I'm ready to rock!

Canon XL-H1 (ready to rock)
Sony HVR-Z1U (ready to roll)
JVC HD-100 (????)
Panasonic HVX-200 (????)

Let's do it! I wanna point these puppies at some charts and stuff! See which one has the best resolution since that is so important to everyone. I have a feeling the HVX will have the highest. Let's shoot some flowers & birds for color testing and film some weirdo strangers in Hollywood for motion comparisons! We can even do some run gun type film making. I'll hire an actress and actor for the day to do some public dramatic stuff in the streets of Hollywood. Maybe we'll have them pull up in a car and get out slamming the doors and begin arguing as they walk up the street! We can shoot them from various angles with the various cameras and post the footage.

Wassup??

- ShannonRawls.com

I don't have a production model HVX yet, I'm still working off the preproduction model, so I can't go forward until I get an end-user unit...

Good idea Shannon, not to only film resolution charts, because frankly, I don't care so much about resolution.
The total image is much more important.

And photos of the shoot would be very nice to see too, like with that JVC HD100 with Mini35 review.
And a review on their ergonomics, how where they to shoot with?
I haven't got any of the cams, so I am of no help (and even IF I had them, I would have to come from Belgium :-))

Good idea Shannon to test all four but, and with all due respect to anyone on these boards, I vote to outsource this test to a pro DP with absolutely no vested interest in any of these cameras or connections with anybody in this community - the heat of the debates about them just go to show people are far too partisan about one make or other and worse I am all too convinced there are unhealthy and undeclared relationships with the various manufacturers going on - manufacturers are getting cuter and cuter in their marketing - (no names no pack drills and no evidence just an ever increasing feeling from the things that are said in the way that they are said).

I also agree with Mathieu 100% rez charts are ultimately misleading - we already know that all 1/3" chip HD cameras are pretty close in terms of rez through the laws of physics and only the 'measurabators' (great term) will find any significant and meaningful difference in them.

Due to the bad weather Kaku and I were suppose to hook up 2 days ago,
I having my HD100 would go against Kaku's HVX and even his A1,
But I guess that will be done for this weekend or so.
Will keep you posted.

John,

If we find a neutral DP, then fine. But lemme assure you.....

SHANNON RAWLS has no intrest in any of these freakin' companies....
I ain't got no software to sell
I ain't got no books to write
I ain't got no semminars to speak at
I ain't got no classes to teach
I ain't got no jobs to get based on the cameras I shoot (like dp's do)

All I got is Movies to make. Because I'm a PRODUCER.....means a whole lot more then being a DP who likes certain gear.

AND I WILL BE THERE. I'm as unbiased & unbrainwashed as they come. So if you can't beleive my word, then you can't beleive ANYBODY'S! Especially some strange DP.

Plus, I doubt anybody will let anybody else "tweak a setting" without someone else noticing or letting it happen. *smile*
But hey....if you got the money...I'll hire someone like BLAIN BROWN or something.
I will however pay for the actrors and everybodys lunch.

- ShannonRawls.com

John,
SHANNON RAWLS has no intrest in any of these freakin' companies....
I ain't got no software to sell
I ain't got no books to write
I ain't got no semminars to speak at
I ain't got no classes to teach
I ain't got no jobs to get based on the cameras I shoot (like dp's do)


Geez Shannon, if I didn't know you better, I'd think you were speaking to me. :-)
That said, you're pretty non-biased, after only the truth and great video. What I *do* wish would occur, is that people that get free goods or "long-term" loaners from camera companies would disclose that so that folks know what is what.
For the record, we've purchased (as in paid cash money for) our Z1's, A1's, JVC HD 100, (we only have one) and will receive a Canon shortly on a 1 week loaner, after having had one for a previous 3 day loaner (evenings only).
We've also paid for an HVX, but haven't rec'd it yet.
In other words, while I'm unabashedly a huge fan of Sony Vegas, that doesn't spill over into the cameras simply because they're Sony cams. However, while VASST is non-partisan, I'm personally not. I like the Z1 (so far) more than any other low cost/entry level HD offering I've seen to date. But for the sake of conversation, the XL-H1 is very intriguing.
We've had 3 of the 4 cameras in the same shoot at once, and really hoping we see our HVX soon while we've got the Canon again.
For full disclosure:
VASST makes conversion software for HDV
VASST has a book on HDV
VASST does HDV seminars sponsored by several software and hardware companies with vested interests in entry-level HD.

