HVX UPDATE: Jarred and Barry go to Hollywood

That's very true ChuckS but if you are working with a no budget production unfortunately penny's need to be pinched, what fwe pennie you have anyways. Hell I would shoot everything with a Genesis if I could, lol
 
I understand the no-budget thing, but even if you don't spend any money look at the effort you put into getting everyone on the same page of production - the day of the shoot, just to trust all of that IP to a $300 comsumer device that was not designed for the purpose your using it. When considering the reliability of a hard drive one of the things you look at is the error rate, I bet the error rate of an ipod is very low. That's not to say that it won't work but all of your effort goes into "the picture." If you can't afford a realistic data management strategy then I would advise purchasing a less expensive camera - a DVX100a.

Buying an HVX200 and backing up the data on an ipod is a bit like buying a monster truck and putting 13" tires on it.
 
So, Jarred, you got the camera all by yourself for an hour and you didn't try to made some testing footage with it that we can now enjoy - stills, or even better, movies? What's up, man, we're counting on you here!
 
I was too busy taking photos.. we did take lots of movies of Barry dancing around in a tu-tu but I promised him I wouldn't post those :)
 
ChuckS I'm happy to say I have a DVX100a and a wonderful camera it is. the ipod is just a solution for mobile transfer, I would love to see a DC powered Hard Drive that would be far the better choice, faster and more reliable. A lot of people may already have ipods though which means they can play around, if even with just a 4gb P2 card. I honestly agree with you when it comes to full out production and having a garuantee that your footage is safe.

Massive field acquisition and the abilitiy to hand the client the 'tapes' after shooting has been a concern of mine since the beggining but the new addition of the upcoming firestore and the new word that it will be possible to transfer to a stand alone HD has made me a happy man! I've been very worried about Run-N-Gun HD shooting capabilities with this camera but the solutions are starting to reveal themselves and I feel by March of next year there will be some more surprises than just the firestore, heck maybe even a fully working HVX200 for sale.

Take care...
 
Isn't an Ipod just a 4200RPM hard drive? Or is it 5200RPM? Either way, its a hard drive. I dont know what guarrantees other manufacturers offer, but i would argue that the hard drives that Firestore utilises are not any better. In fact i could see more complications arising from the Firestores. Out of all the people i know who have Ipods, (quite a lot) not one of them has ever lost any of their data, whether it be music, photos or just data files. In fact i have used the Ipod to edit DV with. So it should be fine for simply transferring files, holding them temporarily and offloading to another hard drive. Of course it wont be quick.

I am actually excited to test this solution for myself. If it works great, if it doesnt, than its going have to be Firestore, and who knows how reliable those drives will be also. But an 60-80GB hard drive for $400 thats battery powered, and truly portable, I am all for it.
 
..I was a little concerned when i found out that I would need a power cource for the off the shelf drives attached to the HVX to dump to. but really. Ive always got power for lights and monitors, and other stuff anyway.. and a cars power inverter would work in a bind. you could also run a HDD off one those booster pack jump starters with a built in power inverter for quite some time.. and its got a nice carrying handle.. and will jump your car after you leave the lights on too long as well :) those are cheap.. like 30.00-50.00 theres other potable pattery options as well, but i dont think itll be an issue really anymore.
 
How would you get footage into that little ipod ? Do they sell special firewire cables for this purpose ? Ipods have that weird connector in the butt
 
rgdfilms said:
How would you get footage into that little ipod ? Do they sell special firewire cables for this purpose ? Ipods have that weird connector in the butt
Click to expand...

Yeah, it takes it in the butt. Its a Firewire cable that attaches to the dock. Its $20.
 
Jarred Land said:
What is the longest dramatic take you ever shot? I know mine is probally closer to a minute than 5.. I think having 5 minutes is a good number for entire scenes.. well at least one angle. While the DP is changing lighting thats time for the offload.
Click to expand...

I agree... the only time you might come close is if you are trying to show off your talent in a crazy "The West Wing" type of shot or something with a well written scene, great actors and maybe a steadycam (with a good operator)... so you rehearse it for ever as if it was for a play. But even then it comes accross only subliminally to most non-film-buff people that you rock... and even so, you are risking quite a bit... you might not get what you wanted or hoped for, then you might have too much pressure from your team to use it anyway, you might even feel you can't keep yourself from using it even though it isn't how it should have been...

