I think Sony were forced to drop the DVCAM codec off this camera in order to gain the CineAlta badge. It would be useful if a Sony rep. could put our minds at rest by telling us if the camera has a downconvert to DV/DVCAM. The main things you have got to ask yourself if you are planning to buy this camera is...
1. Does your NLE support this level of HD in real time.
2. Most NLEs including Apples 8 core MacPro does not output HD material to an external monitor without additional hardware.
3. Compressing 2 hours of HD material for a DVD takes over 16 hours. (8 core MacPro).
4. Downconverting takes extra time.
5. If you back up onto a Firestore via 1394 you will need to buy a new Firestore with XDCAM EX codec.
6. Your Lanc zoom arm/switch will no longer work and looking at the remote pins at the end of the zoom grip although it's a Fujinon lens it's not a standard Fujinon zoom pin config.
7. Your card is your "tape" so you will need to backup all your footage at least twice (Onto 2 external drives) to make sure your footage is safe.
8. What happens if you are asked to work abroad and you don't know how much footage you will shoot this lends itself to backing up to hard disk every evening if you don't have a good stock of SxS cards with you or afford to to so.

HD at this level is not for the faint hearted or those of us with small pockets. We can only hope Sony will bring out a "DVCAM codec" version of this camera as low light is a major drawback with all DV/HDV camcorders to date and the 12.5mm chips seem to give the answer, not to mention the excellent 14x Fujinon lens.
This camera looks superb but will need a complete rethink come post production.

Great thoughts.

HD is a lot more than buying a new camera.

Another thought is the production monitor. To get a nice SD equivalent CRT, your are talking over $3,000.

Computer monitors with component inputs could be made to work, but they might not show motion or represent NTSC colors as well as a CRT.

I think they would work well for a field monitor.

Another thought is, the price of a cheap laptop is under $1,000. This is close to the cost of one 16gb SxS card.

It would be nice to be able to use the laptop screen as a field monitor and a backup device as well.

Do they make laptops with an input that the EX could feed it?

I think Sony were forced to drop the DVCAM codec off this camera in order to gain the CineAlta badge.
If so, I'd very happily swap back the CineAlta badge to regain the DVCAM codec. SD work is likely to be relevant for a time to come and IMO the lack of ability to record 25 Mbs SD DVCAM to the card is quite a serious drawback to what is in most respects a very large step forward.

Anyone think it is possible or likely that adobe CS3 will be made XDCAM EX compatible. I noticed adobe just released an update to handle the HVX 200 P2 mxf 720p file structure.

3. Compressing 2 hours of HD material for a DVD takes over 16 hours. (8 core MacPro).

George, where did you take this figure from?!! On my 4-core QX6700, I compress a 1-hour DVD from 1440x1080/25p HDV timeline in some 35 mins; what makes you think that 1920x1080@35Mbps would take that much longer?

With most of your other points I tend to agree - I wouldn't feel safe with just 2 8GB cards in the field, or at a wedding, far from the office; with my V1E and DR60, I can take 4-5 tapes with me and be confident I'll get 4.5 hours of HDV material already archived on tapes, with the DR60 ready for fast off-loading back in the office for editing. And all this without even replacing or recharging battery, as the L-series 970 lasts forever on the V1, and the smallest 570 - for more than long enough on the DR60. This is why I'm hoping for the DR60 being usable with the EX1 as well, with its i.LINK outputting HDV! This would mean that should my limited quantity of SxS card not be sufficient to cover all the action out there, after filling them with HQ material I could continue recording SP at 25Mbps to the drive.

Nobody confirmed whether this is viable, though.

Moving to HD from an SD business for us paid off two fold and also cost a chunk.

We were able to increase our price due to the fact that we were shooting in HDV. The revenue increased exponentially because people who found out we were shooting HDV migrated to our side and more people bought our packages because they were impressed that thier event would be shot in HD :)

I blindly went for it and just dealt with the hardware/software needs as we met them. Our three year old G5 Macs handle HDV no problem. Sending them to DVDSP via compressor does take time. I'm guessing 14 hours for around two hours of AIC/HDV. The difference in quality is obvious even when put onto SD DVD.

