Getting soft results with HMC150 well lit studio

F

flavio

New member
We have to make a TV News like presentation and I am getting softer image with the HMC150 than with my Sony HDR-XR520V consumer camcorder.

I tried 1080 30p and 720 60p

I found that the best shutter speed was 1/60 (shutter off) with aperture set at f8.0.

The exposure is good but it looks like a soft focus. I have re-focused extensively so I guess there is some other setting I'm missing...

I have a OMNI shooting the back of the head and shoulders on a diagonal position. Another OMNI shooting the backdrop (dark blue). One Tota shooting the ceiling from the left. One Tota shooting the right side with an umbrella. And the key is a Rifa 1,000w opposite to the first OMNI shooting the back of the talent's head, also in diagonal.

The image is just not sharp.

Editing in FCP 7.

Will post on YouTube but I want it to be as sharper as possible and I have seen some pretty amazing YouTube videos lately.

Can anyone help please?
 
hmm i find the 150 more than sharp enough even with detail knocked down. you could try boosting the detail level and i always try to stay around f4-5.6 and rarely go beyond 6.8. but there have always been those who think that the 150 is not sharp enough. i'd rather have a more "organic" look than super sharp especially with talking heads etc.
 
What are your scene settings? Also, the HDR-XR520V is 1080i, try shooting with that on the HMC150. Maybe what you're seeing isn't that it's sharper, but the difference between progressive and interlaced.
 
Mike Harvey said:
What are your scene settings? Also, the HDR-XR520V is 1080i, try shooting with that on the HMC150. Maybe what you're seeing isn't that it's sharper, but the difference between progressive and interlaced.
Click to expand...

Good thought. I'd say as far as the "sharpness".. I think the footage I see played back on vimeo from my personal stuff and others I've seen on here is quite sharp enough. Maybe you have better eyesight than me or something lol

:bath:
 
I own both camera and I can say that the HMC is sharper than the XR520. Are you seing the footage in LCD TV or i your output or what? At first i thought that the XR520 was really sharper than the HMC and Im actually somewhat disappointed basing it on the LCD of the camera. but after placing it to my editor there you can really see the difference. The LCD of sony makes it really sharper compared to the Build in LCD of the HMC 150.

Mario
 
Thanks.

I am seeing the lack of sharpness on the Apple monitor (FCP). When the camera is hooked to the HD TV via HDMI for monitoring it looks sharper. When I bring to FCP it looks soft as if I messed up the focus but I set it to manual focus and have done multiple adjustments before shooting every test.

Could it be "TOO MUCH" light?

I also have a reflective white glass desk that "needs" to be overexposed in order to render the presenter correctly.

The scene settings are the default.

If I'm going to YouTube HD is there a better recording format to start with?
 
the general consensus is that the hmc is softer than other HD cams.
it has bigger/fewer pixels on each sensor than the other 1/3" cams, which is why it's great in low light.

if you want a sharper image:

1. stop down the aperture just like you did
2. zoom in a little, the wide end of the zoom is softer
3. try other scene files. the gamma curve and masterped can dramatically affect perceived sharpness by altering the contrast between adjacent pixels. detail and vcoring (noise reduction) can also influence sharpness, but can start to degrade the image.
4. add some sharpening in post, works wonders!
5. oh yeah, don't overexpose.
6. shoot in 1080p, it gives you the most color info and detail
 
Can you give me some feedback?

I still think there is a lot of room for image improvement. I see I have some exposure problems on the outdoor scenes and focus got overriden by the Auto SW settings which I now have corrected.

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I AGREE



Thanks for the help!
 
looks pretty good to me flavio!
think you're just getting used to the more filmic soft look of the Panasonic cameras....
you can always throw a sharpen filter on there if you want it looking a little more HD crisp.

i've struggled with the same issues and there is certainly a learning curve involved here, needing time to get used to the different look. after a while, you'll realize that you actually prefer the look, but it can be hard comparing it to other HD footage that looks so sharp as to make your footage look out of focus! try sharpening the clip.....you'll be amazed when you toggle the effect on/off as the original will now seem to be shot out of focus!

try to embrace the softer filmic look. make it work for you. as long as the noise levels are low, exposure good and the colors pop (and you had focussed correctly), then you've got a very high quality image.
 
Hey averan,

Thanks so much for the feedback and the tips!

I think practice is the key -- like everything else... :) So I will keep on making them.

Thanks again for the help.
 
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