HMC 150 Purchase question

Bar-Bar

Bar-Bar

New member
Hi,
I've never been to this part of the forum before so I'm a little unsure on whether or not this has been talked about but, I have a friend and a Teacher that I know that is looking at buying some new cameras for his media program. He has 12 DVX100A's and he is looking at getting 6 of the JVC HM-100 and I told him that for his kids to learn on those are a little small and look a tad unimpressive. His big thing that he wants is the tape less work flow on SD cards. I told him that I thought the HMC 150 would be perfect for him. I have have used mainly Panasonic my whole life. The DVX100A, SPX800, HPX500, and my own camera the HVX200 but I feel that I am a little one sided when it comes to Panasonic products. What I'm really trying to figure out is how the HMC150 integreats with finalcut studio 2? What is the low lux rating for it? Weather or not it can handle anything from a wedding to a corporate shoot. I know Sony is known for low light cameras but how well would you guys say this camera would work for this teacher and whether or not it is a good fit. Thanks for you time.

-Bill
 
Bar-Bar said:
Hi,
I've never been to this part of the forum before so I'm a little unsure on whether or not this has been talked about but, I have a friend and a Teacher that I know that is looking at buying some new cameras for his media program. He has 12 DVX100A's and he is looking at getting 6 of the JVC HM-100 and I told him that for his kids to learn on those are a little small and look a tad unimpressive. His big thing that he wants is the tape less work flow on SD cards. I told him that I thought the HMC 150 would be perfect for him. I have have used mainly Panasonic my whole life. The DVX100A, SPX800, HPX500, and my own camera the HVX200 but I feel that I am a little one sided when it comes to Panasonic products. What I'm really trying to figure out is how the HMC150 integreats with finalcut studio 2? What is the low lux rating for it? Weather or not it can handle anything from a wedding to a corporate shoot. I know Sony is known for low light cameras but how well would you guys say this camera would work for this teacher and whether or not it is a good fit. Thanks for you time.

-Bill
Click to expand...

Will they be using the camers in cold(lower than 45F) environment? The HMC's focus ring gums up easily in low temperatures and greatly hampers manual focus in those environments. It is a huge decline from the DVX and HVX in this respect. See this thread here http://www.dvxuser.com/V6/showthread.php?t=152696
 
Well, if they're used to the DVX100, then the transition to the HMC150 is pretty smooth, as the layout is similar. It's basically the HPX170 with a few less bells and whistles and no P2. Same glass, and same CCD block as it and the newer HVX200a. I honestly think it does better in lowlight than the DVX100, largely because you have to really have to crank up the gain in order to see the noise. There are people on this board who are using it for weddings succesfully... I hope to start doing that this summer. And I feel perfectly comfortable using it for a corporate shoot.

I can't answer you question about FCS, as I'm a PC/CS4 person, but I do know that if you have the latest updates, you can use the AVCHD format... but it requires you to use the Log and Transfer tool to transcode to ProRes422.

Dig into some older threads... there are a couple of folks who actually prefer this camera to their HPX170's and HVX200's. There is also a wealth of information that would require a whole day to read through.

But yes, your teacher friend probably couldn't go wrong with this camera.
 
The workflow with FCS2 is so simple. Pop in the SD card to a card reader, initialize Log and Transfer in FCS2, and navigate to the card containing the PRIVATE folder (where the HMC150 stores everything). After pointing the the card (not the folder itself) it will recognize the folder and all the containing clips. Drop and drag them all into the bin below to transcode to prores or you can scrub thru them in the L&T window and set the ins and out points. Then drag those into the bin below like you would if you were editing a clip and dropping it onto the timeline.

Hope this helps.
 
If you're on a budget, you can also consider the HMC-40, shipping in August. It's essentially a beefed-up DVC-30, that's it's a tad cheaper than the HMC150. Same SD-based AVCHD workflow.

The great thing about either cam is the waveform monitor - great to talk about light theory with.
 
The HMC150 is a great choice and so is the HM100. I think that both are perfect for the application. The HM100 will even provide a workflow with no transcoding! If you like I can send you a video of the HMC150 with some AVCCAM footage on it so that they can test the workflow themselves to see if it will work for them.

EDIT: I just remembered that AJA has a new product here at NAB that will convert the AVCHD footage to DVCPROHD for easier editing so that may help. It does it in real-time. I'll see if we can get more info on that in the morning.

Otherwise, the low light is great on the 150 and the HM100 so you don't need to worry. Please give us a call with any questions.

