Hello all. I have a question for all out there. I am working with a new indie production company right now that makes low budget films and they want to buy a camera, video camera (they do movies but not on film). seeing as how I am the only one that graduated from film school they thought I might know but I have only worked with filmSO help :?

They at first were looking at the Panasonic AG-DVX100 b/c of its 24p capabilities, but now think that may an HD camera would be best. Any suggestions and what is the difference between a 24p and an HD.

Thanx all

Vanessa

24p is the frame rate it films at and also indicates that the frames are progressive scan and not interlaced. Of course film is 24p, NTSC TV standard is 29.97 interlaced frames (or basically 30 fps, 60 fields ps - see also http://www.fact-index.com/n/nt/ntsc.html). HD is the resolution of the system you’re using. HD has a resolution of 1080i (interlaced) or 720p and generally uses a 16:9 recording ratio. SD (standard definition that we all grew up with) contains 480i lines of vertical resolution uses a 4:3 format. Of course there are many other differences, but this is the basic.

HD is looking like it will become the next standard. There are already dual format broadcasts, and HDTVs are getting cheaper every day. I would recommend the HD if you can afford it. Some people like the look of the 24p, but in my opinion it's more of an aesthetic decision than hardware picture quality. One thing to keep in mind, if you do get an HD camera, make sure your editing system can handle HD. Most of the major manufacturers have an HD version available now.

Thank you. Do you know of any HD cameras you'd recommend?

What's your budget for a camera? A true HD camera will cost 10X or more what a DVX-100 will. Which is why there are rental houses...

THey thought that perhaps at the rate of renting, they in the long run would be better buying. what do you think? Nonetheless, they have about $30k give or take if they decide to go with the HD camera.

One thing I wanted to say is that the Panasonic's 24P isn't a real 24 frames per second, it's using 29.97 frames per second but uses the 2:3:3:2 pulldown process to make it look 24 framish, however using a program such as Apple's CineTool you can easly convert your 24P into real 24 frames. . .ok ok 23.98. So you can do it with both the dvx100 or HD, it depends on how important the resolution is going to be, and how much hard drive space you've got! Ya look at what the editing capabilities are of the company if they're up for HD. And I don't know of any specific HD cameras to name. . .

All i can say is that I have the Panasonic AG DVX100a, and I LOVE it. Great quality, really really movie/cinema like. I love everything about it.

I cant testify for any other product because i've only used this, and my dad's one chip sony...

I was reading on some other stuff about video moviemaking and seems that alot agrees that lighting is extremely different with video than with film. So would you guys/gals recommend that they get the panasonic 24p and "perfect", "learn well", etc the ins and outs of this kind of camera before moving up to a biggie camera like an HD one? i just want to thank you all for all your opinions and help. if i didnt mention it before this is a new production company in south florida with people with great stories and cash but new to movies (as am I really since i've only just done student films) so we need all the advice we can get.

I'll throw another HD question into the mix as well :)

Does HD need a special workstation, software or connection or something different, as opposed to standard Firewire?

I'm not seeing any "presets" for HD on my Premiere 6.0 project settings, so I'm assuming you need something "extra" to work with it.

Ta 8)

Yeah, HD requires a lot more pipe than what firewire offers. . .unless you use the latest DVCPro HD with Apple's Final Cut HD. For anything else though, you'd need a special HD card like this one http://www.aja.com/kona.htm. Also you'd need a hard drive that could handle 170MB per second, give or take. HD is a lot higher res than DV, so it eats up a lot more hard drive! There's a lot of new HD codecs out now that make it fairly easy to do.

Generally speaking, HD requires bigger, faster hard drives, along with some way of getting from deck to computer. Think Ultra 160 or Ultra 320 SCSI, or fibre channel. The drives typically have to be striped together into RAID arrays. Bandwidth for uncompressed HD can be 6Gb per minute(vs 5min per Gb for DV)!

Panasonic has a new VTR that will play 720P over firewire, but that's only compatable with their own DVCPro 100 tape format. More likely, you'd have to get an HD compatable capture card from Decklink, Pinnacle, Aurora, etc.

And you'll need an HD monitor in the edit suite to properly color grade the footage!

