Okay, so my plan right now is to shoot my next feature on either 2 HVX200s or 2 HPX500s (budget pending), and I would like to know if there is a way to back-up the P2 cards to HDCAM tape without losing any quality. I know the Varicam shoots to some kind of tape (and I think it's the same codec), so, if I'm wanting to save my footage long term, would it work to go from P2 to HDCAM? Or am I looking at having to render to another format?

Thanks.

Since you're shooting with Panasonic P2, my advice is to stick with the Panasonic DVCPRO HD format. Is there a specific reason why you're considering HDCAM? Do you already own an HDCAM VTR?

Nope, just trying to figure out the best way to save my footage long term.

Although I will agree that HDV is not the greatest thing in the world, the nice thing about shooting my last feature on tape is that I still have all 20+ hours of footage readily available to access without a huge amount of hard drives.

I wouldn't advise backing up to video tape at all; a DVCPRO-HD deck is going to cost at least $25,000 and an HDCAM deck is going to be a heck of a lot more.

If you want to back up to tape, consider LTO2 or LTO3 tape. Much faster, far less expensive (more like $2,000 - $3,000), each tape stores far more information (7 to 20 hours per tape) and the per-hour storage cost is about 1/10th the cost of backing up to HD video tape, and it backs up the P2 data "as data", so it's storing everything exactly as originally recorded.

Barry has suggested what many of us feel to be the single best method for archiving P2. Since Brandon mentioned HDCAM in his original post, I thought that might have meant that he had access to such a VTR in the first place, which is the only reason why I mentioned DVCPRO HD in the first place.

What's the life expectancy on these data tapes?

Or you could shoot hdcam to begin with...Are you buying 2 hvx500's? You could get a lot of rental for 60k.

Yeah, budget's not even close to being set (depends on the funding we get, and how well my first feature does with the distributors that are looking at it right now), but I'm looking to get equipment that I can own, so the next film's budget (I plan on doing a film every other year) doesn't necessarily have to include camera gear.

If push comes to shove (i.e. budget doesn't look good), I'll simply plan on going the HVX200 route. There's one guy locally that owns one, so I'd probably hire him for 30 days and then purchase an HVX200 of my own so that we can have two separate production units.

It all depends. I want first and foremost to make sure we have good actors and all the other necessities to tell a good story -- that's the top priority of the budget.

Anyway, regardless I'm looking at P2 for the speed of editing up front (I would like to be able to edit on set), but I am looking at archiving the original footage long term, for posterity's sake if nothing else.

What's the life expectancy on these data tapes?

Last I heard at a seminar was 30 years.

I'm testing to see if saving P2 volumes on blu-ray discs using Toast 8 is feasible.

Any how how much difference are there from HDCAM to DVCPRO HD?
1920 x 1080 VS 1280 x 1080 seems big difference in resolution, but how are the broadcast people taking the quality of DVCPRO HD?
If it passes the broadcast use then 10MB/sec DVCPRO HD seems to be very economical to me.

HDCAM is not 1920x1080, it's 1440x1080. It's also not 4:2:2, it's 3:1:1.

But it does have a higher bandwidth, I think it's 140 megabits.

In short, HDCAM and DVCPRO-HD are toe-to-toe competitors; one's a little better here, the other's a little better there, but they're very comparable.

Thanks Barry for the clarification.
The bandwidth is 140megabits.
I hear NHK purchase both HDCAM and DVCPRO HD (to keep not biased over one company, the leagal thing).

Barry, can you explain to me about how HDCAM records because when I recorded HDV material on to HDCAM at 23.976, then advance the frames on the tape, I saw interlace-like artifacts (not necessarily bad thing) between the frames. Is that some kind of technic they use to smooth out the jaddering?

Kaku,

It's 100% normal.
The original 24p footage needs a 3:2:3:2 pulldown to conform to 29.97i HDCAM 1080i or DVCProHD 1080i.

Antoine,

I figured that it was HDCAM intelace but the interlace pattern was so different, so I wanted to know its nature. It apears after "EACH" frames.

ooops!!!!

Kaku,

after EACH frame ?

oh boy...another story...never seen something like that...

yes, I should say between each frame.
I guess it is interesting interlace pattern that goes vertical AND horizontal.

It could be something that the deck is doing upon playing back.