Sincerely,

Andrew Hoffman
Vice President
Specialized Communications Corp.
20940 Twin Springs Dr.
Smithsburg, MD 21783-1510 USA
800-359-1858
301-790-0103
Fax: 301-790-0173
andrewh@spec-comm.com
www.spec-comm.com
www.twitter.com/speccomm
 
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Hi Bill,

I do not use FCS 2, so I cannot help you there. If your friend wants to learn more about the HMC150, I wrote an article that includes 5 video clips and it may be helpful to him.

As far as lux ratings, ignore the numbers. Lux numbers are not standardized. From my in the field testing, the HMC150 is better in low light than the Sony Z1 and Canon XH-A1. It is very close to the Sony Z5/Z7. I feel the Sony Z5/Z7 are slightly better in low light, but the advantage of the HMC150 is a better format, AVCHD is better than HDV, and the HMC150s CCDs do not suffer from the negative aspects of rolling shutter that is associated with CMOS, which both the Sony Z5 and Z7 use.

HMC150 Article
 
Low light: If low light is important like you posted, you might have an issue with the HMC40 with 1/4" sensors... I am very impressed with the HMC150 all around. We just ordered a 2nd. And, I came from all sony.
 
Sooner or later, I want to get a camera that can shoot 720p60, especially for shooting footage of my grandkids.

I'd like to know how the HMC150 (and also the HMC40 and JVC HM100) compares to a Sony FX1 or Canon XH-A1 in low light.
 
Robert M Wright said:
I'd like to know how the HMC150 (and also the HMC40 and JVC HM100) compares to a Sony FX1 or Canon XH-A1 in low light.
Click to expand...

A little better than both (assuming you're not really talking about the FX1000). It's not that the HMC150's picture is so much brighter, it's that it's so much cleaner than the FX1 or XH-A1.
 
Andrew,
Is there any advantage in image quality with a 35mbps JVC versus a 21 mbps HMC-150. I'm about to buy the 150, but I'm concerned that the 150A will come out upping the mbps to compete.
 
The 150 already uses the maximum bitrate possible. 24mbps (21 mbps with peaks up to 24, including audio). As I understand it, there's no higher they can go. Unless they did away with audio.
 
shadowProd said:
Andrew,
Is there any advantage in image quality with a 35mbps JVC versus a 21 mbps HMC-150. I'm about to buy the 150, but I'm concerned that the 150A will come out upping the mbps to compete.
Click to expand...

The HMC150 has been out less than a year so I think it will be a while until the 150a comes out. The codec seems to compare well to DVCProHD at 100mbps so I don't think there would be much to gain even if it was possible to increase the bitrate.

An option to record in AVCIntra would be nice, but this would require a faster media (SDXC?) , so I can't see that happening for quite a while. It would also eat into 170 sales.
 
Thanks, guys for the quick response. One last question - in your opinions, is there an audio problem with 150 - and would it be a deal breaker for you? Thanks again.
 
shadowProd said:
Thanks, guys for the quick response. One last question - in your opinions, is there an audio problem with 150 - and would it be a deal breaker for you? Thanks again.
Click to expand...
This is the very thing that is stopping me from buying it. i'm so torn. I want to go tapeless, and I do even stuff so I need a good CCD camera. So basically that leaves it to the HMC, HM100u, and the XHA1. I don't want the xha1 or the hm100u for many reasons, however, If I have unusable audio, I simply can't use it.
 
I haven't had any problem with the HMC's audio, the most important thing is to use a good microphone. I've used the hmc to film concerts through the theaters audio mixing desk and the quality was more than enough.
 
ilauzirika said:
I haven't had any problem with the HMC's audio, the most important thing is to use a good microphone. I've used the hmc to film concerts through the theaters audio mixing desk and the quality was more than enough.
Click to expand...
Its not the quality i'm concerned about, rather im really scared of getting the dreaded crackling thing on an important concert or something. I can't redo that audio if its messed up. I might wanna start toting around a recorder like a zoom h4a
 
MattRobertson said:
Its not the quality i'm concerned about, rather im really scared of getting the dreaded crackling thing on an important concert or something. I can't redo that audio if its messed up. I might wanna start toting around a recorder like a zoom h4a
Click to expand...

I have never encountered that crackling thing (and I've filmed lots of event, concerts, theater plays.... since I got it), knock on wood..... BTW, I use panasonic 16g cards if that is useful and I always use a phantom powered mic pluged into the 2CH and record it in the two available channels one with the volume up and the other with the volume a bit lower....

I must also say that I've never seen a any glitch or electronic fail or any other problem everything has worked flawlessly...
 
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