I agree two cards will not cut the mustard even if it's in yer head.. :)

Somehow I believe that we will be able to plug this cam into our editing stations just in time for the cam to hit the street.

Did I read right about the CARDS being 4:2:2 if capturing via the SDI out.. I thought it was just a live feed 4:2:2....

I totally agree with Nigel Cooper in his article. http://www.dvuser.co.uk/content.php?CID=171

Why would you want to record in SD? Please don't seriously try to answer that either. Shoot HD, edit HD, Master HD (XDCAM HD optical Disc), then create an SD master (XDCAM or DVCAM tape) and DVD master. Adobe CS3 allows you to do your Blu Ray and DVD authoring in the same software, the same menus and chapter points can be used for creating both - no extra work at all really, hope Sony Vegas Pro 8 is the same in that way.

HD gives you the best their is...picture quality...but at a cost. Since my early pro days in video, I am talking Sony low band Umatic and 3 tube cameras we have strived for the best there is but to get the best does not always equate to what you do. If I wanted the best from Sony I would spend £50K upwards and thats only for the camera with no lens ! I don't need or want a camera of this magnitude, nor do I want a shoulder mount...I don't need to look good at the cost of my health. Mike good for you...you took the bull by the horns and it seemed to have paid off but 99% of my corporate clients don't want or won't pay extra for a format they can't appreciate. Very few companies are set up to view HD and yes filming a job in HD makes it future proof but thats only if it needs to be. Mike you mention you 3 year old Macs, well try doing some serious graphics in Motion 3 with HDV and it will come to a stand still, I have an 8 core Intel MacPro (6 Gig mem) with an ATI graphics board and if I add an HD Jump Back to a chroma key in Motion 3 it almost falls over. If you are talking about simple editing in FCP then it handles HDV but 14 hours to render a 2hr job which in DV would take 25mins in my Mac is not user friendly...what a nightmare if you need to make any changes as happens frequently and sometimes it's not your fault but the client sees or hears something that they want excluded !

"...try doing some serious graphics in Motion 3 with HDV and it will come to a stand still, I have an 8 core Intel MacPro (6 Gig mem) with an ATI graphics board and if I add an HD Jump Back to a chroma key in Motion 3 it almost falls over. If you are talking about simple editing in FCP then it handles HDV but 14 hours to render a 2hr job which in DV would take 25mins in my Mac is not user friendly..."

Are we not comparing Long GOP w/baseband HD video here? Apples and oranges. ANY workstation will slow damatically when doing layering, transitions and effects with a long GOP HD segment, as it must expand individual frame out from between the keyframes that bracket the involved segment, perform the HD effect desired, than re-compress everything between the keyframes back to HDV.

IF there was any way possible in your workflow situation, it would be desireable to transcode from HDV to some other codec BEFORE beginning the edit process. Should be much faster then waiting till the end, because the native HDV files have the proper GOP intervals. Transcoding at this point means a straight codec translation, no re-computing GOP intervals.

Those advocating lo-loss edit-friendly codecs, like ProRes422 declare it speeds the editing, but if you stay HDV native, the entire timeline will have to be conformed (rendered) in order to reestablish the proper GOP keyframe sequence, as well as transcode to your selected output format.

This is what makes the burn to DVD process so tedious. Make sure, if you are sending to your DVD burner from the NLE timeline, and it may be doing a direct frame by frame conversion, to render a finished mov or avi or whatever format serves you as a master, if it offers you the option.

DV files are not comparable performance-wise because the max data rate is SO much lower, the cpu on most computers can perform the frequent renders quickly. If you were to up-rez DV to DVCPro50, (a Mac example) it would edit even faster (fewer compression/expansion cycles). Translation: big, simple files-no problem, big, highly compressed files with infrequent keyframes (HDV=2/sec), big problem. Sorry if that's an over-simplification, but it might serve someone.

Great thoughts.
Do they make laptops with an input that the EX could feed it?

Sure... lots of laptops have ExpressCard slots. You should be able to copy your video from your SxS card to a laptop in the field so that you can shoot more video on the same card.

I think Sony were forced to drop the DVCAM codec off this camera in order to gain the CineAlta badge.

Hmmm, don't know about that, George. The full size cameras shoot DVCAM and wear the Cinealta badge.

