We have 2 different events coming up that will be around 2-2.5 hours. We are using an EX3 and an EX1, with each camera having a 32Gig card in it. We will do a test beforehand, but thought I'd ask if anyone has done 2-2.5 hours of non-stop rolling and had any issues or problems with this?

We'll be shooting the SQ/HDV-like mode to get the extra time on the card, by the way.

Please let me know if you've had good or bad experiences with this. I'd sure appreciate it!

Thanks.

Kevin

I've shoot two events in excess of two hours each at HQ 1080/60i non-stop recording. EX3 with 16GB SanDisk in SDHC express card adapters. The camera switched slots automatically at which point I replaced the full memory card with another empty one, all without interrupting the recording process. The whole tapeless process from recording to post, works as Sony advertises. Have fun :-)

I've shot several events of one continuous clip that spans cards, even more than 2 cards. Even though the first couple of times I was a little apprehensive but it worked flawlessly. When Card A was full and the EX was recording on card B I could remove the full card A and put in a another. If card A that you've just inserted isn't blank you can still format or erase the clips on card A while the EX is recording on card B, which is a very nice feature.

Once the cards have been downloaded, the XDCam Transfer / Clip Browser software knows how to join them all, I haven't noticed a glitch yet.

2 1/2 hrs live stage show with 2 x 32gb cards in EX3 camera. No problem as the camera automatically switches slots when the first card is full. The recording from the 1st card to the 2nd card is seamless, as is the joining of clips in post. Nothing to fear, lots to be smiling about. I only shoot HQ modes.

Can you not get hold of say 2 additional 16Gb cards to see you over the line and then you can record in HQ mode, getting the best out of these cameras. It is certainly worth trying for, that's for sure.

We had 3 EX1s rolling for almost 5 hours last weekend. No problems. Each one near filled 4 16GB and 2 8GB cards. We did button off during the interval and at any long breaks in the performance. Doing that does improve recording security. My approach is to only leave the cameras rolling when you must, if there's an opportunity to break the recording, take it.

When/If you have one long clip that spans two or more cards, make sure you use the Clip Browser software to automatically join them so when you unwrap into MOV or MXF, you'll end up with one long clip. If you try and edit them together in your NLE, you're asking for trouble as the long GOP XDCAM EX codec could/might/will cause a glitch between the two clips.

Also, I assume your using AC power to power the camera? That would make things even easier. :)

Just a Me Too post
Two MxR with Sandisk 32GB Ulta 2 cards. 4 straight hours without a hitch. I've done this several times.

Thanks for the replies, guys. Great responses and it definitely gives me confidence in the EX media/system. The shoots are actually 4 camera, so I may be renting another couple EX3's. Wow...once you go tapeless, there's no going back. :-) I really liked the Canon H1 and A1, but these cameras really blow them away.

-I will use power.
-I'll probably stick to the SQ mode since the show will probably air SD anyways. So, this way, it's less data to the cards, too.

Thanks again!

Kevin

SQ (SP) mode UGH!

It's not HD vs SD. SP is a codec (HDV) that can break under certain circumstances that HQ will have no problem with. Don't risk it. HQ will give you many more options if frame rates can be used as part of your look.

I shot a 4.5 hour event recently using SP mode (sorry Craig). I was surprised at how good the footage looked. This is the only thing I've ever shot/edited in SP mode and I had no problems with it. But yeah, Craig's right, if you need to over/undercrank you won't be able to do it in SP mode. But in my case, it was an event, and I was shooting almost non-stop for 4.5 hours. The client was very happy with the quality (ended up delivering on SD DVD).

SP (HDV) can look quite good. It can also fall apart horrible depending on the subject and the shooting conditions. I would NOT risk shooting SP unless the job locked me into it.
Shoot rippling water, blowing leaves and grass and you may HDV to be a real problem. Even a camera move on a visually busy background can be a problem.

