Resolution Comparison

[Petr Marusek]

Canon XL H1 from Shannon's chart http://www.cinemahill.com/hidef/xlh1...s/IMG_0115.jpg
800Hx650V progressive
800Hx800V interlaced from German magazine, not from Shanon

Panasonic HVX-200 from Kaku's test http://home.arcor.de/martin.doppelba...rts/0088YP.png
625Hx600V progressive

JVC HD-100 from Martin's chart http://home.arcor.de/martin.doppelba...e%20Blende.jpg
700Hx525V progressive

Sony FX-1 from Martin's chart http://home.arcor.de/martin.doppelba...P_Off%20f4.png
650Hx775V interlaced

I compensated for some factors, like for instance a chart not filling the screen properly.

The Canon is an absolute winner; combined with Wafan HDD or PC based recorder, 35 mm adapter and good quality relay nad 35 mm lenses, it should be an excellent camera for film production with theatrical release.

The Panasonic appears to have CCD's that employ both vertical and horizontal pixel shift, without full pixel count for the format, in either direction.

[Martin Costa]

Petr, thanks for taking the trouble to do the comparisons, now if I could only make a film which was as amazing as the specs of these new hd cams!

[Shannon Rawls]

What mode are these cameras in? 1080 or 720? You should put that in there so we know. I don't want people thinking the HVX-200 was in 1080 when it was in 720.

- ShannonRawls.com

[John Mercer]

I'm sorry but am I missing something - all the rez charts seem to be different. How exactly have you "...compensated for some factors, like for instance a chart not filling the screen properly." ? The JVC chart particularly is way off filling the frame.

The .png images all seem to be 977 x 550 pixels too - what does this mean and how exactly can we relate that to each cameras native rez?

[Petr Marusek]

http://home.arcor.de/martin.doppelbauer/ResCharts/

http://dvinfo.net/conf/showthread.php?t=57572&page=3

This is what Martin determined. The Panasonic was in 1080p mode.

Canon XLH1 about 800 lph (unconfirmed !) (1080i)
Sony HDR-FX1/Z1 about 700 lph (1080i)
Panasonic HVX200 about 600 lph (1080p)
JVC HD 100 about 500 lph (720p)

John Mercier, I don't know what brouser settings are you using, but mine .png images were close to 1910x1040. Note also that I was the only one who interpreted the HVX 1080p resolution over 600 lines. You need to see a few of these charts and go over them with an engineer to to learn how to interpret them properly.

The main difference between my interpretation and Martin's is that I went in 25 line increments. Another one is that if you study the Sony carefully, you see that the vertical resolution goes to about to 775. The JVC was the hardest to interpret. I also remember that the JVC loses resolution on iris closing more than the Sony does, per previous Italian test.

P.S.

I just looked all 4 of the HVX 1080p resolution charts. The camera will resolve 600 lines horizontally and vertically, but the resolution pattern is different than with other cameras. The individual strips with lines in 100 line increments are not as clean as with other cameras once we get close to the resolution limit, indicating IMHO both vertical and horizontal pixel shift. The diagonal resolution is higher, which again IMHO testifies for both V & H shift.

The resolution performance is similar to JVC HD-100.

The Canon is the only camerera in this group with notably high resolution.

Here is a resolotion shart shot with hand-held JVC HD10: http://home.earthlink.net/~lesd/hd/jvc-HD10-chart.jpg It indicates 600Hx450V.

[John Mercer]

Hi Petr,

"You need to see a few of these charts and go over them with an engineer to to learn how to interpret them properly."

I'm sorry but this is quite an arrogant statement. I have been working in TV and film for over 20 years with both film and video - I know how to interpret a resolution chart. These are camera alignment charts - one a very old 4:3 NTSC tube one and the other a more modern Hi-def one. Mostly other types of charts are used for lens collimation. I have never heard of industry professionals testing cameras in this way - only obsessive prosummers.

Ok so I downloaded the .jpgs and see that they are native resolution - my mistake. But my point remains about framing - the JVC is very inaccurately framed - how can you determine accurately the chart here? How did you compensate for this framing? You would also need to look at the JVC image upscaled to 1920 x 1080 pixels to level all comparisons, preferably with the same chart and framing as the H1. The HVX200 OTOH is some wierd 1882 x 1040 - however slight some scaling is going on.

"The Canon is an absolute winner; combined with Wafan HDD or PC based recorder, 35 mm adapter and good quality relay nad 35 mm lenses, it should be an excellent camera for film production with theatrical release."

Even from these very crude comparisons it is far from clear to me that the Canon is "an absolute winner". As I have mentioned elsewhere the differences between these cameras are minimal and resolution charts are only 1 part of the story.

There is absolutely no evidence that the Canon is THE camera choice for theatrical release. a) it is highly unlikely and will be very rare that any of the footage from these cameras will end up in a theatrically released 35mm print, and b) IF that does happen both the HVX200 and the JVC will be equally suitable choices. Consider that 24f 1080p is about 20% less resolution than 1080i, which is about the same resolution as 720p for one thing.