-gb-

Sure... lots of laptops have ExpressCard slots. You should be able to copy your video from your SxS card to a laptop in the field so that you can shoot more video on the same card.

Hey Tom,

Actually I meant a live video feed so the laptop could be used as a monitor.

To answer some questions here using Vegas as an example
(not considering smartrendering in V8)


1. Does your NLE support this level of HD in real time.
((Vegas has support, moreso than any other NLE, file management, proxy, and acquisition from 1394 or USB 2.. were talking edit off the card here. With new FAM support in V8, this too should be improved)

2. Most NLEs including Apples 8 core MacPro does not output HD material to an external monitor without additional hardware.

((Vegas 6 7 and 8 only require a HD capable LCD panel. Colour profiles for your respective area are available. In turn your second display can in fact be used as a colour reference monitor. You do not need any other hardware save for a GFX card which can output dual monitors. SLI then youve got 4 outputs))

3. Compressing 2 hours of HD material for a DVD takes over 16 hours. (8 core MacPro).

((Vegas 8 has smartrendering for long GOP formats, in turn rendering is faster than realtime. Aside form this, Vegas editing is live and "free" whereby you can loop a region and continue to work and edit while the video continues to playback with those adjustments being put through without any need to prerender.
V6-V7 is about 1.5-2.5x realtime in a single core with 1gb ram using lowly IDE drives. However for downscaling, your looking at about 2 to 3 times realtime.
As the XDcam is Native 1920x1080, scaling UP to BluePrint (Blueray disc video format) is not required as it is required for HDV. In turn, saving that crucial upscale process.
Rendering time on ANY NLE is based on what type of edit your doing, colouring, compositing etc etc so its relative to the type of wrk your doing))

4. Downconverting takes extra time.

((Thats a given on any NLE))

5. If you back up onto a Firestore via 1394 you will need to buy a new Firestore with XDCAM EX codec.

((I personally wouldnt use a firestore. but im waiting to see what the "HDV" output on the 1394 is all about. Check the port and youll see the HDV logo))

6. Your Lanc zoom arm/switch will no longer work and looking at the remote pins at the end of the zoom grip although it's a Fujinon lens it's not a standard Fujinon zoom pin config.

((No, it a proprietary connection which will more than likely also offer additional features than those found on simple LANCs. More likely it wil be a remote dvice control for using the deck as a means of media management and transfer. I could be wrong))


7. Your card is your "tape" so you will need to backup all your footage at least twice (Onto 2 external drives) to make sure your footage is safe.

((Or you could back up the material XDcam or BD discs. Another option is to output XDcam 25mbps as HDV onto tape from your NLE. Most pro studios have more than 1 workstation so tis shouldnt be a rpoblem while u continue to work))

8. What happens if you are asked to work abroad and you don't know how much footage you will shoot this lends itself to backing up to hard disk every evening if you don't have a good stock of SxS cards with you or afford to to so.
((This is where laptop computers coome into play. In any profesion using solid state media (psuch as photography ) its wise to either have a means to review and strore your materials A good laptop is about a grand USD, and it can also double as a field monitor when used with OnLocation or a mobile workstation for basic editing tasks))


The issue here is whether or not the format and the camera itself pushes the industry to cover the costs of teh additional processing. THere WILL be people out there giving HD out at SD prices and this sets a poor precedent for those wishing to use HD as a step up for their prices .As for DVCam, in al honesty, is no longer a needed format. For SD work, your better off scaling down to DV50 and attaining a close to 422 colour space and working with that as opposed to 420 (or 411 in NTSC) dvcam

Paul Izbicki "IF there was any way possible in your workflow situation, it would be desireable to transcode from HDV to some other codec BEFORE beginning the edit process."

This is where things get a fair bit muddy in the HD swimming pool...there seems to be different qualities of HD and how compressed it is to the extent that we have HDV. So this might be the time for explanation...
At a guess...Is HDV a more domestic HD and HD comes in different bit rates I notice Sony mention 25 and 35Mbs the latter being the full monty. We also have DVCPRO HD and XDCAM HD and good old Sony are working on Super HD which from memory is 8 times better than todays HD !

