New Panasonic Gear Announcements Apr 15

Well I can't help but be thoroughly disappointed. This is THE year for the cinematic camera market and Panny has nothing to offer. This is a serious problem, as I feel like more people than ever are making major upgrades / transitions to the S35 format.

Not to say panny doesn't have nice cinematic offerings already, but the lack of af100 successor (not even a mock up prototype??) tells me they may not be committed to the format. If that is the case, then boy, what a big mistake on their part. The af100 could have been a S35 from the beginning.

The other cinematic camera, the gh2? Panny got lucky there. It wasn't internal strategy that made it a hit in the film world, it was hackers. Basically, I'm just not convinced that video m4/3 is where their heart is at. To be honest, I don't even KNOW where there heart is at now. Whats more - they basically have usurped the p2 format that many of us are deeply invested in, turning it into what looks like an expensive SD format. sheesh. I'm sure it will be a great product, but old school p2 people are getting screwed. You cant adapt old style p2s into SD slots.

Sorry for the debbie downer, I was just hoping that panny would really bring it this year. I'm afraid theyre gonna be wayyy behind if they don't act til next year. As loyal as I have been to Panny over the years, I gotta say Sony and the FS100 are looking pretty attractive right now.
 
dv416 said:
Well I can't help but be thoroughly disappointed. This is THE year for the cinematic camera market and Panny has nothing to offer. This is a serious problem, as I feel like more people than ever are making major upgrades / transitions to the S35 format.

Not to say panny doesn't have nice cinematic offerings already, but the lack of af100 successor (not even a mock up prototype??) tells me they may not be committed to the format. If that is the case, then boy, what a big mistake on their part. The af100 could have been a S35 from the beginning.

The other cinematic camera, the gh2? Panny got lucky there. It wasn't internal strategy that made it a hit in the film world, it was hackers. Basically, I'm just not convinced that video m4/3 is where their heart is at. To be honest, I don't even KNOW where there heart is at now. Whats more - they basically have usurped the p2 format that many of us are deeply invested in, turning it into what looks like an expensive SD format. sheesh. I'm sure it will be a great product, but old school p2 people are getting screwed. You cant adapt old style p2s into SD slots.

Sorry for the debbie downer, I was just hoping that panny would really bring it this year. I'm afraid theyre gonna be wayyy behind if they don't act til next year. As loyal as I have been to Panny over the years, I gotta say Sony and the FS100 are looking pretty attractive right now.
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I might be completely wrong, and I know I've said it before earlier...but perhaps they are waiting to put out an "AF100 like" camera when it will be more of a leap than a small upgrade. Maybe it will feature a higher end codec recording to the mini P2....
 
Steve R said:
I wonder if "Acquisition" means 60p on SDI out??
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1080/60p on SDI out is impossible. No camera ever made does it or ever could do it. HD-SDI does not have the bandwidth for it, it's limited to 1.5gbps, which is only enough to transport 720/60p or 1080/60i. The HD-SDI interface is physically incapable of transmitting 1080/60p.
 
editman said:
1080p50/60 is that a joke? The AF100 already does the 50/60fps trick in 1080 at about 35mb/s so what do one gain really? 2.39:1 markers for $250?
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The difference is that the upgraded version will do "live" 1080/60p, so that audio is recorded and the playback happens "live" (i.e., not slow-mo). The AF100's current 1080/60p is only for slow-mo playback.

If that's worth $250 to you, then hey, they're making it available. If that's not worth $250 to you, then don't buy it; the market will let them know how successful this idea was.
 
pomoville said:
So is this is for Panasonic for NAB? No AF100 replacement? Or could there be more announcements later on in the week?
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That is pretty much it. In the distant past companies would sometimes hold an announcement or two for later in the week, but pretty much nobody does that anymore.
 
mik303 said:
Panasonic seems to be charging for the AF 100 and AC 130A / AC 160A updates.
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The 130A/160A update is an actual hardware change, not a firmware update. You have to send the camera in and have some parts replaced. It's not a downloadable firmware update.

The 130A/160A update adds new hardware for the expanded focus assist and the one-push turbo AF.

