This devide is all talked up with no online meterial!
End of the story.
When someone throws some online meterial online so everyone can see it then well have something to talk about.
Im getting the dvd so ill try to rip it and put some online meterial on the net.
Why hasnt this company added some online video samples if this product is so great?
Im not putting this product down, im actually verry interested in it but the question does still remain"Why no online footage when your marketing an accessory for a digital cam corder?"

The problem is online material is usually severely compressed. It is difficult to sell a product that promises improved picture quality and their online material looks like VHS or worse. If they post small downloads they are still 100's of MB in size and not practical for download. The sample DVD is the way to go. Good luck and let us know how it looks. Also please be aware of any copyrights on the DVD footage you receive.

Jeff is right. The Internet is just not capable of the resolution required to put even a small sample of these units can do.

Robert -- the video clips are ALREADY online. I've hosted them for almost a year now. See them for yourself at http://www.dvinfo.net/media/mini35/ -- end of story. Hope this helps,

Robert,

All of the above answers basically put it on the table. As you can see from the downloads, they're small, take a while to download, even on broadband, and are not representative of what the Mini35 can do.

The DVD is the best way to go, unfortunately I don't seem to have you on my list to recieve one. If you could please send your postal address to me at mizell@zgc.com I'll make sure I'll get one out to you.

mizel

I saw the demo Chris. Boy!! The photage is awesome. You guys gotta check ou the clips that Chris uploaded. Really Really awesome. Now that's want I'mm talking about. For some odd reason it looks better than the usual mini 35mm that everyone knows today - Strange. Well , check it out for yourself. Download the one that says 'Mini 35-demo'

I emailed chris from the mini 35 web site with my name an address and was told the dvd would be in the mail.

9/16/03

Hi Robert,

Thanks for the interest in the P&S Technik adapter. At the moment we have
a DVD available with footage of the Canon XL and the Mini35.
We are currently working on some footage with the Panasonic camera and hope
to have it available sometime in October.
I will get the DVD out to you this morning.

Due to the image quality improvement that you get with Prime lenses or even
the still lenses that can be mounted to the adapter, there would be no
reason to use the existing video lenses with the adapter. We don't
actually have any side by side comparisons with the regular DV cameras
and the Mini35 set up, but once you see the images captured on the DVD
you'll understand the buzz about the adapter.

If you have any questions on the adapter or if we can be of further
assistance, please do not hesitate to contact us.

Warm regards,
Christine Brnic
ZGC, Inc.
973.335.4460
chris@zgc.com
www.zgc.com

Robert Malin
P.O. box 1341
Brighton,MI 48116
USA

Charles,
whats this supposed to mean? Im not sure what your trying to say.
quote:
""For some odd reason it looks better than the usual mini 35mm that everyone knows today - Strange"
thanks,
rob

Chris hurd,
I have nothing bad to say about your demos on your site :) all of the images look great and i cant wait till i recieve the dvd so i can preview the true quality of the video.
I hope the dvd thats being sent is in english however.
Im supposed to give a presentation on your product to american filmmakers in michigan and it would be embarasing showing a film in a languge no one understands at the meeting.
Im sure the marketers are smart enough to know that if their marketing a product nationaly that their going to want to present the product in the customers native language. :) cheers

Wow, I am BLOWN AWAY by them internet samples. I can't even began to describe how importat the shallow DOF is, after watching them, wowzers. That adapter costs like 8 grand though, whew, heh.

I could tell it was DV, by the not so good dynamic range (highlights being blown out) but it still fooled me into thinking it was film. :D

Heh, anyone in my area own this with a XL1? You'd be my new best friend, haha.

Chris Hurd, as far as I know, has no stake in P+S Technik. He is the owner and operator of this board and is just providing space so we can all see these demo samples of this interesting product.

As for the language, the company is a German company marketing internationally and so far with decent success. It is my experience that most German companies bend over backwards to serve the English market; I wonder if this is the case for American companies marketing in the German language?

The proof of this product is in the images, not the language of presentation. If I was showing off the demo I might actually turn down the audio completely so that all attention is on the images, not on the narration and hyped up soundtrack.

Rob, I was excited after watching the clips that Chris had posted made by the adapter made by the German base company, you were refering to. I was just making a blind eyed comparison between the mini 35mm that is available today and the one that was used with the camera that made those clips. That's all.

Everyone keeps talking about how the dvd footage is the only way to view the true power of mini35+xl1, but isn't DVD compressed as well? Mpeg2 footage isn't that large, even at 9.8 mbit it's not like it's impossible to upload a 5 second clip.

Chris does have clips on the site (see the link above). But if I were thinking of spending $8,000 or more (got to think lenses too), a 5 second clip is hardly long enough to show a products capability.