The concept behind higher codecs is that they are more robust.

If you find out after the fact that HDV failed you on a given shot, it's blown.

If they were equal there'd have been no reason for Sony to develop XDCAM as a codec. They are not equal and HDV can and will fail on some shots.

I shot a 4.5 hour event recently using SP mode (sorry Craig). I was surprised at how good the footage looked. This is the only thing I've ever shot/edited in SP mode and I had no problems with it. But yeah, Craig's right, if you need to over/undercrank you won't be able to do it in SP mode. But in my case, it was an event, and I was shooting almost non-stop for 4.5 hours. The client was very happy with the quality (ended up delivering on SD DVD).

Sure you can break the SP codec and you've got to work harder to break the HQ codec. The SP codec is perhaps easier to break than HDV as more of the bit budget is used up with the uncompressed audio. At the same time the EX cameras provide cleaner video to the codec so I'd expect the outcome to be significantly better than from a single chip 1/6" palmcorder in low light.

The EX cameras give us a choice. When I know for certain how long an event is going to run and I'll have more than enough cards to cover the event then I'll shoot in HQ otherwise it's SP. Last event I shot the guy I was working for insisted on HQ and we came within minutes of running out of cards because the event ran 1 hour longer than we were told it would. The panic and mad scramble swapping cards between camera locations in a packed, dark auditorium did nothing to help framing and focussing. I'd point out that we had over $10K worth of SxS cards tied up.

Thanks for the different opinions, but I'm pretty sure I'll be locked into the SP mode for the reasons Bob said. There will be enough to worry about besides running out of card space if the show goes over...which is likely.

So...with a couple 32gig cards and a couple 8's, we'll only do this for long events like this. Everything else will be HQ...when we're not using our RED. :-)

Thanks!

Kevin

Last Novemebr / December we shot 24 children's dance concerts in 23 days, (most with 2 Ex's) and I have shot over 100 weddings in 18 months all in SP mode.

Honestly, I have never had a problem with "breaking the codec" so for most things, when we're downconverting to SD DVD's anyway, I think it is far more robust than many of us would like to believe.

Cheers,

Vaughan

I am doing weekly "event video" shooting with 4 to 5 hour continuous shoots being the norm. Shooting mostly in 720/30p SQ mode onto 16gb Sandisk cards. Works as it is supposed to.

Run a camera for several hours if you are concerned and do an import.

I haven't heard of issues with the EX cameras running erratically in SP mode.

To refresh the topic a bit: I have a client who needs continuous 24-hour recording of an event. There will be one EX3 locked on tripod, 2 8Gb SxS cards, no breaks allowed. Period.

I see that most of the people here have had no problem swapping cards during recording, but does anyone have any experience with such a long shoot?

Any possible issues in ingesting a 24-hours-long single shot?

Thanks a lot in advance,

Boris

Boris,

I have never done 24 hours with my EX3 but I did do a 10+ hour continuous shoot swapping out cards at times when a little bit of movement wouldn't be noticed. I left the door to the card slots open so that it I could get to them with the least amount of touching on the camera. No problems pulling the files together.

One long boring conference though.

-Garrett

To refresh the topic a bit: I have a client who needs continuous 24-hour recording of an event. There will be one EX3 locked on tripod, 2 8Gb SxS cards, no breaks allowed. Period.

I see that most of the people here have had no problem swapping cards during recording, but does anyone have any experience with such a long shoot?

Any possible issues in ingesting a 24-hours-long single shot?

Thanks a lot in advance,

Boris

I use a NanoFlash often on long days of interview setups where we sometimes record for up to 8hrs at a time. We do break for lunch though.

The NF is great in conjunction with the SxS cards as you can use up to 2 128GB CFcards almost 7 hrs (at 35mb/s) w/o swapping cards or touching anything. And then you can switch to SxS recording when swapping CF cards. Then back to NF never touching the camera. Leave TC to TOD. And it is easy to reassemble. The NF records the EXcodec .movs so file handling is very easy.

