? Feel free to share any other shots you've done in this fashion!

I laugh when people say you lose so much resolution in 24F. The fact is, this mode can produce stunning results, and could make a good film-out.

Of course you'd need to do an A/B flip compare to see the differences, but darn, there's no question that the clip you shared would blow up quite nicely. It sure doesn't look like you are missing a full field worth of information, ala FX1/ZI CF modes.

Regards,

Jim Arthurs

 

[doccutter]

The resolution is amazing. Now if only someone would make an HDSDI input card in the expresscard 33 format. How fast is your G5?

 

[Elton]

The resolution is amazing. Now if only someone would make an HDSDI input card in the expresscard 33 format. How fast is your G5?

Yes, I would buy one of these cards in a heartbeat. However, I think it's complicated to produce because it would need separate audio and timecode. Still, I would be happy to just get the signal in via SDI into another codec and go dual system. Syncing audio is relatively trivial.

btw, my G5 is a dual 2.7

 

[Elton]

If there is more resolution, then 1080 is useful for shooting plates where you intend to degrade the image is some fashion, thereby better matching the 720p, or getting a little extra boost if you know you're doing a film-out.

Interesting. Makes sense if the rez really is noticeably better.

My gut feeling is that the HVX is a terrific 720p camera, with 1080 useful as I described above. And then there's the DVCPRO50 for SD work... and that's very good indeed.

My gut feeling too. Honestly, I'm not saying that H1's HD is far superior than the HVX (so far, I think it's more detailed), because I'm also in love with 720p. Until the goods in 1080 are delivered, I think the HVX should be thought of as a mini-Varicam and exploited for all the format offers...which is staggering. The H1 is more of a traditional HD camera, with a nice 24F/p mode.

Personally, I love 60p. It's virtual reality in a way 1080i could never be. Even if you interpolate 1080i fields into 720p, it might look pretty good, but it's not pure progressive.

An interesting question I have is...how well would these cameras intercut in 1080i/p? So far, I think they'd be tough to match.

Did you do any adjustments to sharpness, etc? Feel free to share any other shots you've done in this fashion!

No adjustments, just the out-of-the-box default look.

I'll share more clips as I've learned to manipulate the camera better.