The 4G card will give you all you need...

On respect to the other subject: I think that it you have an iPod and you are shooting an indie you might just end up using it... I will probably look for a hughe HDD just cause I know a 320G or a 500G are not that much more money and your cost per G stays really low... I will also use a power inverter if I have to to use an HDD that needs AC... chances are that if you cn't have a car close by then you will have a power socket close by and vice-versa... unless you are by the beach and you can't bring your car there...
 
A reply to Barry's Reply

A reply to Barry's Reply

Thanks for the reply Barry!

1. I agree that I didn't see the chroma fringing on the prerecorded footage and this is definitely a good thing. It was when I was playing around with the camera at the Panasonic demo booth. There was just as much fringing as one would find in a DVX image evident around areas of highlight in the courtyard.

2. I would love to believe that it was just monitor causing problems....well in terms of richness of color I agree completely. It wasn't a professional CRT monitor, and is therefore destined to look much much worse. BUT... it was a 1080i monitor. It was one of their new professional series LCD monitors...I don't remember the name. But it displayed "1080i" at the top when she (Jan) was playing the footage from the DVCProHD deck (which she dubbed to from the P2 cards) and then "480p" when she switched over to the DVX100B). So, yes I know it's still not 1080p but neither was the XL-HI technically.

3. So in the end my post was just to raise attention to the fact that I found this camera (in it's prototype stage) to not be as free of traditional problems as you guys did (or as much as I hoped it would be). I am by no means trying to convince people to buy the Canon instead. If the HVX does everything we hope it does when finished, I'll still spring for it instead. I believe with all of its promised features intact, that it will still be superior even if it ends up with a slightly softer image and more chroma fringes. I hope it doesn't end up that way, but I'd rather buy it providing it delivers in 1080p and some more latitude like a healthy 8 1/2 to nine stops...okay nine is a pipe dream at this point in time....but speaking of more latitude....

I'm really excited about this horribly named News Gamma. We can always use more shadow and highlight detail.
 
Jenga said:
BUT... it was a 1080i monitor. It was one of their new professional series LCD monitors...I don't remember the name.
Click to expand...
No, it was a 720p monitor. It can accept a 1080i signal but it converts it to 720p. The monitor is a 1280x768 LCD.

Here's the link to the monitor on Panasonic's site:
http://catalog2.panasonic.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/ModelDetail?displayTab=O&storeId=11201&catalogId=13051&itemId=94264&catGroupId=14625&modelNo=BT-LH1700W&surfModel=BT-LH1700W


but I'd rather buy it providing it delivers in 1080p and some more latitude like a healthy 8 1/2 to nine stops...okay nine is a pipe dream at this point in time....but speaking of more latitude....
Click to expand...
There's not a chance it'll have nine stops! 7 is amazing enough... we were expecting it'd be more like five and a half, like the Z1. 7 is a big step up, considering it's a 1/3" high-def camera.
 
Jenga said:
I'm really excited about this horribly named News Gamma. We can always use more shadow and highlight detail.
Click to expand...
Haven't seen it, but I think it was designed to match SonyGamma for seamless integration into existing Betacam operations at news organizations. Ick!

I would sincerely appreciate a clear explanation of what it does, exactly.
 
naw, they don't need to -- Beta's already been mostly exterminated in news in the US. At NAB Panasonic claimed that their DVCPRO format controls 70% of news acquisition in the US...
 
thisiswells said:
Haven't seen it, but I think it was designed to match SonyGamma for seamless integration into existing Betacam operations at news organizations. Ick!

I would sincerely appreciate a clear explanation of what it does, exactly.
Click to expand...

The News Gamma is one that allows for a black stretch for dark detail and compress highlights and more of a straight line inbetween. It has nothing to do with SonyGamma. And as you say Ick, or I say Eeeuwww! ;-)

I think for narrative work one of the cine gammas would be vastly more interesting. I happen to like the cinelike D setting of the DVX100A as my personal fav, but I can hardly wait to see it on the HVX.

Best,

Jan
 
Jan_Crittenden said:
The News Gamma is one that allows for a black stretch for dark detail and compress highlights and more of a straight line inbetween.
Click to expand...
Thank you so much, Jan, for your clear and detailed description. I also like Cine-D gamma on the DVX100a.

Sincerely,
Brian Wells
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top