From Panasonic:
http://catalog2.panasonic.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/ModelList?storeId=11201&catalogId=13051&catGroupId=14569

The SDX-900 is standard def, 16X9, '24p'. It's really worth looking at. If you want to go HD, the Varicam is about 2X your price range, but it's being used on a lot of TV commercials, & some shows as well.

THanx arniepix. we didn't even look at that one. It looks like a good camera and since its not HD, seems we don't have all those trouble people have been talking about in terms of editing. Well not really problems, but more things so keep in mind. NOw that I know we don't have HD editing capabitlies, perhaps this SDX-900 is a godo bet. Anyone else have any takes on this camera?

That is an excellent camera. Panasonic makes some great video cameras and this is one of them. If you have the budget I would go for it.

I am a newbie to filmmaking and wanted to ask if the Canon XL-1S is still a viable camera to use for independent productions.

I haven't heard a lot about the XL1S, except that it's a decent camera. If you're asking because you've got one, then you're wasting time. If you're asking because you're considering buying it, also check out the Sony PD150 and DCR-VX2000, and the Panasonic AG-DVX100A and Canon GL2. They're all mid-range cameras that are fairily widely used for indiefilms.

Can anyone think of a produced film that was shot on PanasonicDVX100? I've heard so many praises so I thought that maybe I should check out the quality of the film.

One thing I wanted to say is that the Panasonic's 24P isn't a real 24 frames per second, it's using 29.97 frames per second but uses the 2:3:3:2 pulldown process to make it look 24 framish, however using a program such as Apple's CineTool you can easly convert your 24P into real 24 frames. . .ok ok 23.98. So you can do it with both the dvx100 or HD, it depends on how important the resolution is going to be, and how much hard drive space you've got! Ya look at what the editing capabilities are of the company if they're up for HD. And I don't know of any specific HD cameras to name. . .

I was told it was true 24frames but it converts it into 29.7 for video viewing.

the whole point of the camera is to transfer over to 35 or 16mm film without having to use a processer that cost a lot of time and money.

Depends on whether you use 24p or 24 "Advanced"

I believe Gerg Harrison's film "November"as shot with the Pan Dvx100

Yes, "November" was shot with the DVX100. It won the cinematography award at Sundance. I saw it at a special screening a few months back and it was impressive. It was projected with an HD projector on a 40 foot screen. Did it look like film? Much of the time, but there were some things that were dead giveaways that it DV. I'd say 80% good, 15% DV-ish and 5% not good.

Scott

Hello all. I have a question for all out there. I am working with a new indie production company right now that makes low budget films and they want to buy a camera, video camera (they do movies but not on film). seeing as how I am the only one that graduated from film school they thought I might know but I have only worked with filmSO help :?

They at first were looking at the Panasonic AG-DVX100 b/c of its 24p capabilities, but now think that may an HD camera would be best. Any suggestions and what is the difference between a 24p and an HD.

Thanx all

Vanessa


Go for JVC PRO GY-HD 100 3CCD 24P CAMCORDER


http://www.dvuser.co.uk/Main%20pages/what's%20new%20pages/GY-HD100.html

http://pro.jvc.com/prof/Attributes/...=&feature_id=08

http://www.expandore.com/product/JVC/HDV/JVC_ProHD.htm

I am a newbie to filmmaking and wanted to ask if the Canon XL-1S is still a viable camera to use for independent productions.

Depends on what you are planning on shooting. The image on the XL1 was very sharp, we shot some documentary syle footage and it looks good. It you are filming something with a learning experinece in mind, festival entry and such, it's a cheap way to get started at this point. I just finished my first film and while I'm happy with the outcome, I knew we had budget constraints and needed to learn a lot so a big investment in a top of the line hd camera would really have been wasted on our subject. It would be fine for local commercial work as well. It always comes down to budget and the tool should fit the job.

Make sure your get a decent external mic like a boom or something, you can't use the camera's.

That's my 2 cents worth.

So, why don't they want to buy a film camera? 30k will buy a really nice super 16mm Arriflex SRII setup with lenses, extra batteries, mags, video tap ..... Better quality than any HD camera and a whole lot less expensive. Actually, for about 20k you could get a decent 16mm package and have money leftover for film stock/developing for your first movie.

