Panasonic just announced update to TM300. New HMC40 soon?

Arash Ayrom

Arash Ayrom

Cataclysmo
Hi,

I don't know if I'm allowed to post a link to another blog in the forums, but Engadget just posted (with actual Panasonic press release) info about the TM300 (and its hard drive-equipped sibling.

Biggest new feature: 1080 60p! Not sure if there's a native 24p mode as well.

Of course, since the HMC40 and the TM300 supposedly shared internals, what does this mean for the HMC40?
 
If they announce a 1080p60 HMC40 tomorrow, I think I might cry. Can they at least wait until Auguest of something -- unless its that mythical firmware update....(the term mythical being key here - I really would be surprised if that were it)
 
I am certain Cranky would win that bet. The professional lineup doesn't change nearly as frequently as the consumer lineup does.
 
You know, it's entirely possible that they could do 1080p60 in the HMC40 with a firmware upgrade (and charge for it). I'd pay for that, if they cranked the bitrate up a bit. 28Mbps for 1080p60 would be a bit weak in a pro camcorder. I doubt it would be a notable improvement over 720p60 at 21Mbps (might actually have less detail, due to being considerably more compressed in terms of bitrate per pixel).
 
But companies don't do things like that. Firmware updates are for bug fixes, not for adding new features. New features are what new cameras are for.
 
In general it looks like any given professional camera will be on the market for around 3 to 6 years. A possible upgrade, like a "A" version (like HVX-200A) could come out after around 3 years.

Given that the HMC40 came out last year, this is it for some time at this price point.


Bob Diaz
 
Press release indicates that it does shoot at 24p, albeit no indication if it is native.

Sometimes I think that these prosumer releases come too often and too many.

Kinda like the way Epson releases new ink jet printers every few weeks.

If the new cams improved on something or added a significant feature, I could see it. But does anyone here sometimes get lost on differentiating the previous model from the new one?
 
Robert M Wright said:
Is 1080p60 insignificant?
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For a $30K camera - maybe. For a $1.5K camera offering 720p60 would be much more practical. No one will shoot Planet Earth with this camera anyway.

But I suppose this is not about practicality, it is about trying new waters. I can see that it is safer for Panasonic to start pushing 1080p60 in consumer sector, not in professional.
 
Cranky said:
For a $30K camera - maybe. For a $1.5K camera offering 720p60 would be much more practical. No one will shoot Planet Earth with this camera anyway.

But I suppose this is not about practicality, it is about trying new waters. I can see that it is safer for Panasonic to start pushing 1080p60 in consumer sector, not in professional.
Click to expand...

Well it also has do with 1080/60p being in the AVCHD codec... 1080/60p is not available in the AVCIntra or DVCPro HD codecs, they'd have to have a camera with AVCUltra to be placing that into professional cameras above the HMC150 line.
 
There's a big difference between AVC (H264, and a few other synonyms) video encoding spec, and AVCHD. AVCHD is a camcorder format that Panny and Sony created, that includes using a limited subset of the AVC spec for the encoding video (and also AC3 or PCM encoding for audio).
 
AVC is a codec, AVCHD and Blu-ray is packaging (container, metadata, directory structure, naming conventions, interactivity, etc)

Similarly, MPEG-2 is a codec, while HDV, MOD, TOD, XDCAM and Blu-ray is packaging.

You may notice that Blu-ray can use both AVC and MPEG-2. The above examples do not list broadcast standards, that also can use AVC and MPEG-2.
 
Andrew McCarrick said:
Oh wow...so it can't even technically record 25p and 30p natively in either 1080 or 720?
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Nope. You can stuff these into 50p and 60p respectively, or you can use PsF, hoping for a BD player or a TV to recognize progressive content and reconcile the frames.
 
Andrew McCarrick said:
Well it also has do with 1080/60p being in the AVCHD codec... 1080/60p is not available in the AVCIntra or DVCPro HD codecs, they'd have to have a camera with AVCUltra to be placing that into professional cameras above the HMC150 line.
Click to expand...

From MacWorld:

At the highest video resolution and frame rate (1920 by 1080 at 60 fps), both camcorders record MPEG-4 video using the H.264 codec at a 28-megabits-per-second bit rate.
 
You would have to use some awfully high bitrates to encode 1080p60 using intraframe only compression (if it's going to look decent). Think AVC-I boosted to 200Mbps for encoding 60 full 1920x1080 (2 megapixel) frames every second, to get about the same image quality as encoding 1080i60 using AVC-I at 100Mbps.
 
Barry_Green said:
But companies don't do things like that. Firmware updates are for bug fixes, not for adding new features. New features are what new cameras are for.
Click to expand...
I think Playing MMOs like Warcraft has my generation hopeful that the next patch will fix everything they don't like about the game, and give them everything they have been wishing for.

/cynicism off
 
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