There is a separate, free firmware update for adding 1080/60p to the AC160.
 
mik303 said:
They announced a 4K Varicam in development. I don't think that an AF200 is ever going to happen.
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Why would you think that a 4K Varicam would have any bearing on whether there would or wouldn't be an AF200 ever happening? How are those related at all? A 4K VariCam is probably going to be their range-topping uber-cam, probably (wild guess) $40k or $50k or something, who knows... so how would that have any bearing on a $5000-$10000 AF200?
 
bruceallen said:
If Panasonic is such a good broadcast camera company, you'd think they'd remember that broadcast cameras sometimes require genlock.
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They're pretty well aware of that. They put genlock on all their shoulder-mount cameras and also on the HPX250. Find another camera anywhere near its price range that has genlock.

And 3D broadcasts sometimes requires compact cameras that have genlock and some way of synching the lenses.
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You keep going on about this, but I think you're missing the fundamental core issue: they make 3D cameras that are all-in-one. They're not interested in making two-camera rigs. They offer three separate 3D cameras at different price brackets. You may not find them adequate for your use, fine, but they offer them and that's their approach to how 3D should be done. So no, they're not overly interested in offering a genlock capability that very few people actually need, but for those who do need it, they offer broadcast cameras that do have it.

How the heck are we supposed to make good 3D content with their product line?
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Hmm. I would suggest perhaps using one of their many 3D cameras?
 
dcloud said:
microP2 are essentially sd cards.
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This is something I quizzed them about, and no, MicroP2 are not essentially SD cards. They're fully implemented P2 cards that happen to use the same form factor as SD. They have the same raided internal architecture, the same advanced error correction, the same ridiculously high write speeds, the same microprocessor controller, all that stuff.

It's going to be confusing for sure, and I wonder just how many times we'll see people repeating this same line -- "oh, it's just an SD card". They may have made a brilliant move here, or they may have opened themselves up to a can of worms, we'll see how the market reacts.

The main thing that MicroP2 does is eliminate the need for a P2 reader for many/most users, as they could be read and offloaded in an SD card slot. And it provides the potential for using SD cards in an existing P2 camera, although only up to 50mbps. And, and this is fun, if I understood this correctly, it turns all the existing AVCCAM cameras into P2 cameras, because you could use a MicroP2 in an SD card slot. Not 100% sure about this, I'll have to clarify with them, but for those of us who appreciate P2 speed and reliability more than we care about SDHC's low price, this may be a way to get P2 advantages in existing SD cameras. But you wouldn't get the 10-bit AVC-Intra codecs, so it's not like it's the same as if it was designed to be a P2 camera in the first place, but ... well, it's a step, at least.
 
Barry, please whisper in Panasonic's ear to get a free firmware upgrade with just the 2.39:1 viewfinder marker. They made an ignorant mistake, and should correct it for free.
 
Barry_Green said:
You keep going on about this, but I think you're missing the fundamental core issue: they make 3D cameras that are all-in-one. They're not interested in making two-camera rigs.
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That's pretty stupid then because they're missing out on camera sales in pairs. It surely can't cost that much to add that functionality...

Barry_Green said:
They offer three separate 3D cameras at different price brackets. You may not find them adequate for your use, fine, but they offer them and that's their approach to how 3D should be done.
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Why are they even bothering with 3D then? Why put all the billions of dollars into developing a whole product line if they want to cripple shooting options? Fixed interocular is AWFUL!

Barry_Green said:
Hmm. I would suggest perhaps using one of their many 3D cameras?
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They all have fixed interocular. That is no good.

OK - I could rent all 3 cameras and choose the one with interocular that is closest to what's needed by the shot... but the range simply isn't there. The interocular ranges there SEVERELY LIMIT composition and shot choice for 3D films and TV shows.

Seriously, name ONE good film, TV movie or TV show that has been produced using cameras with the interocular options Panasonic is selling. Once you start going into the diversity of shots needed for the average production you run into real issues with interocular.

Panasonic are selling a broken, dead system which is really tragic because it is their stubbornness that is creating it.

Last time we had this discussion, you and Jan were lecturing me on how 4/3rds or S35mm sensors were bad for 3D... I respectfully pointed out that films such as Hugo, Underworld, Hobbit, Prometheus, etc seemed like they were going to be pretty darn good - and the 3D on Hugo and Underworld turned out great.