So back to your quote Paul...HDV seems to be a killer because I assume there is still some compression that my Mac does not handle well. So what codec do you recomend that is better for me to use.
Q. What form of HD would my Mac cope with better than HDV.

I just bought a DSR450 (2/3" DVCAM) a few months back in order to replace my JVC HD111.

When I read the stats on boards like this I sometimes question that decision. When I shoot with the camera and view the results, I don't.

It produces great pictures with controllable DOF, with excellent low light and super low noise. I can buy media for £2 an hour and use a billion different lenses. I've shown SD footage on 30' screens and never, ever, ever once has a single client said, "looks a bit soft to me" or questioned the picture quality in any way.

Also I can edit footage happily on my old G5 Powerbook in the field with full realtime performance.

I think HD is more a marketing tool than anything. It certainly has trade-offs and at the end of the day, doesn't make a film any better, just sharper.

So back to your quote Paul...HDV seems to be a killer because I assume there is still some compression that my Mac does not handle well. So what codec do you recomend that is better for me to use.
Q. What form of HD would my Mac cope with better than HDV.

George,

Transcode the HDV to either Apple ProRes or DVCProHD. I get near-realtime performance on my Quad Core with DVCProHD. I ingest all HDV and my jumpback HDs into compressor or FCP 6 and batch convert to DVCProHD. Then I complete the final edit of my program in DVCProHD.

Cheers,
-GReg

Greg's got it right. Trying taking a short project you already completed, and convert the HDV files into DVCPro100. Or create a new DVCPro100 project and import your media. Then proceed. Converting the HDV should go quickly because it will be easy on the cpu-all the GOP's will still be in native format and the keyframes at regular intervals not having been edited.

You should find the project goes very smoothly, and there are only short renders required. Compositing will go much faster.

Good Luck

So what about XDCAM EX how would my Mac deal with this, is it closer compression wise to DVCPro HD or would I have to transcode it again.

So what about XDCAM EX how would my Mac deal with this, is it closer compression wise to DVCPro HD or would I have to transcode it again.
My completely untested opinion is that since HDV and XDCAM HD/EX are based on the same MPEG2, Long GOP style compression they will have similar performance characteristics when it comes to editing them. I haven't had chance to work w/the format before, but that's my guess. I'm hopefully getting some loner XDCAM gear this week so I can answer that question, among others, myself.


-A

It makes sense to understand what you're getting into before buying a camera like this, but some of the comments here seem a bit off base.

- If all you or your customers want is DV quality then this won't be the camera for you, and there are plenty of other camera options to consider. And if you want a more gradual transition to HD production, either HDV cameras or the HVX200 offer standard DV recording options.

- If your current editing setup can't handle footage from the EX1 effectively then you'd need to figure how to deal with that. For those on Macs converting the source footage to either Apple ProRes or Cineform editing codecs should help significantly, and it definitely shouldn't take a whole day to render a standard DVD file from an HD timeline.

- The EX will require an adequate supply of the memory cards and a disciplined backup plan to maintain your master footage. But I haven't heard HVX200 owners complaining about that, so apparently it's a manageable issue once you get used to it.

If you can appreciate the usefulness of a camera which records full-resolution 1080p video, you'll find a way to deal with all of the above. If not, don't buy it...

HD gives you the best their is...picture quality...but at a cost. Since my early pro days in video, I am talking Sony low band Umatic and 3 tube cameras we have strived for the best there is but to get the best does not always equate to what you do. If I wanted the best from Sony I would spend £50K upwards and thats only for the camera with no lens ! I don't need or want a camera of this magnitude, nor do I want a shoulder mount...I don't need to look good at the cost of my health. Mike good for you...you took the bull by the horns and it seemed to have paid off but 99% of my corporate clients don't want or won't pay extra for a format they can't appreciate. Very few companies are set up to view HD and yes filming a job in HD makes it future proof but thats only if it needs to be. Mike you mention you 3 year old Macs, well try doing some serious graphics in Motion 3 with HDV and it will come to a stand still, I have an 8 core Intel MacPro (6 Gig mem) with an ATI graphics board and if I add an HD Jump Back to a chroma key in Motion 3 it almost falls over. If you are talking about simple editing in FCP then it handles HDV but 14 hours to render a 2hr job which in DV would take 25mins in my Mac is not user friendly...what a nightmare if you need to make any changes as happens frequently and sometimes it's not your fault but the client sees or hears something that they want excluded !

