Longest Clip Length for HMC150

C

caiofilm

Member
I'm shooting a lecture next week and remember hearing about issues with clip length or size. The lecture is schedule to be about an hour long. Should I stop and restart every 10 min. or so when recording? I'm used to shooting narrative shorts so the longest take I've recorded so far has been about 3 min. for a master shot. Any advice out there? Also I've heard there were audio problems with the onboard mic. Has anyone used a wireless lav with onboard audio? I'm also used to having a separate sound guy on narratives, but most docs and industrials use mics wired into onboard.

thanks for any insight.

CaioFilm
 
I've recorded over 2 hours straight on a 32GB card with no problems. No audio glitches, no dropped frames, and 1 long clip showing up in FCP, ready to edit.

Be sure and format the card in the camera, and it might help to have the 150's latest firmware, which I think is v. 1.19.
 
The HMC150 can record for up to 12 hours at a time, depending on what recording mode you select. Even in the very highest-quality PH mode you can get three continuous hours on a single 32GB card.

Audio issues are way overblown, the audio issues being talked about are taking place in places with massive SPL, such as live concerts. You should have no problem whatsoever with the audio if you're using appropriate mics for the job.
 
I shot several times 1h to 1h35 clips with a 16GB Panasonic card.

You should not experiment issues. Maybe if you use a cheaper card like a 32GB non Panasonic class 4 card, but with a good 16GB card, you should not have any issues.
 
the video cuts at 4 gigs nomatter what. but u can get a program to re conect the parts befor you convert them(if u do) they show up in the camera as 1 clip but transfer as 4 gig or so sized clips.
 
I've read many posts about this 4GB limit, separate clips being created, and a 3rd party program needed to rejoin them, but I have never experienced this. I get one clip each time I press record and stop, no matter how long it is.

I have never needed to rejoin clips, and i have not seen any dropped frames or audio glitches at this so-called 4GB limit. I've recorded lots of long sessions, and never missed so much as a frame.

Why are others seeing this? It seems like this would take away one of the main advantages of shooting tapeless , which is to be able to record long sessions continuously without dropout worries, so I am glad my camera doesn't behave this way.
 
Mike... the HMC150 only records to cards with the FAT32 file system, so the camera HAS to start a new clip at 4GB, as FAT32 can't work with anything larger. Your camera does do this... if you record one clip longer than about 25 minutes at the highest bit rate (which roughly equals 4GB), then look into the directory to find the actual .MTS files, you'll see multiple clips. If you are transcoding to DVCProHD with the Main Concept transcoder Panasonic provides, it will rejoin the clips. However, when I try to edit natively in CS4, it uses the separate clips.

However, there are no dropped frames or audio glitches at the file breaks. It's all seamless if you line them up in the timeline. Plus, 90 minutes is still only 4 files, so it's not really a big deal. Given all the pro's of this camera, the 4GB limit barely registers as a mild inconvenience.
 
I think the "joining" issue depends on the NLE. I have shot almost 90 minutes continuous which produced 4 clips on the card. When I dropped the clips into the timeline, there were problems at the "splits". I used the MTS join tool (uses "append" command to join the files) and the single file did not display any problems at the 4Gb points.
So, again the issue is not the files created on teh SD card, it is with the AVCHD implenetation in the NLE.
 
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