XDCAM-EX vs. AVCCAM

I really have to second what Elton has said.

The Nanoflash seems like much more of a worthwhile purchase than this.

It'd be one thing if the pricing was in the $1k range, but at this point, it is encroaching on NanoFlash territory. And the Nanoflash is capable of providing far greater image quality.
 
There's an other difference,
the AG-HMR10 is not only a recorder, it's a part of a POV cam in pair with the AG-HCK10G
for this raison, the price is higher.

Barry, will you make some test with this camera?
 
Sumfun said:
But I think most people who use an external recorder do so to get better quality video, not lower bit rate. So it would have been nice if this unit recorded to AVC Intra. I know Panasonic has the HPG20, but that's twice the price and records to expensive P2 cards.
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One of the reasons why AVC-Intra is higher quality is because it is a higher bitrate, 50-100 Mbit/s. That's more than an SDHC card can handle, which is why it records to more expensive P2 cards.
The unit costs more because the hardware to encode AVC-Intra is more expensive, and I'd bet the hardware to write to P2 cards is also a little bit more expensive.

It's like that old saying: Fast, Good, Cheap - Pick two.
 
strangways said:
It's like that old saying: Fast, Good, Cheap - Pick two.
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The Nanoflash writes darn near uncompressed quality to CompactFlash cards for another $500 more than this unit. It's fast, it's cheap, and it's good. That's where the apparent disconnect seems to be.

But again, this unit does not seem to be targeted to that kind of buyer. Actually, I am not sure who it's targeted at. Maybe surveillance market? $2500 for an external recorder is clearly pro-territory. But the codec is not what Panasonic is pushing in their pro products, more in line with their prosumer product. Seems an odd hybrid.
 
Barry, which cams coming out of Panasonic's pro division use this codec? I ask that out of ignorance, since the ones I am aware of use either DVCProHD or AVC-Intra.
 
Don't forget that is a part of a camera.
You have a good monitor, the setting and the remote off the camera, and the waveform and the vectorscope I think, like the HMC150.

Can you confirm that Barry?
 
PerroneFord said:
Barry, which cams coming out of Panasonic's pro division use this codec? I ask that out of ignorance, since the ones I am aware of use either DVCProHD or AVC-Intra.
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The HMC150 and HMC40. Any of the "AVCCAM" cameras. The HMC70 has some of it, but not all; the HMC70 only has up to 17mbps and doesn't have the "good stuff" which is the 24mbps PH mode.
 
Arc-en-ciel said:
Don't forget that is a part of a camera.
You have a good monitor, the setting and the remote off the camera, and the waveform and the vectorscope I think, like the HMC150.

Can you confirm that Barry?
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This unit is like the recording deck of the HMC150, without a lens. Instead of a lens it has an HD-SDI input, but other than that it pretty much has what the HMC150 has, so yes that includes waveform and vectorscope.
 
For distinction between the "pro" and "consumer" versions of AVCHD, I think that's what they really came up with the AVCCAM brand for. AVCHD can contain apparently many levels of quality, but AVCCAM is (I believe) only for the highest-quality, pro-caliber stuff.

When they first came out with AVCCAM I was like "why?" but now that we've seen AVCHD Lite and the GH1's very-limited AVCHD codec, I think it makes a lot more sense that they'd brand their pro line with a completely different name (even though the format complies with the AVCHD specifications and the equipment bears an AVCHD badge). I think the AVCCAM name is their mark to say "this is the good stuff".
 
Barry_Green said:
The HMC150 and HMC40. Any of the "AVCCAM" cameras. The HMC70 has some of it, but not all; the HMC70 only has up to 17mbps and doesn't have the "good stuff" which is the 24mbps PH mode.
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HMC70 == AG-HSC1 + big plastic box + XLR inputs
AG-HSC1 == HDC-SD1 + gray body color.

All the above models record exactly the same flavor of AVCHD, topping at 13 Mbit/s, interlaced only.

AVCCAM does not define a technology different from AVCHD. AVCCAM is a brand. It is akin to Technics compared to National. It is like ProHD compared to poor-man's HDV. Presently, Panasonic chose to limit its consumer AVCHD models with 17 Mbit/s bitrate and it also stopped manufacturing native progressive consumer models. Panasonic uses the higher quality High-Profile@Level-4.1 AVCHD mode topping at 24 Mbit/s with native progressive recording modes for the current crop of AVCCAM camcorders only.

Canon uses High-Profile@Level-4.1 AVCHD @ 24 Mbit/s in its consumer models and still calls it AVCHD. It is worth mentioning that the XH-A1 also bear only "HDV 1080i" mark despite that it can record in native progressive mode (can I write "native progressive mode" without (tm) mark and a bow to Sony?) Canon focuses its branding on idiotic names like Vixia.
 
Cranky said:
HMC70 == AG-HSC1 + big plastic box + XLR inputs
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Plus component outputs plus a 3-year warranty plus service & support from the professional division.

AG-HSC1 == HDC-SD1 + gray body color.
Click to expand...
Plus revamped colorimetry to get its footage to match the rest of the pro line. Plus it's discontinued.

