Old camera, but still looks good – Gabor Maté talk

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fsorvin

New member
A few months ago I was called to record this event, and the reliable HVX200 was my tool of choice mainly because at 720pn the record times on a 32gb card are ridiculously long and it has the ability to span cards and hot swap.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6nXNirGzMCk&lc=UgySGklqDwT1BqhBRz54AaABAg

Camera was an HVX200, not an HVX200A. Shot on 720pn 24 with the following settings:
B. Press
Low Knee
Matrix Norm
Master Ped +4
Detail -7
V. Detail +7
Detail coring -2
Chroma level -2

I was trying to get the most dynamic range (not increase the camera's dynamic range, but capture a digital negative of what it can do) but also have low noise (because the event was under lit for the camera. I think I had to flip on +3 gain in order not to horribly underexpose and crush everything into the black.

In post, I used FCPX and the lovely default denoiser. That thing is fast and good. I think I balanced it with a bit of sharpening so I didn't loose too much.

Sure, I wish I could have more resolution, and a less noisy imager. Sure, I wish I could have shot in 1080 as well, but FCPX won't interpolate 24p or 24pa from 1080 properly, not like FCP7 and cinema tools could.

But still, I was pretty impressed how it all came out. 10,000 views on YouTube so far, so I guess no one minded that I used a 16 year old camera!

Sadly, YouTube's additional compression softened the heck out of it. My master file looks better. Not 4K better, but very, very passable.
 
I don't mean to rain on your parade, but I think it looks really, really soft, even for 720p. Plus there's no way I'd expect audiences to watch a 90 minute wide shot. No close-ups, no graphics, no b-roll, no cutaways, or anything to add some production value? It's basically a podcast with a visual element.
 
Doug Jensen said:
I don't mean to rain on your parade, but I think it looks really, really soft, even for 720p. Plus there's no way I'd expect audiences to watch a 90 minute wide shot. No close-ups, no graphics, no b-roll, no cutaways, or anything to add some production value? It's basically a podcast with a visual element.
Click to expand...

i'm going to have to agree with doug on this one. The image is way too soft, and not much personality to it. Granted, the HVX still is a good camera to use in some situations... I would never use it for work that was paying me though... personal art projects sure.

 
Gabor Maté's audio could use some dynamics and compression, as he's hard to hear sometimes.

This might not have worked in the venue, but if you were able to get the camera closer, you could have shot with a wider aperture and minimized noise somewhat.

The framing could be improved, as at times you're starting to cut off the interviewer, and the power outlet on the left is distracting, both problems could have been solved by panning slightly to the right.

You might get it to look better on YouTube by uploading a 1080P or higher resolution version, as YouTube will assign it a higher bitrate.

I remember watching a trailer for an independent movie that I thought was shot on film, but it turns out that is was very competently shot on an HVX200 with a DoF adapter. I probably wouldn't come to that same false conclusion today, as streaming resolution was much lower back then.
 
Doug Jensen said:
I don't mean to rain on your parade, but I think it looks really, really soft, even for 720p. Plus there's no way I'd expect audiences to watch a 90 minute wide shot. No close-ups, no graphics, no b-roll, no cutaways, or anything to add some production value? It's basically a podcast with a visual element.
Click to expand...

Looking at their posted settings, it’s no wonder it looks soft. -7 detail and -2 detail coring, plus raising the black levels(master ped). Some people think that that makes “video” look more “filmic/cinematic”. No, it just makes it look like out-of-focus, soft, washed out video.
 
fsorvin said:
A few months ago I was called to record this event, and the reliable HVX200 was my tool of choice mainly because at 720pn the record times on a 32gb card are ridiculously long and it has the ability to span cards and hot swap.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6nXN...BqhBRz54AaABAg

Camera was an HVX200, not an HVX200A. Shot on 720pn 24 with the following settings:
B. Press
Low Knee
Matrix Norm
Master Ped +4
Detail -7
V. Detail +7
Detail coring -2
Chroma level -2

I was trying to get the most dynamic range (not increase the camera's dynamic range, but capture a digital negative of what it can do) but also have low noise (because the event was under lit for the camera. I think I had to flip on +3 gain in order not to horribly underexpose and crush everything into the black.

In post, I used FCPX and the lovely default denoiser. That thing is fast and good. I think I balanced it with a bit of sharpening so I didn't loose too much.

Sure, I wish I could have more resolution, and a less noisy imager. Sure, I wish I could have shot in 1080 as well, but FCPX won't interpolate 24p or 24pa from 1080 properly, not like FCP7 and cinema tools could.

But still, I was pretty impressed how it all came out. 10,000 views on YouTube so far, so I guess no one minded that I used a 16 year old camera!

Sadly, YouTube's additional compression softened the heck out of it. My master file looks better. Not 4K better, but very, very passable.
Click to expand...

thanks for footage,
I feel that hvx images are grainy, colour and dynamic is good but some of its pixels are stolen, of course, only strict people can see it.
 
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I have seen many hvx videos on Vimeo and YouTube, some of them were poor and some were better, some were excellent, but in most of them I felt there was a limitation, that was the number of pixels, the dvcpro image is similar to varicam hdc27 with the same color, but it wants put it in another bowl!
​​​​well it depends on what we want to shoot, a wildlife documentary from Costa Rica was very impressive and similar to 16mm for a camera in 2008, I heard in the Frozen Planet documentary (2010) the second camera was next to The camera was varicam, but they were filming ice and snow and polar bears, and the side shots could have been with an hvx!
My great curiosity about hvx200 images is that I bought one hvx last year...
 
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