HVX discussed in ASC magazine

holditnowfilms said:
I'm just curious. What exactly are all you people doing with this 2k or even 1080p footage? What is the market for it? Do you guys all shoot theatrical stuff or burn out to film? If so what type of stuff? Anything I could go see and check out this 2k look? Or do you just want to shoot 2k then downrez it back to 1080i or 720p or SD for mass audience viewing? Does the 2k image really look that much better broadcast at 1080i and compressed by the broadcaster and then again by the DVR?
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On this year´s IFA in Berlin (supposedly the biggest consumer electronics / entertainment convention) the big hype was FullHD, huge panels everywhere - state of the art.
There where also some 4K panels and I´m sure there will be more next year.
So, soon the term "film out" will give you a big "What?". It´s a video world now, period.
Sure, it will take a couple of years to really go mainstream, but there definetely will be more and more demand for 1080 in the near future...

Back on topic: the HVX is noisy (which can be taken care of to a certain degree...) and has a rather organic picture compared to other cameras that opt for the ultra sharp "live" HD look.
It´s a 1/3" HD camera for around 6000$ and has offered a lot of people the oportunity to own the camera and capture great images.
10 years ago this price value ratio probably was unthinkable, hell, all this pixel counting nerds should shoot there next project on VHS again:D
(the only circumstance where I find that "who´s got the biggest chip" talk relevant is of course greenscreen work, otherwise I couldn´t care less...)
 
The potential 2k is definitely derived from something less. I have information that suggests the HVX is a 960x540 imager. There is technical engineering and then there is the eye. Andromeda output looks good through my eyes.

As William, the uncompressed data is also what I am mostly looking for, 10-bit is enough and manageable for long form.
 
If you are happy with the Andromeda output, as I am, then I foreshadow the Hydra will produce approximately the same quality output, a little larger at up to 2k and up to 60p.

Chris Oben was doing some tests a while back, seeing if the HVX could be used to marry with their HDCam footage, for shots that were too dangerous with the HDCam or for run and gun shots, which you could not practically do with a heavy HDCam rig. Here is the link; PDF

Interesting enough, the last page has some info sourced from Panasonic guru engineer, Steve Maher:

"In response to my inquiry as to why the results of the above test show that 1080 has higher resolution than 720P, Steve Mahrer of Panasonic Broadcast writes:

The HVX200 is a multi-format three chip native HD / SD camera; the imagers used are progressive, 1/3" and 960 x 540 pixels. We use a closely specified half pixel horizontal and vertical spatial offset of the (R ed + Blue) to the Green imagers. Each imager is then fed to its own 14 bit A/D, this is then fed to the camera's DSP “engine”

This new video DSP “engine” parallel processes the CCD content and in the luminance matrix processing area combines the sampled video onto a 1920 x 1080 array. The beauty of this system is that we gain an approximate 30-40% increase in effective luminance resolution from the spatial offsetting over the native imager resolution. This “correlated” image data is then gamma corrected, detail enhanced, matrixed, colour corrected etc as required. The 1920 x 1080 video "array" data is then format converted, sub-sampled and then compressed to whatever recording format is chosen by the user.

In the US HVX200 cameras, the 1080 DVCPRO HD CODEC uses a 1280 x 1080 sampling matrix for the Y signal, the R-Y/B-Y is 640 x 1080. The Y signal derived from the 3 CCDs is thus more than sufficient to saturate the 1080i CODEC and produce a very high quality image.

In 720p we sample at 960 x 720 (Y) and 480 x 720 (R-Y/B-Y), this is why the 1080p looks slightly sharper than the 720p CODEC, yet both are derived from the same CCDs…."

So 960x540 turns into 2k, then I guess you may say that Juan will tap the signal at that point. I am all for the Andromeda and Hydra and my eyes tell me the output of the Andromeda is much better the native DVX camera and Hydra will likely be much better than 1080pA24 HVX to P2, although the later may be lesser improvement to some extent, due to P2 being a 4:2:2 signal, as opposed to DV being 4:1:1 or 4:2:0, depending on NTSC/PAL model.

Technically, not sure if it really truly is a duck, however, to me, it will likely look like one walking. :D
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Christopher Barry said:
So 960x540 turns into 2k, then I guess you may say that Juan will tap the signal at that point.
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It turns into a 1920x1080 matrix for processing, but not with the level of detail that a "true" 2k camera is capable of resolving, which are two very different things. To quote from what you posted before from Steve Mahrer of Panasonic :
The beauty of this system is that we gain an approximate 30-40% increase in effective luminance resolution from the spatial offsetting over the native imager resolution.
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In other words, these 960x540 chips are capable of giving a true max luminance resolution of somewhere around 1248x702 (@30%) to 1344x756 (@40%). Respectable HD figures, big enough to make the use of 1080 recording advantageous over 720, but not in any way approaching true 2k resolutions, regardless of how the signal is recorded.
 
It is technically something like that hd, no debate from me. I like to research and then trust my eyes for final analysis.

The extra dynamic range, uncompressed RGB 4:4:4 final image from Hydra should be better than the 1280x1080 image with a 1.5 aspect ratio applied (25P European HVX is 1440x1080 with a 1.33 aspect ratio) DVCPRO HD truncated to 8-bit file recorded to P2.

IMO, the price of about US$3500, provides good value, where as some of the next camera options to get to uncompressed/RAW are much more expensive. Yet, I see your point.
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So....what's the best way to uprez a 720 24pn to 1080 24p for a HDCam master?
I experimented with an uncompressed QT export from Avid in both 1280 x 720, and a 1920 x 1080 and brought it to a post house for a Da Vinci color test. He couldn't lay the 720 to HDCam tape, but the 1080 looked good, but is that the best way, from Avid? I'm trying a QT Reference file into After Effects (16 or 32 bpc?) and then export my uncompressed QT. Advice?
 
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