New DVX.. Tips?

Bonedog

Bonedog

Active member
I just bought a used 100b and I've spent most of this evening testing it out. I shot passing cars at a variety of shutter speeds and frame rates, then the sun setting across a field at 24p, 1/60, ND 1/64. Looking at the footage on my LCD, it seems sub standard to what I know the dvx can produce. I'm pretty sure this is just because of my inexperience with the camera settings, and am wondering if ya'll could offer a newbie some advice.

The main two things I'm noticing are jagged edges and an overall fuzziness to the picture. I'd appreciate anything you guys can offer.

Thanks,
~Bonedog
 
Congrats! The DVX is a wonderful wonderful camera. I love mine to death.

First off, buy Barry Green's DVX book. It will tell you absolutely everything you need to know about your new camera.

And for the jaggies, what is your method of viewing your footage? DVD, straight from the camera via the s-vid out...? The steps you take prior to displaying but after you have shot your footage can have a profound effect on how it looks.
 
I've viewing importing the footage off the tape and viewing it raw on a NLE timeline. Right now I'm experimenting with exporting it uncompressed and upressed to .mov files.

As for Barry Green's book, after a few weeks on this forum I've realized that It's a necessity. But unfortunately my budget is real tight right now, so I'll probably have to wait until the holidays. But it is definitely on my list.
 
Bonedog said:
I've viewing importing the footage off the tape and viewing it raw on a NLE timeline. Right now I'm experimenting with exporting it uncompressed and upressed to .mov files.
Click to expand...

Rule #1 about post-production: do not trust your computer screen to show you what your footage actually looks like. You will see all sorts of artifacts and weirdness in there that isn't actually there. Your NLE's viewer window is an approximation, designed to play back smoothly and in real time during editing. If you really want to see what it looks like, connect a DV camera or deck via firewire to the computer, and connect the camera's/deck's analog video output to a calibrated production monitor.

Of course, even connecting to a TV will show you a whole different world from your NLE, albeit not a color-accurate one.
 
But wouldn't footage on a lcd monitor, colors calibration aside, display almost identically on an lcd tv?
 
Bonedog said:
But wouldn't footage on a lcd monitor, colors calibration aside, display almost identically on an lcd tv?
Click to expand...

Nope. Try it and you'll see :)

TVs, no matter what display technology (LCD, CRT, Plasma, etc) are much kinder to the images we feed them than your average computer display.
 
Bonedog said:
But wouldn't footage on a lcd monitor, colors calibration aside, display almost identically on an lcd tv?
Click to expand...

One would think. Unfortunately, watching on your LCD computer monitor isn't as simple as viewing on a progressive, LCD screen. Again, your NLE is playing games with your video. It's going to take a hit on resolution.

Also, QuickTime is a terrible way to watch your video for critical monitoring. It also messes with the quality and doesn't really show you what's there.

It's the software, not the hardware, that's the problem. But then, it doesn't mean the software's bad... it's actually doing exactly what it's supposed to be doing.
 
Congrats on the new DVX! I am approaching my second year with it, and I love it so much! my recommendations for starting out is just questions, questions, questions. Ask them here! Read posts. I made probably 500 posts the first year of having my camera...

I do recommend the DVX book, but aside from that expense, things like a tripod, shotgun, basic lighting kit, etc... are good to get started with.

What kind of videos are you planning on shooting?
 
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