I have GY-HD 100, What would be a low cost camera to use as cover shot in wedding senerio? I was thinking of the new JVC Enviro. Also are there any low cost decks I can use for just capturing HDV?

Randy, please search existing threads! It's all been well covered, although I admit that the 2nd camera is a moving target. It's all compromise for a second camera. What's funny, is that our cameras are the 2nd shot camera for many pro projects ("24" and "An inconvenient Truth" come right to mind).
It's all a price compromise. You can probably get a JVC HD 1st generation 720p 30p camera (had one) pretty cheap, and it works well given some specific limitations in manual control.

The The BR-HD50U is the only deck that works with Pro-HD footage and it's not low-cost. The above camera will play back many of the formats on the pro-cameras though.

The firestore is a solid option for many people instead of the deck. Really depends on the tyoe of work you're doing, and Post workflow considerations.

here's a old jvc link that describes the GY-HD1 HDV camcorder:
http://support.jvc.com/consumer/product.jsp?modelId=MODL027075&pathId=29&page=1&archive=true

they run $800-$1000 used.

Thanks for the info, Id like to get the JVC 1 chip but its discontinued. It could be the cover shot and deck for me. Im a wedding guy. Maybe NAB Will bring something.

Thanks again
Randy

I hope you're right Randy. This has been a big topic since this camera came out and there still isn't a solid solution. There's plenty of other units to use as a second camera, but none of them will play back the jvc format. Jvc really left a hole in this area because a big camera works great on a production when it's complimented with a small unit that can match it's look.

I quit waiting for a solution and this fall I bought a canon hv10. The images take some work to match in post but without a jvc unit I expected as much. And of course it doesn't play back the 720p footage. Oh well, it works for what I use it for.

Good luck and hopefully something comes out that works with the hd series of cameras.

They had a pretty fair solution but they discontinued it. That little portable deck would have been great for me. It doesnt do 24p though but I dont use 24p. I was going to go Firestore until I saw how fragile the Firewire ports were. Id like someone to make a deck that would play all the formats so we wouldnt be limited to JVC.

sony's HDV deck will play 720P as well as 1080, but I think it won't output 720 via the FW port. they did something typically sony and stupid like that. analog component to a kona card would work..... and $2800 or so for the BRD50 deck is cheap, really cheap considering that DSR-20's went for that not so long ago which were SD only, and single format only. betaSP was $7-8k for a 1800. don't look at the price of digibeta or HDcam (SR), or maybe you should and then you'll see the BRD50 is a good deal.

I tihink the scary thing is with 2 out of the 3 big companys going tapeless the chances of us see new and cheaper decks are pretty slim.