Laptops & notebooks as monitors

[Carlos_E._Martinez]

Carrying things around has become a logistic problem when flying around. Airlines are getting more restrictive in weight you can carry on board, so I'm looking for tools that I can use for several purposes.

Video monitoring comes first in that list, particularly when focusing an be an issue.

So I wonder what laptops or notebooks around can be linked to an HD camera, and how, to be used as monitor devices.

I'm not talking of programs like Adobe On Location, which did not quite work for me, but more advanced methods, delivering real HD quality.

Any suggestions?

 

[BrianMurphy]

There are several boxes out that allow monitoring over an ad-hoc network. Teradek makes one Paralink Arrow and there are others. There are latency issues with most. The quality of your laptop screen might be fine for a client monitor, PA notes, but you sure don't want to use it to judge lighting or focus etc.
If you check the search engine there are several threads on all of the above and others. Good luck!

 

[Carlos_E._Martinez]

I'm afraid what you're suggesting is not what I was talking about.

You talk of a network, wireless in the case of Teradek, and that would probably be quite expensive if quality is an issue. I would go for a cable if possible.

Also I'm not so sure about image quality on a laptop being as problematic as you suggest. What was the gear you had such problems with? Today I talked to a friend of mine who is also a DP and produced/directed a feature using a Sony Z7. He linked it via USB to his ACER notebook for that job with great quality HD image.

I also did a search on Google and here, on monitoring a camera with a laptop, and found very few results. Though maybe I'm using the wrong parameters for it. Focus and color shifts were no problems with my friend.