Hyperdeck Shuttle 2.0 - Another External Recorder Option
- Thread starter nsoltz
- Start date
Guy_Cochran
DVXUser Sponsor
One thing to keep in mind, yes, the Blackmagic HyperDeck will pass HDMI to HD-SDI and HD-SDI to HDMI but.... you need to make sure that your HDMI monitor can support the resolution.
For example, if I want to monitor with a large off the shelf consumer "LCD TV" via HDMI from my HD-SDI camera, it may not work. When I switch to 24p my large HDMI monitor doesn't understand the signal and goes black (out of range). If I feed a 1080i 60 signal through HDMI, then it works fine. So, yes the HyperDeck works as an HD-SDI to HDMI converter- but....it just passes the native signal though and does no cross conversion. My 5" Marshall LCD monitor does understand the signal in 24p and displays appropriately.
Postmaster
Dark Side of the Camera
Yeah, that would be great, especially because David form Cineform told me, that BMD has licensed the codec quite a while ago.
I guess when we all forked out an other $345 for the shuttle2 they come up with the shuttle3 and Cinform next fall.
Oh well.... I guess i cant afford not to buy it.
Guy_Cochran
DVXUser Sponsor
I happen to have the HyperDeck Studio, the rack mount version, here in our showroom with the 2.0 public beta firmware. I have switched the unit over to capture DNxHD and recorded a few sample clips. If anyone would like to test the recorded MXF file workflow on their NLE, feel free to download these clip(s). It would be helpful if you could report back your findings.
http://dve.s3.amazonaws.com/Hyperdeck2.zip
Yes you can..
http://avid.custkb.com/avid/app/selfservice/search.jsp?DocId=423319
And regarding the mounting plate...it's f###### $95!
Cory Braun
Well-known member
Yea but if you think of the whole thing as $450 it's still by far the cheapest recorder.
Andrew Stone
Veteran
Most cheese/weight plates similar to this are in $200 to $300 price bracket. Your complaining is misplaced in my view.
Other companies in the video recording business see Blackmagic's pricing on this recorder as predatory. You should consider yourself fortunate, at this point in time, that a recorder solution like this is available at this price point.
this may be a stupid question. but DNxHD 220 is the 1080/60i mode, right? so if I am shooting 24p (which should be DNxHD 175) will it still capture in DNxHD codecs? I am confused by the 220, it sort of makes it sound like it only records 220 in 1080/60 mode. But I am easily confused! 
Barry_Green
Moderator
Thanks for providing the files.
Downloaded the Avid codecs and installed them on a Windows 7 64-bit system.
Downloaded the MXF files...
Vegas Pro 10 failed to import.
Windows Media Player failed to play.
Quicktime Player failed to play.
Adobe Premiere Pro CS5 could import the audio files, but on the video file it said it had an "unsupported compression type."
Postmaster
Dark Side of the Camera
DNxHD in MOV is not a problem, but in MXF is a nightmare. Almost nothing supports it natively, except AVID.
Solutions:
1. CalibratedQ software- 250$. Can create reference MOV file, which can be opened in most NLE- Premiere, Vegas (99% sure), Edius etc. Shows all metadata in MXF also.
2. Re-wrapping to MOV with free ffmbc tool. Just takes as much time as copying. It simply copies DNxHD data (100% same data) from MXF container and puts into MOV. Than it works as above.
DNxHD v ProRes- both have similar compression ratio (in highest quality modes), but ProRes is better. DNxHD in case of some noisy, difficult sources, softness image and can even start macroblocking. ProRes is more resistant, but also not as good as Cineform, due to it's bitrate limits. Apple say it's VBR, but not really- it only goes about 10% above average bitrate (but can go way below), so not really VBR. Cineform is less restricted and keeps quality for every source. Apple's white paper show PSNR graph for STEM (some special testing footage) and there is difficult scene at about 700 frames in, where ProRes goes down to 44PSNR (this is not that great anymore)- in this place Cineform still keeps 54dB (bitrate is probably above 300Mbit fot this scene). This is main difference- beside this ProRes is very good- for clean footage like F3 it keeps amazing quality.
