My thoughts on the HMC 150 ( A review of sorts)

I'm sorry if i came across as "pissy" as some of you said, I really like the way the review was written. And i would really like to see the "in-depth" version of it, and also would like to read RaviSun3D article!

There's nothing wrong with this write-up! keep it up!
 
First of all, guys, thank you very much for the appreciation of my post. It makes me happy anytime I'm able to contribute to a good discussion.

I do feel bad for the pissy remark. I did not intend to direct that to anyone specifically here. I wrote that post pretty quickly, and I'm really referring to the "culture" of dismissal that often occurs on the boards. I'm sure we're all guilty of rudeness due to the anonymity of the internet. I know I am. I'm just trying to reinforce good habits and manners, for my self mostly and hopefully and for others too. So, I don't intend to be Holier than Thou.

20 years ago when I chatted on the internet there wasn't so much contempt for other people's opinions. But I don't mean to go on and on. The point is simply to reflect and make sure we all contribute to debate and not argument, in addition, we all benefit from making sure our posts are not motivated by anything personal; that we remember we're here to exchange knowledge, period.

IMHO there's no such thing as a stupid post: it's either relevant or irrelevant.

Back to the cams, and I hope this isn't too etherial: I think it's nearly impossible to really measure sharpness (not that we shouldn't try)... the reason is that everyone sees differently. My vision is Red-Green deficient and that HAS to affect my perception when comparing cameras and footage. It's not enough to really affect anything in day to day life (my Dr. tells me). I'm not color blind. But for instance, and this is only speculation, being that I am lacking a normal amount of color information in my sight, a panny's camera with it's lush colors may compensate to some degree that a sony may not. Therefore, I may perceive more information when looking at panny footage. I also have migraines, which most people don't know, affect vision even when there is no headache. It's a vascular disease, and affects were blood is diverted in the visual areas of the brain. And they do this in ways that are not fully understood by science. Conversely, none of this may be a factor, but due to the motion of panny processing, when I look at still footage relative to moving footage, I just process things differently in the old rear lobe anyway. It's far too complex for any kind of definitive conclusion.

I have a friend who has (uncorrected) 20/15 vision, but needs to sit far away from his monitor because his vision often loses his mouse... his peripheral vision is damaged (idiopathic). This is, of course going to affect his "theater" experience a great deal. He may do much better with 1.66 aspect ration than 2.35, because he simply can't digest the extra wide areas of the screen.

Add to this that sony's ex1 drops rez during pans, so is exerting a type of processing that is not common or understood. (It still looks awesome.) As Barry Green put it, we all know he EX1 takes amazing STILL footage. Alot of people do complain that panny looks "soft." But assuming their pixelshift (although as far as I know the hmc150 has not been totally confirmed to have the "exact" same imaging block as the hpx170 or hvx200a) really does get us 810 x 1440 rez. Si-2k if my math isn't off is not that much different once the footage is demosiaced (assuming 70 to 75% resolution, noting that color sampling would be very difficult to compare). Most people would say si-2k looks sharper. Why?

I don't know. Also there are some cameras that begin with full raster 1080p. How much of that rez is being thrown out due to artifacting? Or, perhaps a VERY small amount is OLPF'd allowing a great deal of artifacts that may be very difficult to see due to the compression that particular camera employs.

I know when I convert my DVDs to h.264 I notice a serious "smoothing" going on making the footage more pleasing to my eye. If the source material were coming off of a heavily aliased source, I imagine this would make a great deal of difference and reduce the need for aggressive OLPF.

With the new moon landing footage in mind among many other developments like RAW motion photography, I think we (the end users) are beginning to give more attention to the processing of our data rather than just the front end of the camera. The processing is so difficult to compare due to both complexity and the proprietary nature of each camera system. Think if you took vision3 kodak stock, perfectly shot to a 1940s lab. Now take 1940s 35mm to a 2009 lab. Which would likely look better? It's tough for me to say because my specialty is not celluloid, but it's safe to assume it would greatly affect the final output. Since processing is the digital equivalent to developing... well.

Of course this is all my speculation and opinion only, nothing more. As I read this back it's rather random, but I do firmly believe that we need to separate perceived sharpness versus actual sharpness, and I guess my point here is that this is a far more difficult task than we think due to a variety of factors, some of which we don't often think about. I could be, and probably am in error about a lot of this stuff, but I'm thinking out loud, and sometimes thinking out loud helps others with similar thoughts.

Ok, time for my Zaleplon and a good night's sleep. ..... maybe I already took it and that's why I posted this. "Did I say that, or just think it? Did they hear me?"
 
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