Panasonic HC-X1 4K 60p camcorder

I know what you mean; I've just been watching these things long enough to know that somebody's gonna say "I heard it only has 5.5 stops" and the next guy's going to scream about how ridiculous that is... so I just wanted to get the fact out there up front...

But yes, I do agree with you. After spending a lot of time with both, I think the UX180 is more a spiritual successor to the DVX100, than the DVX200 is. The DVX200 is great at what it does, but the UX180 is a full 1/3 lighter, and that really seems to make a huge difference. The UX180 "feels" more like a DVX100 in that way. In fact, I had to look it up; it's actually pretty much the same weight as the DVX100 was. That may be one big reason why it feels more like a DVX100 than the DVX200 does. And the 20x optical is killer. I think, for most folks, the UX180 is the camera they'd want. The main advantages to the DVX200 are that it has V-LOG L, 10-bit output, and a much bigger sensor. But if you don't NEED those features, the UX180 does everything else the DVX200 does, at a lower price, with a much wider and longer zoom range, better 1080p HD, and NO FOV CROP when going to UHD/50p or 59.94p. Heck, it doesn't even crop when going into 120fps. And it costs less. But the DVX200's LCD panel is much bigger, I'm always surprised how much bigger every time I go back to it...

If you need LOG gamma, and you need 10-bit, and the shallowest DOF possible, the DVX200 is the way to go. But if you don't need those features, I've been really impressed with the UX180. I think it really hits a perfect balance with size, weight, performance, and price, and it really feels like the go-anywhere, do-anything type of camera the DVX100 was. Just with, you know, 25x as much resolution and twice as much zoom range... heck, the UX180 even takes DVX100 batteries...
 
Barry_Green said:
I've been really impressed with the UX180. I think it really hits a perfect balance with size, weight, performance, and price, and it really feels like the go-anywhere, do-anything type of camera the DVX100 was. Just with, you know, 25x as much resolution and twice as much zoom range... heck, the UX180 even takes DVX100 batteries...
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I appreciate your perspective on these cameras Barry. Thank you for comparing & sharing your experiences with them for those of us interested in purchasing them.

I know that you haven't had a chance to handle the HC-X1, but considering what we know so far (that it's basically a UX180 without 3G-SDI or GenLock Timecode ports) would you agree that it's weight & price & ability might be an even better fit for some videographers than the UX180?
 
From what I've seen, that's what the HC-X1 appears to be. I'd have to be pretty hard up to forego an SDI port and I'd have to be certain I'm not going to be doing any multi-cam work before I'd give up the timecode port. Note, however, that you said "genlock"; the UX180 doesn't have genlock.

So it all depends on the price difference, and whatever difference there is in support or warranty service. I think it's odd that Panasonic's decided to release fundamentally the same camcorder with such minor distinctions indeed.

If you know for a fact that your work will never require an SDI connection or interlocking timecode, then sure, the X1 looks like a valid way to get pretty much everything else and save a few bucks. It'd just have to be quite a few bucks for me to make that tradeoff, is all.
 
Price difference in Canada is $700. Enough for an extra battery, protector filter for the lens and a wired controller. For me UHD is important so the 3G SDI is of no use other than monitoring as UHD only comes from HDMI. There is no genlock so the timecode is just close for editing anyway. I agree very puzzling marketing by Panasonic. If 3G SDI is important one is really talking about a HD camera . I don't understand why the cameras are divided between Pro and Consumer divisions. They would make sense to be all in the Pro division. The Pro WiFi app is not as good as the consumer app so we have the HC-X1 a consumer product using the Pro division app that doesn't look to be as comprehensive ( no preview or touch focus etc and the consumer app is also iOS and Android !!! ) . Very strange. If it had 12G SDI, true genlock and 10bit 4:2:2 it would be a lot more money and worth it. Maybe that will come for a p2 version.
 
Ron Evans said:
If it had 12G SDI, true genlock and 10bit 4:2:2 it would be a lot more money and worth it. Maybe that will come for a p2 version.
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I agree. For it to have a timecode input but no genlock is pretty crippling. I'd gladly pay more for the inclusion of both. I'm actually on the fence right now about picking up a bunch of these (the 180s), but the lack of genlock may be a dealbreaker for my needs.

12G-SDI isn't in widespread use as far as I know (Blackmagic seems to be the only one pushing it heavily), so while I agree that it would be cool to have, it isn't surprising. I guess I would ask what your use for it would be. We CAN get 4K/60p out the HDMI, so for monitoring purposes that's already possible (though obviously SDI would be a much preferred connection). For something like live switching in 4K/60p, 12G-SDI would be fantastic - but again, the only switchers in this price range that do this sort of thing are Blackmagic products. What they do make is a camera converter that takes either HDMI or SDI and sends the signal over fiber, which is then converted back to SDI at the other end. It's fantastic for long runs that extend well beyond the limits of SDI (Blackmagic states the reasonable limit of 12G is only about 50 meters - see https://www.blackmagicdesign.com/support/faq/59012). The kicker? It's just about their only current product that is still stuck in 3G-SDI land. What I'd like to see even more than 12G on the camera is one of their camera converters doing it. At least that would work with the current HDMI port on this camera, and it's silly that they have cameras, splitters, embedders, switchers, recorders, and a whole slew of other things that spit out and take in 12G, but not a way to get the signal to and from those things at respectable distances.

10-bit 4:2:2 as others have stated really should be included (at least through the outputs). I'm definitely over P2 at this point (I think the move to non-proprietary SD cards is great), but I understand what you were saying.
 