I use remote rec button and the NF can be anywhere like sitting on a table. It makes the swaps really low stress.

I often record both to the NF and on SxS just to be safe, if I am only using one camera. Though I have never had a problem with CF cards or SxS cards in thousands of hrs.

I have never had a problem with over heating of EXcams even in all day recording sessions outside in 100F temps.

I once had a shoot similar to that with 2 of the 8GB SxS cards back before the SDHC adapters were out. I had a MacBook pro with PC Card slot and downloaded them every 1/2 hour. I did it but it was tedious. I would suggest at least getting a couple of the MxR or MxM SDHC to SxS adapters and putting a couple of 32GB in them, which is what I do now. The swapping will then happen every 2 hours rather than every 1/2 hour.

-Keith

Thanks a lot for the input, guys!

Actually, we've got 16Gb cards with our camera, not 8 Gb (my mistake), so swapping will be necessary once an hour, not every half an hour. It's about recording a 24-hour art performance in an improvised studio setting, so taking care of the camera at regular intervals will not be a problem (but renting additional equipment is).

My main concern is the length of the final clip. Having a single 24-hour clip is a conceptual condition of the artist, but I'm wondering how Clip Browser and Final Cut will handle it. (Of course, the best way to know is to make a test in real-life conditions, but I'm not really inclined to spend an entire day and night swapping cards one additional time :) If you know of any possible issues, I will try to convince the artist to stop the recording for a second, say, every 6 hours.

For conferences consider the MxM hard disk solution. I run mine with an 80gb SSD. You get approx 280 minutes on a standard EX1 (EX1R's can support larger disks).

The wonderful thing is you don't have to faff around with cards or worry that the slot switching will work. If you have E-SATA in your machine the transfer is fast as well.

I couldn't go back to fumbling around with cards at the back of a dark conference hall or messing around afterwards joining the clips up. Just seems so backwards.

For the 24 hour shoot you may have to do the card swap solution. Although frankly it makes me wince just thinking of it. I'd be more inclined to take the SDI output and record to a separate device with battery backup which can be trusted with huge files. Then you won't even need to touch the camera.

My EX1 shot (I was not the camera operator) a nearly four event with two 32 GByte Sandisk SDHCs in full quality mode. I bought a pair of the 32GBs during the BH Photo blowout earlier this year. Now, a 32GB Sandisk Extreme Pro with a 90 MByte/second read/write speed goes for about $130 .

I've had problems (Media Restore issue, but no footage lost) with the old Sandisk Extreme III 15 MB/sec cards in my EX1, so I leaned on my Transcend Class 6 16GB Green stripes more often. When I compared the 15 MB/second version with my newer 45 MByte/second Sandisks, I did not notice a difference in the time the green writing light turned off.

I wouldn't shoot in HDV anymore. Just buy another good SDHC card, but I like Marcus's suggestion of the MxM hard disk recorder. I should have purchased that in retrospect.

Marcus, does the EX1 green recording light turn off faster than for SDHC?

Marcus, does the EX1 green recording light turn off faster than for SDHC?

Depends on the SDHC in question. The old Transcend's I used to use (which were the cause of many problems) could take as long as 5 seconds to clear in the adaptors I used to use. But a modern ATP or Sandisk Class 10 in a MXM adaptor takes a couple of seconds.

From memory the hard disk recorder takes a couple of seconds. The limiting factor is the USB bus, not the media (remember I'm recording to SSD which is very fast indeed).

The downside with the hard disk unit is that it's really only of use when the camera is on sticks. While you can use it handheld, it really does tend to get in the way. But for long form recording at conferences or presentations it really is a godsend.

Marcus, it would be good to know if you are able to measure a difference between the SSD and SDHC.

