HMC150 or Sony HDR-AX2000

MadHMC150 said:
What are you talking about?? You are saying CMOS is acceptable by you and your clients?

I don't think its up to par when it comes to movement - but a bolted down vSLR with primes can get some amazing shots. What vSLR you considering 7d?
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So I guess there was no movement in Slumdog, or District 9, or Public Enemies, or Che, or Knowing, or Book of Eli... Come on man. I just did an entire short with a 5D and there was no tripod on set for the entire month shoot. Camera held up just fine.
 
AFAIK, the Sony is not exactly full res. But who cares? AVCHD -- just like HDV -- will not be able to record full 1920x1080 image, all the different pixels. Bitrate is simply not enough, so why bother with sensor resolution?
 
PerroneFord said:
So tell me about those sensors... Sony has full res... HMC has what?

It's all a compromise.
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Oh, I'm not arguing with Sony's resolution and sharpness. Universally recognized to be clearer. Which . . . is why I'm now going back and forth between HMC150 and NX5U. Hmmm . . . dynamic range and resolution VS. global shutter . . . my head hurts.

But the AX2000 is just missing too many features. An easy no way, for me. Especially since it's priced above the HMC150.
 
Cranky said:
AFAIK, the Sony is not exactly full res. But who cares? AVCHD -- just like HDV -- will not be able to record full 1920x1080 image, all the different pixels. Bitrate is simply not enough, so why bother with sensor resolution?
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AVCHD is 1920x1080. That's exactly the point. But if the senors aren't...

The Sony CMOS cams are all 1920x1080. That's why they went to them. And why the small single-chip consumer cams are also 1920x1080.

AVCHD at 24Mbps is PLENTY enough for full frame recording.
 
Superfresa66 said:
describe way better! please be specific!
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lets hypothesize they're both at 3500(although clearly hmc150 is below 3500 on some stores now)

hmc has a wider lens, 720p modes, no pulldown, waveform, vectorscope
con - slightly lower resolution. (which is a small problem for its price)

ax2000 is better in terms of resolution (but still not full) and 20x zoom lens(where i prefer wider)
non-native 24p (720p modes) kills this cam for me. talk about watering down your cameras, Sony!

nx5 now has more features than the hmc(minus vectorscope and waveform) but i have to test it out before i can judge it. (which bottomline goes down to lowlight, handling and image quality)
 
PerroneFord said:
AVCHD is 1920x1080. AVCHD at 24Mbps is PLENTY enough for full frame recording.
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Nope. If you want to record all 1920x1080 pixels, all them individually, then you are talking about uncompressed video. With compressed video you record blocks, not individual pixels, so super-duper resolution of the sensor does not matter that much. It matters, but not THAT much.
 
dcloud said:
nx5 now has more features than the hmc(minus vectorscope and waveform) but i have to test it out before i can judge it. (which bottomline goes down to lowlight, handling and image quality)
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Yeah, I think you said it there. I'm going to need to get my hands on both of these in the next couple months and decide after that.

CMOS . . . the flash artifact is pretty annoying, but not a total deal breaker in itself. I am not too concerned about jello-cam. My HV30 has a bit of visible skew and wobble if I get hyper with handheld, but even that's not too bad. From all I've heard, the Sony prosumers are quite a bit better in that regard.
 
Cranky said:
Nope. If you want to record all 1920x1080 pixels, all them individually, then you are talking about uncompressed video. With compressed video you record blocks, not individual pixels, so super-duper resolution of the sensor does not matter that much. It matters, but not THAT much.
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Here's the thing... see that HDMI port? You CAN record uncompressed if you need it. Very few people do. Even on high end digital cinema cams with material destined for filmout. But the option exists because the camera has full raster sensors. If the sensors are not there in the first place, then you can never get it.
 
PerroneFord said:
Here's the thing... see that HDMI port? You CAN record uncompressed if you need it. Very few people do. Even on high end digital cinema cams with material destined for filmout. But the option exists because the camera has full raster sensors. If the sensors are not there in the first place, then you can never get it.
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You are right. Very few people do this.
 
Does this new Sony cam improve on the encoding part? Supposedly newer cam's with more powerfull/newer processing chips could make better use of the H264 codec.
 