My comment on 12G SDI is only to match the output resolution and frame rate of the HDMI 2.0. HDMI is fine for me. The locking connector of SDI is nice though. I can understand the marketing for 10 bit though. There has to be some distinction between products in the lineup otherwise everyone would buy the lowest consumer model !!! The company has to make money otherwise there will be no new products. Bit depth, VLog , SDI and timecode are obvious distinguishing reasons between prosumer and pro models.
 
Right, having the choice of camera that could do those things (even at a higher price point) would be great.

I am mostly doing live event work these days and have wanted to make a shift to 4K for the longest time, but there haven't been any cameras with decent sized sensors (needed for quality 4K) paired with long zooms (I know it's a challenge, hence the f/4.5 aperture) until now. In fact, I'm surprised Panasonic was able to develop a 20x optical zoom that can cover a 1" imager while staying so compact. I sorta figured the options were 1/3" (yuck) or a much reduced focal length range (ala the DVX200). When the DVX specs were announced, I was glad it had a very respectable sensor size for 4K acquisition but knew the lens range would be far too restrictive for our productions. Thankfully the UX180 has come along to fill that gap, but as has been discussed, we still need to be able to genlock them. As it stands, I don't know of any other 4K camera with a 1" or larger sensor that is coupled with a 20x zoom (integrated or otherwise). I'd gladly pay more for that 10-bit, 4:2:2 version with 12G-SDI and genlock so they can have "product distinction;" I just need it to exist in the first place! :)
 
Haakon said:
I'd gladly pay more for that 10-bit, 4:2:2 version with 12G-SDI and genlock so they can have "product distinction;" I just need it to exist in the first place! :)
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As Barry has stated the distinction or lack thereof, between the 180 and HC-X1 is a really odd decision. Seems to me that the inclusion of your desired features would have been an excellent way to distinguish between the X1 and the 180 and they probably could have charged more money for the 180 as well. That being said, I am seriously looking at the 180 and will be renting it to try it out soon. In Canada we don't have the same return policies that they also offer in the US so renting is the only way to try before you buy.
 
Angry Leprechaun said:
One issue we have found though is there seems to be a serious lag between what's being recorded and what's showing up on the monitor and the viewfinder. It's definitely an issue when recording audio. I'd say it's just about as bad as monitoring the Osmo through wifi, even though it's the built in monitor and EVF. Is this common for the 4K Panasonic fixed lens cameras or do you think this might be an issue to send to Panasonic? Like I said I haven't used it enough to see how workable it is but just testing it was definitely noticeable.
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Hello, I’m a new member here. I’ve had my HC-X1E since just before Christmas (CVP kindly expedited the delivery – thank you). I also noticed the frame lag in the LCD. It's quite marked. It also seems to be lower in the EVF, probably by a frame or so. But that’s hard to prove because of the either/or EVF/LCD thing.

But what’s really interesting (and not so hard to prove) is that the lag seems to be lower through the HDMI! I observed this on my Shogun Inferno, at UHD at several frame rates. It wasn't a controlled test. But as soon as I get some free time, I'll do one and post images. It's not at all what I’d expect. Considering the huge amount of processing that has to be going on between the camera to HDMI to the Inferno (which has to down convert to display at 1080P too), I'm scratching my head at that. This is actually quite important to me, as the camera will mainly be used for coverage of airshows – tracking fast-moving aerobatic aircraft is difficult enough without being 3-4 frames behind! I'll try to post up pictures showing the difference over the weekend.
 
Hi, i've just purchased an HC-X1, overall i'm happy with it although i've only had a limited amount of time playing with it, i'm yet to use the camera properly, some observations though.

Heaphone noise, i'm getting quite a bit of background noise in the headphones, it doesn't matter what headphones i'm using, from Sony MDR 7506's or sure in ear's or even cheap crap mobile phone headphones, using the cameras internal mics or my Sennheiser MKE600, the background hiss is there. Is this normal ? The noise isn't in the recorded video though.

User switches,,,
Slow motion, user assignable, all good, hit the button, straight into slo-mo, do the shot, hit the button, back into your chosen format mode, um no, if i'm shooting in 4K 50p then i can't do slo-mo, so i still have to dive into the menu, change the format to 1080-25p, exit the menu, then hit the user slo-mo button, then after the shot go back into the menu, switch back to my chosen format etc. It would be good, (maybe with a firmware update) if hitting the user slo-mo button took care of the format change.

High sensitivity (Hi sense), that would be good to have as a user assignable button.
Audio, there's no manual/auto switch behind the audio flap, (the DVX200 has them),again we have to dive into the menu, that would be good to have as a user assignable switch, even if it applied to both channels.

Power LCD, to brighten the LCD when shooting in bright light/sunlight, that would be good to have as a user assignable switch.

Servo noise from the zoom when zooming quite fast, the noise is recorded on the video, obviously only a problem when using the on camera mic.

Some input from Barry would be nice. I've watched a few of your videos on youtube of the 180 which is the same menu from what i can see, very helpful, thanks.

Thanks, Paul.
 
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Hi! Need some help with HC-X1

Getting "Invalid" when I press the super slow motion button that I assigned to user 4
I got myself the HC-x1 with SD card U3 150 mb/s sdxc.
Fomratted with camera
selected 59.94hz
mov
FHD1080/59.94 100m
 
You need to change the recording format to 1080-25p (over here), maybe 30p for you.
See my above post about the user switch assigned as slow motion.

Paul
 
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