Gerald,

I would have to agree!

If you compress a video right and post it on the net you can get pretty accurate results.

Check out this short video of the cinealta
Id have to say it looks pretty exceptional.

http://www.texashighdef.com/768art.wmv

Lenses arent that big of a deal
the unit is approx 8 grand but you can rent prime lenses for 75-100 per day.
I think if your going to make a nice film then lense rental is a must unless you have 8-10 grand to blow on a few primes..
Id rather buy the adapter for 8 grand then have to rent a camera package for 1000.00/day for hd or something. your still saving money in the long run.

Robert,

You're in the system now...Chris must have updated the record after I had posted :)

To all,

The clips on the DVD are in the native language for the origination country of the production. In this case, most of them are in German except for Phreakers, which is an American production. Unfortunately this one is only to music.

The answer is to, as suggested above, turn down the volume if the audio is distracting...it is the images we want to focus on.

DVD is compressed in MPEG2 but the difference is that you get an MPEG2 compression directly from source material and in full screen. I believe the clips that Chris and P+S have on their websites are further compressions from the MPEG2 compression i.e. it's 2 generations of compression, plus the fact that they are not full screen.

Robert is right that prime lenses are relatively inexpensive to rent. Remember though that for most shoots you are going to want a minimum of 5 primes; a normal, 2 wide, and 2 telephoto. If I'm remembering correctly from Film 1 you want to make sure that each lens has a 15% difference in the focal length to edit properly. (this also technically goes for camera placement).

The really important thing to remember here is that the Mini35 can utilize Nikon SLR lenses. These provide excellent optical quality while keeping the expense low. I had one client who was able to purchase 2 Nikon zoom lenses for about $2,000 which gave him focal lengths of something like 15-400mm at T2...more then enough range for almost any but the most specialized of projects. There are also many still lenses by other manufacturers that can be Nikon mounted i.e. Tamrac. Leica is another excellent choice for which we have a mount for, and if fact many think Leica glass is better then Nikon, it's just Leica is used more in Europe. We also have the Canon EF still mount.

Keith is correct. Chris Hurd has no vested interest in P+S Technik or ZGC.

The rule of thumb that I learned and use is that to be able to cut on axis between two focal lengths, one has to halve or double the 2nd angle. In other words, a master on a 50mm will cut with a closeup on a 100mm or longer, or a 25mm or wider (this being without having moved the camera).

That's if you don't want the image size to "jump". Nothing wrong with breaking the rule if it achieves the desired effect.

Mizell is right about the prime set. For the Mini35 job I just did I used a standard Zeiss speed set which contains the 18, 25, 35, 50 and 85, and I added a 10, 14 and 135mm. The 10 was amazingly sharp and free of distortion compared to using a wide angle adaptor on a DV zoom, which could possibly approach that field of view. I dug the whole setup very much.

Charles,

I'm going to bow to your field knowledge rather then trying to find my freshmen class notes but in general I think we were on the same page in that to cut properly, you want images that make a significant change in the composition from setup to setup so that it doesn't look like you just accidentally moved the camera.

The exercise in question was where we had to shoot the same action, we used those swinging balls that executives like, from multiple angles and focal lengths to then cut into one seamless story. The goal was to show that if you say shot a 50mm from position 1, and then say a 60mm from position 1, if you tried to cut them together there would not be a significant enough change in composition to justify or make a cut look good.

it could also be that the 15% rule was more for camera position as compared to focal lengths. with are trusty bolexes we were only issued 3 lenses, wide, normal, and telephoto, so we didn't have much choice in focal lengths anyway.......ahhh the days of winding your camera :)

mizell

Got the dvd today and i really liked the footage i saw!
It does look spectacular.
In most of the footage on the dvd i would have to say forget about the film look i like the P+S Technik look with primes!
The converter does make the dv look alot like film but the greatest thing i liked about it was the fact that the dv had a film look but still captured the definition and beautiful color contrasts that you wouldnt normally associate with high def it puts the P+S Technik in a league of its own.(Looks better then film)
I guess the best way to describe it is this..
We all remember the look and feel of quintin Tarentino films.It was pretty cool! and no one had really seen that style of work he was doing.
Well i think that the P+S Technik is doing for dv what quintin tarentino did for filmmaking.Its new and exciting and i cant whait to try it.
*Yes i know that quintin is a has been but thats besides the point*

I'll only call quintin a has been when he gets my money a second time for the continuation to "kill bill" which is going to just be so much freaking fun to watch.

For what it's worth, I shot my short film with the Mini35 and an XL1. A rough cut is online in its integrity. You can watch it here: http://thechineseshoes.com/videos/shoes.html