I'm saying again: fixed interocular is total death for 3D. Panasonic is digging a huge financial hole with this one. Please just trust me on this one and communicate to Panasonic if you can!

Thanks.

Bruce Allen
www.boacinema.com
 
Barry_Green said:
This is something I quizzed them about, and no, MicroP2 are not essentially SD cards. They're fully implemented P2 cards that happen to use the same form factor as SD. They have the same raided internal architecture, the same advanced error correction, the same ridiculously high write speeds, the same microprocessor controller, all that stuff.

It's going to be confusing for sure, and I wonder just how many times we'll see people repeating this same line -- "oh, it's just an SD card". They may have made a brilliant move here, or they may have opened themselves up to a can of worms, we'll see how the market reacts.

The main thing that MicroP2 does is eliminate the need for a P2 reader for many/most users, as they could be read and offloaded in an SD card slot. And it provides the potential for using SD cards in an existing P2 camera, although only up to 50mbps. And, and this is fun, if I understood this correctly, it turns all the existing AVCCAM cameras into P2 cameras, because you could use a MicroP2 in an SD card slot. Not 100% sure about this, I'll have to clarify with them, but for those of us who appreciate P2 speed and reliability more than we care about SDHC's low price, this may be a way to get P2 advantages in existing SD cameras. But you wouldn't get the 10-bit AVC-Intra codecs, so it's not like it's the same as if it was designed to be a P2 camera in the first place, but ... well, it's a step, at least.
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From what youre saying...they should really phase out the avccam line and replace it with the avcultra. Lower end gets avclong-g on sdcards, midrange goes to micro p2 and higher avc class. Im sure sandisk extreme could even work with avci100 on the p2adapter.
 
dcloud said:
Im sure sandisk extreme could even work with avci100 on the p2adapter.
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These are very fast cards and I am also sure that they would work. I hope that Panasonic saying that 3rd party SD carts are limited to 50Mbs recordings is just them being conservative. But somehow my gut tells me no.
 
KINOKS said:
These are very fast cards and I am also sure that they would work. I hope that Panasonic saying that 3rd party SD carts are limited to 50Mbs recordings is just them being conservative. But somehow my gut tells me no.
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50mb/s is still enough for a 100mbps avc intra
 
Hi,

the thing i hope is that Panasonic will make available the new AVC-Long-G 4:2:2 10bit codec on future AF100 firmwares and usable with Micro-P2 Cards (in AF100)...would be great!
 
LamProductions said:
Hi,

the thing i hope is that Panasonic will make available the new AVC-Long-G 4:2:2 10bit codec on future AF100 firmwares and usable with Micro-P2 Cards (in AF100)...would be great!
Click to expand...

I'm thinking there's no chance of that. No amount of firmware will make an 8-bit AVCHD camera turn into a 10-bit AVC-i camera.
 
Basically all the benefits of P2 with the added ability to leave them in your pants and put them through the wash.


Barry_Green said:
This is something I quizzed them about, and no, MicroP2 are not essentially SD cards. They're fully implemented P2 cards that happen to use the same form factor as SD. They have the same raided internal architecture, the same advanced error correction, the same ridiculously high write speeds, the same microprocessor controller, all that stuff.

It's going to be confusing for sure, and I wonder just how many times we'll see people repeating this same line -- "oh, it's just an SD card". They may have made a brilliant move here, or they may have opened themselves up to a can of worms, we'll see how the market reacts.

The main thing that MicroP2 does is eliminate the need for a P2 reader for many/most users, as they could be read and offloaded in an SD card slot. And it provides the potential for using SD cards in an existing P2 camera, although only up to 50mbps. And, and this is fun, if I understood this correctly, it turns all the existing AVCCAM cameras into P2 cameras, because you could use a MicroP2 in an SD card slot. Not 100% sure about this, I'll have to clarify with them, but for those of us who appreciate P2 speed and reliability more than we care about SDHC's low price, this may be a way to get P2 advantages in existing SD cameras. But you wouldn't get the 10-bit AVC-Intra codecs, so it's not like it's the same as if it was designed to be a P2 camera in the first place, but ... well, it's a step, at least.
Click to expand...
 
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