Just a thought :)

One thing I wanted to say is that the Panasonic's 24P isn't a real 24 frames per second, it's using 29.97 frames per second but uses the 2:3:3:2 pulldown process to make it look 24 framish, .

...while we're kind of on the subject, can someone explain what 'pulldown' is?....I'm still trying to figure it out...

--spinner :cool:

I'll throw another HD question into the mix as well :)

Does HD need a special workstation, software or connection or something different, as opposed to standard Firewire?

I'm not seeing any "presets" for HD on my Premiere 6.0 project settings, so I'm assuming you need something "extra" to work with it.

Ta 8)

Hey chaps, im a new one to indie talk so bear with me! HD on a DV cam just requires that you have an editing package that supports it. Premiere 6 is a tad outdated, premiere pro supports the 24p (or 25p in europe) function on sony and panasonic cameras, premiere pro 1.5 supports HD with a quick 15 mb+ download. The newest version of final cut pro also supports HD, but you have to remember that HD takes up nigh on double the amount of hard drive space that normal DV does.
The panasonic camera were talking about here is a lovely model, I have had the pleasure of using it for most of this year and I'm always suprised at the lighting conditions it handles (low light being a real struggle for DV). Filming in 24p (25p) seems a tad gimmiky to me, you only hold on to the 24p if you output back to DV tape or straight to DV, any other method and the render is going to have to insert 'junk' frames to bring the frame rate nack to speed. Also i don't think the differences in interlaced and progressive hold particularly true in this case as DV can't really alter the way it encodes (interlaced). One thing I wills say about the Av 100 is that the aperture and shutter are fantastic to work with, it allows you to get really creative with your lighting and still maintain picture quality in those low light sessions.

Spinner: Pulldown is the odd terminology used to describe filler frames that are created so that a 24fps video stream can be displayed on a normal interlaced display. This can be done in various patterns depending on your intended output. For instance, 24pAdvanced is recorded so that you can just drop the junk filler frames and extract the original 24 without recompressing the footage. 24pNormal is just the normal means of adaping 24frames to interlaced.

Welcome to the forum Grak! It's always good to see new members :D.

25p isn't gimicky at all though you could argue that about 24p. Pal TV doesn't have to create artificial frames to play the 25fps stream back. It merely splits each frame into two fields and displays them sequentially (much like 30p here in NTSC land).

I personally don't think 24p is gimicky. The DVX does record a true 24fps stream which it then records to tape in interlaced form (in one of two pulldown cadences). You can extract the original 24fps for editing or you can edit the interlaced stream (with its filler frames). The benefit of editing the original 24 frames is 1) you edit only real footage not filler and 2) you can make a "24p DVD" (which is what hollywood does by the way) which allows you to record less material to DVD giving you better compression and/or more information capacity on disc. When played back on a TV this will look just like any other hollywood movie played on an interlaced TV so you do retain "the look" so to speak. Of course you can also print those 24frames to film as well if you have the cash :D

Here is a list of lots of films that have shot off of the Pan DVX100A

Imdb Info (http://www.imdb.com/SearchTechnical?CAM:Panasonic%20AG-DVX100)

Certainly going to be camera of choice.

Two cameras worth checking out are the Sony FX-1 and sony Z1U, thy shoot in HD, but it stored on a regular mini DV tape. They both have a 24p mode, and I would highly recommend them. The Z1U is about 4-5 grand and the FX-1 is slightly cheaper. The Z1U has more professional features.

IMHO, for SD video, go with the Sony PD170. I'm waiting for HD cameras to drop under $1000 before I grab one. When I finally buy one, it'll be 24p.

This article here helped me out a lot when choosing whether to go over to HD or not

Click (http://www.dvxuser.com/articles/shoot3/)

sony FX-1 and Z1U
SevenKnife
Newbie

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Two cameras worth checking out are the Sony FX-1 and sony Z1U, thy shoot in HD, but it stored on a regular mini DV tape. They both have a 24p mode, and I would highly recommend them. The Z1U is about 4-5 grand and the FX-1 is slightly cheaper. The Z1U has more professional features.
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I am afraid to tell you that both Sony HD cameras do not have TRUE 24P.
Only JVC PRO GY-HD 100 3CCD 24P CAMCORDER has TRUE 24P in HD PROSUMER CAMERA below $10000.