DVX image good enough for broadcast?

P

pud

Member
I'm looking for a camera to do a series of documetaries.
Is the image obtianed from the dvx good enough for broadcasting?
The series will be on various artists.
Is there a set up equivilant to an oxberry for shooting/panning
on still images (photos or pictures) for the DVX?
Do any of you feel there are better cameras out there for
this use?
Thanks
 
If you can afford the HVX (and get your hands on one) go with that. But if it (DVX) is good enough for academy award nominated Murderball, and the cinematography award at sundance has been won a couple of times by a film shot on the DVX. I have shot several broadcast shows with my DVX. The only folks who will not take DV is Discovery and national Geographic.
But for the next year it is still more than fine for broadcast.
 
It depends what you mean by National Geographic. Maybe not the high quality nature documentaries, but for adventure type material DV is perfect, as usually there is nothing better available anyway. I have one documentary running on NG channels ("Into the Forgoten Valley" in the series "Into the Unknown") shot with Sony TRV900.

While pro broadcast cameras do make a better image (4.2.2 coding), the sad truth is that at least here in Finland the new digital broadcast standard is only 4.2.0, which means it is not any better than what miniDV cameras like DVX100 do. As long as you do not attempt any green screen effects with it DVX100 is perfectly good for drama and documentaries. Actually many 10000$ "pro" cameras are also only DVCAMs, which means that their picture quality is identical to DVX100 meaning the same compresson standard 4.1.1 or 4.2.0 (PAL). It is just the better and easier manual adjustements, bigger sensors and interchancable lenses that make them "pro", not the output quality itself, on which front DVX100 has nothing to be ashamed of.
 
re: the oxberry,

your best bet is probably to get good high-res digital stills of the art and use your editing software to do all of your panning. aftereffects will give you the most control for moving around inside the image, but you can get away with doing it in finalcut.
 
The answer to your "broadcast" question is a qualified "yes".

I normally shoot for Spanish language television news networks along with a couple of the large, American based, English language news networks.

All of them prefer my Sony BVW 400 Betacam...which is getting pretty old but still prefer ed.

I have a DVX-100a that I use to shoot for other shows. Most of them are Spanish language travel shows. These air as regular broadcast programing but also end up on airline in-flight shows. I've found there is a range of clients who is looking for something than can "re purpose" to several outlets instead of limiting themselves to broadcast only. The final product looks good...but it's not as good as my even my aging Betacam achieves.

The other end is on the travel shows, I had to go places where my bigger camera just would not have cut it do to simple space requirements. I got some great stuff of a remote Indian tribe near the Colombian border in Panama as well as fun stuff crossing the Panama Canal in a 37 foot sailboat at night.

The producer was happy with the video ( which is all that really counts anyway)and, knowing my limitations and seeing what I was able to make the camera do, was also pleased.

Sorry...I'm long winded here.

The point is this.

Use the camera to produce material which the bigger cameras can't.

Don't try and mimic the bigger gear. Turn what some consider a negative into a positive.

Get shots and interviews where others can't. My best from this last trip was hanging my arm out over the edge of a dugout canoe shooting back at the interview subject. A shot location and angle I could never have achieved with my heavier Betacam!

Does this make sense what I'm suggesting?

It all comes down to using the right tool for the job.

The DVX can do some really nice, creative things the other cameras can't.

Use them to your advantage and don't waste time and money trying to look like something you really can't beat.

Don't waste time trying to build the Queen Mary cruise ship when you can make a better racing sloop that will take you places the bigger ship never could.

No more analogies for now!
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My friend shot some footage of his college in Virginia, and they did a local news story on the college. They showed some of his footage, and it looked much better than any of the normal news stuff they also had on there.
 
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