Solutions:
1. CalibratedQ software- 250$. Can create reference MOV file, which can be opened in most NLE- Premiere, Vegas (99% sure), Edius etc. Shows all metadata in MXF also.
2. Re-wrapping to MOV with free ffmbc tool. Just takes as much time as copying. It simply copies DNxHD data (100% same data) from MXF container and puts into MOV. Than it works as above.
DNxHD v ProRes- both have similar compression ratio (in highest quality modes), but ProRes is better. DNxHD in case of some noisy, difficult sources, softness image and can even start macroblocking. ProRes is more resistant, but also not as good as Cineform, due to it's bitrate limits. Apple say it's VBR, but not really- it only goes about 10% above average bitrate (but can go way below), so not really VBR. Cineform is less restricted and keeps quality for every source. Apple's white paper show PSNR graph for STEM (some special testing footage) and there is difficult scene at about 700 frames in, where ProRes goes down to 44PSNR (this is not that great anymore)- in this place Cineform still keeps 54dB (bitrate is probably above 300Mbit fot this scene). This is main difference- beside this ProRes is very good- for clean footage like F3 it keeps amazing quality.
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Barry_Green
Moderator
Yeah, hmmm... not interested in rewrapping or in transcoding.
Can the Hyperdeck not just record DNxHD in a MOV file?
Can the Hyperdeck not just record DNxHD in a MOV file?
Guy_Cochran
DVXUser Sponsor
:embarasse
Thanks for the info and for testing. I found the same issues with Adobe Premiere CS5.5 on Mac and Windows as well as FCP 7. I was hoping for a nice smooth drag and drop workflow without transcoding once the Avid codecs were installed on the system.
In this beta version 2.0 RC2, nope. The files recorded to the SSD are 1 Video and 2 Audio .mxf files. There are no other settings to adjust and there is no folder structure. It records at the root level of the drive.
Now the Uncompressed .mov files drag and drop into all the editing apps I tested. What are we missing? There's gotta be an easy way, and without dropping $250 on CalibratedQ or similar software.
No easy way- except asking BM to record directly to MOV (which also works in AVID).
I don't see a problem- do you copy your data from SDD to some local drive?
If yes than this is the step when you re-wrap to MOV- for free and as I said- as fast as drives are. It won't add any time compared to copying.
If someone is interested I can help- there is also simple GUI for batch converting. It's as simple as drag and drop and press go
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Postmaster
Dark Side of the Camera
Actually I wonder if it is worth the whole thing - at least on the FS100.
Though I know - at lest on paper - an external recorder with a good codec sould be better than AVCHD.
But when I look at my files, AVCHD looks better and holds about the same in CC as uncompressed.
One reason is (again only for the FS100 and maybe F3) that the codec adjusts himself to your settings (like gain).
The Signal over HDMI is not adjusted.
The other thing is, that we maybe have to rethink, what we think that know about color sampling.
Frank
Though I know - at lest on paper - an external recorder with a good codec sould be better than AVCHD.
But when I look at my files, AVCHD looks better and holds about the same in CC as uncompressed.
One reason is (again only for the FS100 and maybe F3) that the codec adjusts himself to your settings (like gain).
The Signal over HDMI is not adjusted.
The other thing is, that we maybe have to rethink, what we think that know about color sampling.
Frank
220 is the maximum bit rate and applies to 30p/60i.this may be a stupid question. but DNxHD 220 is the 1080/60i mode, right? so if I am shooting 24p (which should be DNxHD 175) will it still capture in DNxHD codecs? I am confused by the 220, it sort of makes it sound like it only records 220 in 1080/60 mode. But I am easily confused!
If recording 25p/50i, it is proportionally smaller, I forget what exact rate, 185 I think.
24p is also proportionally smaller.
220 is the nominal bit rate.
Matt Gottshalk
Resident Preditor
AVCHD is no near quality of ProRes or DNXHD- sorry, but AVCHD is only good enough for wedding DVDs
Thousands of users on this board disagree with you, but you are entitled to your misguided opinion.