I do suffer through this (changes about 5%) and have a corporate customer coming in October that wants 4:3 SD and the tapes.... I offered a hard drive but he wants the "tapes"...

So in that case this cam is not the cam for the job and maybe if I told him is has to be HD then down rezd to a hard drive it may scare them off...

I don't think it will take long though... HD is in cheap handycams and people are starting to expect it all the time.

I don't edit in HDV, I capture as Apple Intermediate Codec and the rendering is not that bad. The cost of hard drives is so cheap now that I have 1TB raid on my old G5 thanks to wiebetech... on the cheap all things considered.

I hope to expand to do "same day edits" with this cam and add a new revenue stream to my business. Depending on the transfer speeds it may be a huge thing for me.

I guess SD would have been a nice backward compatible feature but I never use it on my Z until said corporate customer asked for it so....

I hope I'm not too off topic ....

OH Motion is a PIA no matter how you slice it....

Mike

Well putting a spanner in all of our works so to speak isn't a bad thing as far as the hype for the new camera is concerned.

For the people who ask why we would still want to shoot SD with this camera.....because it is what is here now and what majority of the Editing software can handle well. We all like to future proof and the cost of the media is another factor with this camera. It isn't as if we can unpdate our cameras like a new plasma...8-9k is a big difference to 2k Tvs every couple of years.

I hope someone can point out a decent workflow for shooting SD with the Ex and editing it on CS3 on a Pc.

I hope someone can point out a decent workflow for shooting SD with the Ex and editing it on CS3 on a Pc.

Shooting, apparently not. But if you wanted to convert the footage to DV for editing or output purposes that shouldn't be particularly hard to do, depending on what software you're using. I shot a project in HDV once which ended up having to be output to 4:3 DV on tapes for someone else to edit, and in Edius I just had to change the project setting, check the clip properties and record back out to a camera recording in DV mode.

But overall this doesn't appear to be a camera for anyone who thinks they may need SD video on a regular basis. For that buy an HDV camera or the HVX200.

Mike Williams said "OH Motion is a PIA no matter how you slice it...." Motion is a very good hi-end graphics program far more intuitive than AE. Motion 3 needs a lot of graphics power to work well (I don't think it will run on 3 year old Macs sadly)...but I was given a tip from the Apple forum to output my Motion projects as Animations and this works well for me. Having full 3D, cameras and lights has really pulled Motion ahead of AE.

I think many of us will wait for others to delve into the Sony EX camera and find the pit falls first, I will see it at the IOV show next month maybe by then Mr Sony will have a solution for the DV shooters amongst us or is this a ploy by old Sony to kick us up the but...and to stop messing around HD is here so you may as well embrace it ! After all this must be the first time ever that Sony have exceeded all expectations and brought out the camcorder of our dreams for us (me) to turn round and question..."why did you not make it inferior, it's too good" Poor Sony they can't win.

Shooting, apparently not. But if you wanted to convert the footage to DV for editing or output purposes that shouldn't be particularly hard to do, depending on what software you're using. I shot a project in HDV once which ended up having to be output to 4:3 DV on tapes for someone else to edit, and in Edius I just had to change the project setting, check the clip properties and record back out to a camera recording in DV mode.

But overall this doesn't appear to be a camera for anyone who thinks they may need SD video on a regular basis. For that buy an HDV camera or the HVX200.

I think Sony has released this into a new niche. HDV cameras are there to bridge the gap for those who want SD now and an inexpensive entry into HD. For those ready for the transition to the nascent HD era, the EX is a real leap forward in performance and capabilities. Sony and the other manufacturers continue to make evolutionary gains in their codecs, and I expect the Ex will demonstate that in practice.

As pointed out earlier, many of us will change workflow routines, transcode to ProRes422 or Cineform and then output to SD or HD, whatever format we need. The mastering format is appealing for archive purposes as well.

Workflow: SxS cards into laptop via expresscard port. Files out to FWdrives. Import files into edit system from FWdrive, convert to Prores. Edit. Output deliverables, SD or HD. Rinse, repeat.

