How to satisfy HDV & DVCAM clients with HPX300?

nedcam

nedcam

Well-known member
I have two jobs coming up where different clients are still in the HDV & DVCAM world. Other sections of the videos were shot in those formats so I am not interested in proseltyzing about DVCPRO P2, rather, how can I avoid renting other cameras and use the HPX300? Any codecs within the 300 that will work with the editor's timelines? If these are long shoots I don't want to do a lot of post and encoding. I would prefer just giving them a drive to go.

For the DVCAM gig I could go BNC (maybe firewire?) out of the 300 into my portable Sony DSR20 DVCAM deck but then I'd be worried I have to quickly move positions or go handheld.

Any ideas?

Thanks!
 
Hi Ned what edit package are they using?

I just did some similar tests and was amazed at what I could do with DVCPro and a powerbook G4 running FCP v5, it all worked very smoothly and even though its only an 800mhz machine with less than a gig of ram the workflow for news and SD shooting was very quick.
 
Maybe I'm out of it, but -- is there any editing program left on earth that doesn't allow you to drop multiple formats in the same timeline? I don't know if there's any "real" editing programs left that don't support AVC-Intra, but surely every one of them supports DVCPRO-HD...
 
For DVCam, just use the DV codec in the camera. DV & DVCam are the same when it comes to codecs, DVCam tape runs at a faster speed and a wider head width, but once digitized they are the same 25 mps file. Mix and match. As for HDV, I'm not sure.

John
 
If they are combining HDV and DVCam already then they are not that worried about matching. As Barry said the editor should be able to handle it. Their bigger issue is matching styles of shooter. The differences between shooters is typically more easily visible then the difference between cameras or formats (in real shooting environments). Now I wouldn't try to combine a flip camera with a 3700 or anything without a serious need, or graphic cover, but hopefully you get my jist.

Your problem may be that there are a lot of people who are stuck in old school ways and won't want to deal with it. For those clients I either rent the camera if the rate is good enough, or pass on the job.
 
OP here: These are two separate clients wanting two different formats. Both are non-technical types who were requested to find a shooter with such a codec friendly camera. Usually I finagle my way to the editor but in both cases I can't: in one case the editor is "too busy" for me to contact and the other they don't know who the editor is. When I do manage to contact editors they are usually "fine with P2" and just spec either 60/30/24, protect 4x3 or not.

So if I understand correctly from Suthvid setting to 480 DV will look the "same" as DVCAM?

That leaves HDV: if I shoot 1080/60 and the editor drops it into his HDV timeline, will that "look" the same as HDV? I know both these clients are PC which could mean Premiere/Vegas/Pinnacle rather than FCP.
 
I think you will find that shooting 1080 60 on a 300 will look far better than any HDV camera, that is why I got rid of my Z7 and S270 HDV just doesn't look very good.

I have a similar problem with the shooting of a drama next month, the director wants to edit it at home on his PC with Edius.

I am going to do some tests next week to find the best codec so that he can edit it with ease, I suspect we will end up DVCPro or AVC intra 50 as he normally shoots for his small projects DV or HDV with a sony A1.
 
nedcam said:
I have two jobs coming up where different clients are still in the HDV & DVCAM world. Other sections of the videos were shot in those formats so I am not interested in proseltyzing about DVCPRO P2, rather, how can I avoid renting other cameras and use the HPX300? Any codecs within the 300 that will work with the editor's timelines? If these are long shoots I don't want to do a lot of post and encoding. I would prefer just giving them a drive to go.

For the DVCAM gig I could go BNC (maybe firewire?) out of the 300 into my portable Sony DSR20 DVCAM deck but then I'd be worried I have to quickly move positions or go handheld.

Any ideas?

Thanks!
Click to expand...

What are your HDV clients transcoding the HDV to? And what are the DVCAM clients doing, DV25? On what plaform?
At the end of the Day it seems they want a tape from you, in both cases one DVCAM the other HDV, giving them an Drive full of material they cannot open anyways, will only hurt, unless you know what software they are posting in.

And also, why don't you DUB the HPX300 material via SDI/(BNC) to the DVCAM deck after you're done shooting, and not during....

Also in both cases print-to-tape is an option, (at least via Final Cut - TESTED) where you take a ProRes422 source of your HPX300 output,
then throw them a DV25 or HDV output via firewire - all you need is to get your hands on a cheap HDV camcorder that supports print to tape on HDV it will support miniDV as well.

You'd only have to do this once, so a 60min tape would take 60min plus some prep time to print-to-tape.
 
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I recently did work for a client that had previously been shooting /cutting HDV. I shot some AVC I 720 30 P material for them and they have been thanking me ever since. With the P2 workflow she is getting material in her edit system faster than before, beginning the edit sooner, the green screen material I shot keyed beautifully and everything "looks better" to my client's eye.
 
It's been awhile since I used Edius, but you can (or could back in '07) throw anything at the timeline and it would take it, mixed formats, etc. PC wasn't an issue.
 
nedcam said:
So if I understand correctly from Suthvid setting to 480 DV will look the "same" as DVCAM?

That leaves HDV: if I shoot 1080/60 and the editor drops it into his HDV timeline, will that "look" the same as HDV? I know both these clients are PC which could mean Premiere/Vegas/Pinnacle rather than FCP.
Click to expand...
Part 1: Yes, DV and DVCAM are the same quality, it's only a speed/tape pitch difference, but they are identical 25 mb formats.)
Part 2: Depending on the editing software, I don't think you could put HPX300 1080-60i on the same timeline as HDV footage (except maybe with Edius.) I am dumping a job to DVCAM tape as I write this... You record in DV format (I'm using 16x9, so I set it to "squeeze mode") and plug a firewire cable from the camera to a DV or DVCAM deck (I use the DSR-30). One person here said "use an SDI cable from the camera to the DVCAM deck", but I don't know of a DVCAM deck that uses SDI... (maybe a $15000 one)
 
Since I can't communicate with the editor I'll just rent a Sony Z1U and add it to the bill. Less grief. Some of these "set in their way" clients just want tapes in their hands when we wrap and are still paranoid of hard drives. If there is no economic incentive for them to change and they've been satisfied with DVCAM & HDV over the years, no sense aggravating them as long as they pay the rental of a different model.

Thanks everyone for your ideas.
 
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