Geez, Shannon, confession is good for the soul. :-) I feel so much better now. I do wonder though, how many guys out there get free cams, long-term loaners, or trade out cameras for endorsements. Nothing wrong with that, so long as there is disclosure or at least an understanding in the forums as to where folks are coming from.

Too bad we missed you at the BandPro and VASST events last month! We had a blast.

Good idea Shannon, not to only film resolution charts, because frankly, I don't care so much about resolution.
The total image is much more important.


If the Canon is doing some intelligent deinterlacing to achieve 24f/25f/30f, a static res chart will give a misleadingly high result in these modes. Something to bear in mind.

I wouldn't waste money on actors personally, no one cares about the performance, just how it is captured :)

Thanks in advance Shannon.

If the Canon is doing some intelligent deinterlacing to achieve 24f/25f/30f, a static res chart will give a misleadingly high result in these modes. Something to bear in mind.

I'm not quite following that statement. Are you saying we shouldn't beleive what we see?
So you mean to tell me if the Canon yields 100,000 lines of resolution and we are seeing this with our own optical eyeballs, you're saying...."don't beleive it, it was done electronically in the camera so it don't count??" LOL

If a Porsche goes 0-60 in 3.6 seconds, we shouldn't beleive it because it used a Turbo to do it?

If it ain't one thing, it's another. I swear, you just can't win with human beings. Nothing is ever good enough. LOL

Geez Shannon, if I didn't know you better, I'd think you were speaking to me. :-)
HAHAHAHA, Naw DSE....You're my idol bro! I wasn't even thinking about you when I typed that.

*scratching my head*

But now that you mention it.... COME TO VASST TO GET YOUR HDV CERTIFICATION! *smile* Only $59.95 or your money back! (not including shipping & handling) lolololololol

Just kiddin' man. I wasn't thinking about you when I wrote that. I think when you "OWN" a camera from all manufacturers, it kinda eliminates you from being bias. However, since VASST is the poster child for the HDV format, you have to put your "WE LOVE HDV" jacket back on and wear it. Sorry, but I gotta keep it real! So NO BUDDY OLE' PAL.... you ain't Switzerland either! *smile*

And thanks for the open confession. In my religion, that's the only way to get SAVED!

- ShannonRawls.com

I'm ready to rock!

Canon XL-H1 (ready to rock)
Sony HVR-Z1U (ready to roll)
JVC HD-100 (????)
Panasonic HVX-200 (????)

I'm hoping to have them all side-by-side on a balcony at a wedding ceremony in mid-February, if I can work out the details. If you do a comparison before then, please send me some notes on how you capture and edit all those formats. (Software used and step-by-step capture instructions would be helpful.)

Kevin:

If you need any muscle at this "test", I would be willing to help just to get a look at all of the rigs..

Chris Barcellos

I'm not quite following that statement. Are you saying we shouldn't beleive what we see?
So you mean to tell me if the Canon yields 100,000 lines of resolution and we are seeing this with our own optical eyeballs, you're saying...."don't beleive it, it was done electronically in the camera so it don't count??" LOL

If a Porsche goes 0-60 in 3.6 seconds, we shouldn't beleive it because it used a Turbo to do it?

If it ain't one thing, it's another. I swear, you just can't win with human beings. Nothing is ever good enough. LOL



An intelligent deinterlacer can interpolate a progressive frame from two fields and some are clever enough to simply use both fields if the frame is completely static. A res chart IS completely static, 99.9% of shots in films AREN'T. Therefore a static res chart could be misleading - Yes the camera can resolve "X"LPs on on a chart but not in the real world.