When BluRay and HDDVD decks are common and affordable, burn HD output. Clients will be ready for HD deliverables at that point, and you'll be positioned.

If that was true then why do cameras like the optical XDCAM HD cameras (33 for example) have a standard DV mode?

I have a close collegue who needed a new 16:9 camera. He doesn't need HD at the moment but the best option for him was a 330. So far he has shot DV mode on it exclusively. HD is for its future.

In fact, he has been shooting Spring Fashion Week here in Australia, and they require SD 4:3 (in this case he just uses his DSR-250) but it demonstrates that SD mode in HD cameras are not an "inferior" capability, but a workflow optimisation and very real client need in many cases.

Thanks for that Paul....yes this camera is just too good to pass up.

Just like the old make sure you design Web pages for "monitors that are 15inch".

This is as good a time to change workflow and buy the new setups.
If this camera doesn't entice you to do it then nothing will.

George I meant that motion is a PIA when it comes to rendering etc. on my machine. Otherwise it can do some really amazing stuff...

Not sure what you meant by give us less though... I would rather the cam stay at this price point and not have the SD capability.

I plan to base my entire business around the work flow of these cams if the transfer speeds are at least three times real time to Hard Drive, the low light really is better than the Z1 and they hit the 6-7k price range.

Loading via tape real time is another PIA I won't miss.

Mike

- The EX will require an adequate supply of the memory cards and a disciplined backup plan to maintain your master footage. But I haven't heard HVX200 owners complaining about that, so apparently it's a manageable issue once you get used to it.


Actually, I'm a big fan of the HVX200, and was planning to buy until I saw the announcement of the EX at NAB and decided to wait. I've been lucky enought to get hands on time with the HVX and to compare it to the HVX500 and HPX 2000. I love the picture on the 200-it's lush and utterly satisfying, like an oil painting. I don't even care about 720 vs 1080, it fills the screen, and looks great, though I am totally convinced on progressive, at an appropriate frame rate.

Now for the big inside secret. Card management IS a big problem and DOES require discipline and a learning curve. Pana never expected the degree of resistance to the card capture, transfer, edit, archive process, a return to a more film-like workflow, which is how I like to think of it. They have reps and consultants travelling the country, doing workshops and seminars, educating people, and it has been hella hard. It is a RADICAL change from DV and other tape based systems.

And now Sony too has embraced tapeless, capture-card workflow technology, an interesting development. They too will have to go through the mainstreaming process. Maybe with both Sony and Pana out there preaching the tapeless, disk-less gospel, the public will get it.

I've been satisfied with everything I've read and the reports, but will still need to verify in a hands-on test that there are no motion or compresson artifacts, and that the low light performance is better than the HVX. If it satisfies in both those categories, put me down for one.

Hey Tom,

Actually I meant a live video feed so the laptop could be used as a monitor.

Sorry Tim... I misunderstood your question. Clearly a laptop with video editing software capable of capturing XDCAM EX footage would work as a monitor. Sony announced that many companies are working to support the XDCAM EX signal format.

There is a component output also, as well as SDI.

No problem Tom.

My thoughts were of travel or field work with only the camera and a laptop.

During shooting, the laptop screen could be used as a monitor, then after shooting could be used to wipe the cards off.

My main concern is the lag shown when firewire is used as a monitoring device.

I have been searching and have yet to find a laptop with any type of HD signal input.

Any ideas about real-time input into a laptop?

Is this what you meant by "Sony announced that many companies are working to support the XDCAM EX signal format"?

Thanks

"Sony also announced that several nonlinear editing manufacturers—Adobe, Apple, Canopus, Dayang, Main Concept, New Auto, Sobey, Sony Creative Software's Vegas, and Sony’s XPRI NS—are developing compatible interfaces."

You would connect through iLink (Firewire - IEEE-1394)... so you would need a laptop with a Firewire input.

For those of us who like the feel of a manual focus ring and the possibility to work wiht a shallow depth of field, the EX is quite an exciting product. It offers both; a real lens and the largest CCD ever fitted on a camera of that size. Speaking of DOF, there is a pretty drastic difference between a 1/2 CCD and a 1/3.

Thierry.