I agree the USB bus is the limit, but some flash cards data writing is delayed by up to 1/3 second, usually as they fill up or age. I'm also wondering if using a higher capacity SSD will eliminate such delays as they contain much larger write buffers than current flash cards.

"The downside with the hard disk unit is that it's really only of use when the camera is on sticks."

Since I'm using a Nanoflash with the Sony EX1 on a shoulder mount quite often, the additional wire for the SSD is not such a big deal.

Just one question, maybe silly.

But who is going to watch anything 24 hrs long?

I do use M100 to edit long form projects, with no problems. But the longest piece I ever made was just short of 2 hrs. No problem handling hundreds of hours of footage and lots of different versions and hundreds of cuts in a program with as many as 7 layers of video and 12 or more audio channels. I use lots of compound clips. M100 is really great for long form.

I have done this with FCP7 as well and it was not nearly as smooth. But it works OK. Just slow, lots of rendering as M100 has no rendering needs at all while editing, only on output to a file. It plays out to tape perfectly w/o rendering.

I think FCPX will get there in a while. It is not there yet but it seems real promising. Once the Pro monitoring solution is solved I think it will be fast and capable.

There is also Avid. It works great for these types of projects. I just prefer M100 at this time because I have used it for 1 1/2 decades and know it really well. I am still allergic to Premier because of all the old problems with audio sync, I know this may be fixed now but it has bitten me badly in the past.

Another comment is why just record on one camera. I almost always shoot with 2 or 3 especially when it is a long interview or event/lecture, it makes the cuts much easier in editing and can save your a** when technical problems arise.

olof wrote "But who is going to watch anything 24 hrs long?"

It's an issue of capture. Have you ever had any gigs that involved a two week stay in a foreign country ? I remember a desperate "chimping" (deletion process) of DSLR photos during my two week stay in Kashmir during the 2006 earthquake relief effort. I brought a dozen DV tapes, and given the limited supply, I shot less video with the thought that I would really need the remaining 1/3 tapes for something great.

Don't overlook that flash media and SSDs operate more reliably when they are not fully-written. Even an iPod has scarily-slow write performance when there is only 10% space left.

When recording space is not limited, you are not constrained by the capacity of the recording media.

Just one question, maybe silly.

But who is going to watch anything 24 hrs long?



Hi Olof,
I was recently in Boston and there was a wonderful 24 hour piece being shown at the art museum there (don't remember which museum, but it was on Huntington Ave. right next to the NEU campus) called 'The Clock'

I stuck my head in to take a look, and ended up staying about twice as long as I thought I would. The great thing is that if I go back I'll probably see a different part of it! The idea wasn't to spend 24 hours there, but the concept required a full 24 hr cycle.

It was a concept piece showing the use of time in various movies, but I thought it ws really well done, and well worth looking at.

MEANWHILE --
On the technical side ---
I have some doubts about the idea of constantly recycling the same cards and having a single camera there -- because I only trust cards that have been deleted or formatted in the camera, not in a computer, and particularly not in a mac where the computer may try to create a 'trashes' folder with your deleted data, thus reducing the amount of time available on the card. If you plan to use a workflow like this, you'd better do a test of it that goes on for at least 12 hours...
If you have enough cards available to just keep recording them one after the next, that should work best. Your main issues are then:
- Camera jiggle removing and inserting cards - make sure you hav a good tripod and are mounted firmly.
- Power - Run on AC with a battery backup if power is available. Otherwise, use one of the dual battery anton bauer adapters and a couple of brick batteries (with adapters to get to the EX), Bricks can be swapped individually without bringing down the system. We used a system like this for a 72 hr time lapse with the EX3.

On the post side --
How is this being shown? - Are they showing it off a hard drive playback system? Will that system allow for playing a series of files without breaks in between? Conversely will the playback system choke on a file that is large enough to cover the full 24 hours? I'm guessing that a single 24hr file in BluRay format would be <200GB.

Just my musings...
Best of luck with it!