I am sure Canon would know about this and also know people would test the camera in this way. Therefore it is very possible that the camera is designed to give misleadingly high res readings from a static res chart. This only applies to the "F" modes.

To use your car example:
I used to have a car that would do 62mph in 2nd gear and 101mph in third gear. This gave it impressive 0-60mph & 0-100mph times, so in testing it DID APPEAR faster than it really was. The gearing was designed to make it look good ON PAPER. The car was crap though :)

My suggestion to you guys is that if you are going to the bother of doing the tests, put as much energy into leveling the playing field as possible. If this means bringing in a DP that can ensure that this is happening, then that's the way to go. There are many examples of test footage posted here and elsewhere on the net that is accompanied by excuses and apologies, i.e. "that shot is out of focus, whoops--I didn't use a tripod on this one so it's sort of shaky--we didn't have a monitor so we couldn't make the shots exactly the same" etc. In the interest of fairness I'll admit that I am guilty of this to an extent with the tests I did of HD100 for the article here at HDVInfo.net; there were a few mistakes or uncertainties made at the beginning while we were getting organized, so it certainly can happen. But not using a tripod? oy...

I'd even recommend taking a page from the tests that Jared and Barry do at DVXuser, mounting the cameras on a board so that they can be panned simultaneously. It's not at all out of the question for all four cameras to be mounted together on a single head (get an O'Connor 2575 from a rental house). Think how helpful that will be to evaluate motion judder seen during pans--you'll be able to run split screens to your heart's content.

Shannon let me know when and where and I ma down. Itodl you I wnat to compare the HD100 w/ mini35 to some of the other cameras too. Maybe Sunday??

Ok. I'm learning. I'm new at this, so bear with me.....
Do I have this right?

"RESOLUTION CHARTS AREN'T GOOD ENOUGH FOR TESTING CAMERAS ANYMORE."
The results are a lie.

correct?

Is it just me, or does it seem like the rules of the game keep changing?

- ShannonRawls.com

Ok. I'm learning. I'm new at this, so bear with me.....
Do I have this right?

"RESOLUTION CHARTS AREN'T GOOD ENOUGH FOR TESTING CAMERAS ANYMORE."
The results are a lie.

correct?

- ShannonRawls.com

I don't believe that is what they are saying or meaning. It is just that there is more to testing a camera than checking what the lenses and CCD's can do. There are motion artifacts, light level conciderations, and on and on.

They just want the tests to be more than a Resolution Chart tests, and more like real world tests of all or more aspects.

After all, my Nikon D70 would out rez all of these cameras if I figure this right, but I sure can't make a movie with it.

I look forward to see the results of these tests, and would love to be there.

Mike

If you need any muscle at this "test", I would be willing to help just to get a look at all of the rigs..

Chris: this will be taking place on Feb. 15th in Sacramento, California, as part of an event being sponsored by WEVA. If you think you can make it send me an email and I'll give you the details.

I don't believe that is what they are saying or meaning. It is just that there is more to testing a camera than checking what the lenses and CCD's can do. There are motion artifacts, light level conciderations, and on and on.

HENCE......

Let's shoot some flowers & birds for color testing and film some weirdo strangers in Hollywood for motion comparisons! We can even do some run gun type film making. I'll hire an actress and actor for the day to do some public dramatic stuff in the streets of Hollywood. Maybe we'll have them pull up in a car and get out slamming the doors and begin arguing as they walk up the street!


*scratching my head* OK, so what's the problem? Did you guys miss that part?

- ShannonRawls.com

Res charts are just one useful data point. Nobody is saying that it's all that matters. Motion compression artifacts can be an issue, the flames and birds that someone shot over on the JVC thread really tell me that the mpeg2 is showing no problems on the JVC 100 .
Can't wait to see the charts!
-Les

My suggestion to you guys is that if you are going to the bother of doing the tests, put as much energy into leveling the playing field as possible.