AVCCAM does not define a technology different from AVCHD. AVCCAM is a brand.
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Yes, it is a brand. But under that brand you will (apparently) not find crippled implementations such as the GH1's AVCHD. There is a mile of difference between PH mode on an AVCCAM device, and the GH1's AVCHD. So this is a case where the brand means something. Plus the 3-year warranty and all that.

I got a nasty surprise with the GH1's codec; I was expecting so much more from it, and it's really the first time where I found AVCHD to be a big disappointment. So what I'm saying is that AVCCAM's distinction here is that the weak stuff won't show up under an AVCCAM banner.

When they first launched the pro line, they created the AVCCAM banner to launch it under, and I didn't really get why. I thought it unnecessarily confused things and made 'em frankly sound more like a Sony product (AVCCAM? BetaCam? DVCAM? HDCAM?) But now, if nothing else, knowing that the AVCCAM products are going to get the top-end version of AVCHD, that alone makes the brand name worth knowing about.
 
Barry_Green said:
When they first launched the pro line, they created the AVCCAM banner to launch it under, and I didn't really get why. I thought it unnecessarily confused things and made 'em frankly sound more like a Sony product (AVCCAM? BetaCam? DVCAM? HDCAM?)
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I think this was one of the goals - to sell the product to Sony lovers. Notice slanted sans serif typeface very similar to DVCAM logo. I am waiting for Sony to respond with XDCAM PRO.
 
Cranky said:
I think this was one of the goals - to sell the product to Sony lovers. Notice slanted sans serif typeface very similar to DVCAM logo. I am waiting for Sony to respond with XDCAM PRO.
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Barry, is the "new" sony product launch nxcam their entry into the AVCHD market space?

http://provideocoalition.com/index.php/atepper/story/sony_launches_nxcam_tapeless_camera_family/

And like others said at the top of this thread, thanks Barry for doing so much of the leg work. We are a better community for your efforts.


Be well

Rob
 
Sony is one of the ORIGINATORS of the AVCHD format. They co-developed it, with Panasonic. I've been expecting them to do this for three years. The day AVCHD was introduced, I said "well, that's the end of HDV."

But, for the last three years they've instead been telling people the most astonishing claim: "AVCHD isn't for professionals. Use HDV instead." It's amazing to me. I even went so far as to proclaim that Sony would never introduce another HDV camera, after Sony themselves said "AVCHD is the format best suited for the era of HD camcorders" and "AVCHD is two and a half times more efficient than MPEG-2". Boy, did I get that one wrong, they've continued to promote HDV for almost three more years! (well, I guess if people will keep buying them, there's no reason not to.)

All the way I've been telling folks that Sony would go AVCHD in their pro line, and intraframe in their top-end line, and fervent Sony defenders have told me I'm crazy -- Sony would never go h.264 over MPEG-2 -- but -- I could never understand why?? H.264 is a better format, a better codec, why wouldn't professionals want it? And that's really why I chose to do this article -- I wanted to get to the bottom of it. And I proved that conclusively, unquestionably, no two bones about it, AVCHD is a more efficient codec and a better compression system than MPEG-2 in either HDV or even XDCAM-EX.

So why did Sony continue to insist that AVCHD is "only for consumers"? I never could understand it. But now, just five days after I publish this article, Sony launches "AVCHD for professionals!" :shocked:

Sigh, you gotta love 'em. Well, somebody does, I guess...

But yes, to answer the question you asked, NXCAM would be their foray into AVCHD in the professional market space. I'm wondering about the twists and turns they'll do to justify EX on higher-priced models and NXCAM on lower-price models... although, frankly, I do think they did the right thing by giving the customer the choice of recording MPEG-2 or AVCHD on the same unit; someone who needs the easier edit of MPEG-2 and doesn't mind the quality hit is free to choose it, someone who wants the ultimate quality at the minimal bitrate can choose that.
 
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I was bugging Sony on their previous online expo, I intimidated Juan Martinez, I bugged them at NAB... all they were saying is that AVCHD is for consumers. I am glad that they are finally switching to AVCHD. It sucks that they use MemoryStick, but did anyone expect SDHC? The article mentions an additional recorder, is it the same one as on the Z5/Z7, that records to CF?

I still think that switching to MPEG-2 based XDCAM and then adding AVC to XDCAM spec would be a better strategy, which would not be limited to 24 Mbit/s of AVCHD and would use existing XDCAM wrappers. Sony should offer real XDCAM EX @ 35 Mbit/s as a second format in this camera. At the very least Sony should offer DV, who needs "DVD on MemoryStick" MPEG-2 SD @ 9 Mbit/s? Half-baked solutions and half-measures again.
 
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It's amazing what technology can do and the fact that most people want more out of the RED data rate not less i.e. REDcode 42 just coming out. Consumers must be hard to deal with when they want the exact opposite things so often.
 
pretty enlightening article. from the pics, it seems that avccam holds up better than xdcam ex when shooting high detail and fast action. my question is regarding post. i use xdcam ex all the time and one thing i have noticed is how far you can lift the mids before the image gets too noisy and falls apart. you can go quite far with it. how does avccam compare in this respect?
 
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