PerroneFord said:
So I guess there was no movement in Slumdog, or District 9, or Public Enemies, or Che, or Knowing, or Book of Eli... Come on man. I just did an entire short with a 5D and there was no tripod on set for the entire month shoot. Camera held up just fine.
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We are not talking about a SI-2K here with amazing lenses and a 2/3" sensor and a million dollar production budget....

In regards to my CMOS camera (t1i)... its unexceptionable IMO as being pro... And the 7D is questionable. Again IMO.

Now when you get up to the 5D, you have a lot more manual control and way better image sensors... probably a much better camera to work with.

Personally rolling shutters annoy me. I see the jello, I see the frames look all sliced in half. Who knows how this cam will work in comparison - 1/3" chips are nice though...
 
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Bram1982 said:
Does this new Sony cam improve on the encoding part? Supposedly newer cam's with more powerfull/newer processing chips could make better use of the H264 codec.
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Doesn't look like it - wiki... I know the 150 has the new 4.1 AVCHD... This sony probably does also, with the 24mbs claim. I am sure we would have heard about a new 4.2 or something of the sort.

The implementation of H.264/AVC codec varies from manufacturer to manufacturer. Canon and Panasonic camcorders use High-Profile@Level-4.1, up to the AVCHD format's maximum bitrate of 24 Mbit/s. The maximum rate of Panasonic HDC-HS300 in its highest HA recording mode is 17Mbit/s. Until their latest releases at CES 2010, Sony camcorders have only used Main-Profile@Level-4.0, at a maximum bitrate of 17 Mbit/s. The High-Profile mode of H264 is more difficult to create and play back than main-profile. Consequently, recordings made by one vendor's camcorder or editing software may be unplayable on another vendor's equipment, leading to a frustrating user experience.
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Keep in mind...just because a camcorder (or DSLR) has an HDMI port does not mean you're recording directly off the sensors.

HDMI as a port option does not imply that no video/audio compression has occurred prior to being transmitted across the HDMI cable.

Get a camera with HD-SDI out...now you're talking :)
 
scapsinger said:
Keep in mind...just because a camcorder (or DSLR) has an HDMI port does not mean you're recording directly off the sensors.

HDMI as a port option does not imply that no video/audio compression has occurred prior to being transmitted across the HDMI cable.

Get a camera with HD-SDI out...now you're talking :)
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Which the HXR-NX5U has . . . grrrrrrr. You just gave me another plus for that camera. Not that I'd be using it right away, but at some point might want to get the nanoFlash.
 
AVCHD H264 encoding is quite capable of recording full raster images with excellent quality (simply blows away HDV). I don't know about Sony's codec implementation, but Panasonic's implementation is equal to or better than XDCAM EX, for image fidelity (see Barry Green's comparison).

The imaging chips in the AX2000/NX5U aren't full raster, but they will resolve considerably more detail than the imaging chips in an HMC150.
 
MadHMC150 said:
We are not talking about a SI-2K here with amazing lenses and a 2/3" sensor and a million dollar production budget....

In regards to my CMOS camera (t1i)... its unexceptionable IMO as being pro... And the 7D is questionable. Again IMO.

Now when you get up to the 5D, you have a lot more manual control and way better image sensors... probably a much better camera to work with.

Personally rolling shutters annoy me. I see the jello, I see the frames look all sliced in half. Who knows how this cam will work in comparison - 1/3" chips are nice though...
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You made absolutely NO allowances in your comments for variation. The glass in front of the SI-2K does not change the CMOS sensors. Making them larger than 1/3" should make the problem WORSE, not better. And the production budget has zero to do with whether a camera is using CMOS or CCD.

The fact is, CMOS can perform just fine. And needs to be evaulated on a camera by camera basis. Casting aspersions on an entire class of chips is silly and plain wrong.

None of us like Jello. But frankly, I think more of it comes down to how the camera is operated than the technology.
 
Whoa. I think I am totally leaning toward the NX5U now. Assuming the AVCHD execution is as good or better than Panasonic's. Reading through the operation manual, and even more than the added resolution, this is really doing it for me:

To record movies using both the memory card and the flash memory unit
(Simultaneous recording)
You can record movies on both of these recording media simultaneously.

The ability to record to two media at the same time is invaluable. I think I can handle a little split-frame flash in exchange for peace of mind, knowing that I have a back-up media.
 
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