Any suggestions anyone can provide along these lines would be appreciated. Some things I'm particularly wondering about are how to establish a fair exposure comparison, how to ensure an equivalent white balance, and what modes to run the cameras in that will be most useful to people. I probably won't have time to run all the cameras through all of their paces, so my plan is to pick a single "standard" recording mode for each camera for the main event and then run whatever experiments I can beyond that. I also hope to do a comparison of encoding the resulting footage to widescreen SD and compressed HD formats, so any recommendations of encoders to test are welcome.

"RESOLUTION CHARTS AREN'T GOOD ENOUGH FOR TESTING CAMERAS ANYMORE."
The results are a lie.

correct?


I could be wrong BTW, I am just saying it is how I would do it if I was designing the camera. :)

I wasn't trying to knock your test plans or anything, just suggesting additional considerations so the test is DEFINITIVE :)

I am still trying to think of a way to test resolution objectively if intelligent deinterlacing is being used... any ideas guys?

It's a tricky one, Kevin...take white balance for instance. Nominally you can just point all of the cameras at a white or grey object and do a white balance. However, each manufacturer has a different bias to their cameras DSP, so one might appear cooler than another, one more green than another etc. Ideally one would "paint" the cameras to match each other as much as possible, using a vectorscope and a broadcast monitor. Then there's the exposure issue--as has been discussed in another thread, simply setting all the cameras at the same gain setting (say, 0 db) does not mean they have the same gain processing internally.

The very least that one can do to achieve parity between the cameras is to A/B them through a trusty monitor and adjust the second camera to match the first by eye, then put the third camera in place of the second and adjust it, and so on. Of course, this requires a lot of fiddling with menus and each camera has different nomenclature and features, so a lot of trial and error will result.

If the cameras are not matched, inevitably a certain amount of false result may apply--anyone viewing the footage may decide a preference for one camera's image over another when under more controlled circumstances, they may choose differently.

To me, the only way to qualitatively judge two cameras is to match their images as closely as possible AND have the framing as similar as possible. It makes for a tedious shoot day; it's not as spontaneous as shooting a wedding or as sexy as shooting two actors walking down the street having a fight, but there it is.

Quick example--say you are shopping for a 42" plasma; it's pretty obvious that all 42" plasmas next to each other in the store should be exhibiting the same program in the same mode...think how much harder it is would be if one was zoomed in, another was stretched, etc. Plus you hope that they are adjusted as well as possible; you'd hate to plunk down your money for the Sony only to find out the next time you went into the store that the Panasonic next to it had subsequently been dialed in and you actually preferred it.

Thanks Charles -- sounds like it would be useful to try to line up a decent broadcast monitor and maybe a vectorscope. We will have some time before the shoot to try to match everything up, and framing will probably be locked in place, so we could at least attempt to make this an equal test.

Wish I was on the left coast to help out! If any of you could include the following in your test, it would be extremely useful:

In at least one of your shots, include some well-lit primary colors - ESPECIALLY RED. I've seen HDV and even possibly some HVX200 material appear blocky, as if it were losing resolution in those areas, such as auto taillights (and parts of Kaku's footage in the bike store). This is an issue I haven't seen addressed anywhere as of yet - perhaps I missed it?

I did tests with the Z1 shooting some custom charts I made in Photoshop, and it revealed these artifacts - mostly in primary colors. I would be interested in seeing how these different cameras perform in this regard. (Also - be happy to send these charts as image files to anyone if they would want to replicate my test).

So you mean to tell me if the Canon yields 100,000 lines of resolution and we are seeing this with our own optical eyeballs, you're saying...."don't beleive it, it was done electronically in the camera so it don't count??" LOL


Hey if it yields 100,000 lines of resolution, forget the Origin, I'm buying a Canon. :-)