[Petr Marusek]

John,

Sorry if I sounded arrogant. I did not mean "you" particularly, but "someone in general". The charts are far from perfect. I don't want to start looking at them again. I mentioned that the JVC chart was the hardest to interpret. I don't rememeber which one was it, but one chart was a 4x3; that was OK, since H and V resolution lines and their spacing were identical. The chart was shot so it fills the frame vertically, which was proper.

You can consider the JVC interpretation as not too accurate. There were also some charts done somewhere in Italy that showed that the JVC is losing resolution with iris closing a lot more than the Sony; I already mentioned it. So for determining the JVC resolution accurately you would need more charts for sure.

As to cameras losing resolution when converted to progressive, that is for sure, but if you look at the Canon chart, you can see that Canon is doing something differently. I can only guess that although the chips have a native format resolution, a pixel shift allows higher resolution than 1440x1080 and this higher resolution is probably the starting point for Canon to create their progressive footage. It makes sense, since 1080/24p is available also via HDSDI.

Petr

[Shannon Rawls]

Don't beleive Shannon's Chart. It's incorrect. The Canon will yield a better resolution then what that chart shows. I know Shannon personally. Probably better then anybody here, and he told me to tell everybody not to use that chart as scientific data.

Just passing the message

- Wendell R.

[Kristian Indrehus]

Originally Posted by John Mercer

There is absolutely no evidence that the Canon is THE camera choice for theatrical release. a) it is highly unlikely and will be very rare that any of the footage from these cameras will end up in a theatrically released 35mm print, and b) IF that does happen both the HVX200 and the JVC will be equally suitable choices. Consider that 24f 1080p is about 20% less resolution than 1080i, which is about the same resolution as 720p for one thing.

I agree with John, and I just bought the XL-H1. I love the camera but I may go buy the HVX as well. But not because of any higher resolution.
I think we should not be too hung up in these spec´s. They all seem to have more then decent resolution. I´m not saying the discussion isn´t important and that spec´s doesn´t count. But lets not get fanatic about them. There are so many other equally important things to look for, like what happens when you start to move these things, and colors etc.

I´m not into moviemaking for the big screen myself, but I had a part in one many years ago. $4 mill. budget. (That´s pretty much as high as it goes around here) It was shot on 35mm but I was very disappointed with the quality when I saw it again a few months ago. Now, I had a guest-part in a more recent movie. It was shot on digibeta and then transferred to film, and that looked quite impressive. Here they say in three years it will all be done in HD. (In Norway that is) That certainly does not mean it will be done on prosumer-cam´s. Though it might happen occasionally.

If I had to choose between pro-sumers for the big screen, I would have chosen the one with 1920x1080 SDI uncompressed out and recorded to deck. Wait, that´s not entirely true. I would have done test transfers of the cam´s that I found most pleasing to the eye. I certainly would not choose looking at res.charts.

For my own work, I picked the H1 because it´s so versatile. All the in´s and out´s you need, it can be used as a shoulder cam for short periods without any hassle, decent lens, sdi out for studio recording, tc in/out for multi-camera work, and very important to me; both the look of progressive and interlaced compatibility for TV work. What more can you ask for in one package and in this price range? Dare I say it? My customers are used to seeing big shoulder cams, but they go WOW about this little fellow.

[Petr Marusek]

Originally Posted by Shannon Rawls

Don't beleive Shannon's Chart. It's incorrect. The Canon will yield a better resolution then what that chart shows.

Shannon, you've been saying this, implying that the camera will do 800Hx800V in 24F, if I understand right. Does it mean that the German magazine also talks about progressive 800Hx800V resolution?

Since you have the camera, could you possibly shoot the resolution chart in 1080i and 1080p and post some frame grabbs, please.

[Pierre Barberis]

Comparing on different targets pictures in different rezsolutions is jus NOT SERIOUS.
People who do this without following a documented process and describing the production thread they have been using are just an embarrassment, and they lead new candidates to erroneous choices.

Try by yourself and make judgement on Movies !!

Some Moderator should do his job and kill such ( suspect ? ) posts.

[Petr Marusek]

Originally Posted by Pierre Barberis

Comparing on different targets pictures in different rezsolutions is jus NOT SERIOUS.
People who do this without following a documented process and describing the production thread they have been using are just an embarrassment, and they lead new candidates to erroneous choices.

Try by yourself and make judgement on Movies !!

Some Moderator should do his job and kill such ( suspect ? ) posts.

Excuse me, but the frame grab resolution was approx. 1920x1080 for all the cameras except the JVC, where the resolution was approx 1280x720, which is OK for 720p camera. Since the cameras all had significantly lower resolution than 1080/720, the resolution of the frame grabs was always more than enough; there was no need to have uniformity beyond what was presented. Where the chart did not fill the screen properly, I compensated for that.

I think that the figures are as accurate as you can get. Another site claimed 600 lines for the Canon and 700-750 for the Panasonic. Maybe they are the ones who need to kill their posts!

[Gabriele Sartori]

Originally Posted by Petr Marusek

Here is a resolotion shart shot with hand-held JVC HD10:

Peter I checked the charts and although is probably a test that we can't consider scientific I agree with your observations. Now a question since I have an HD1. What is the resolution of the HD10 in your opinion? From the chart it seems to me not to different from the other cameras although we all agree the problems of the old JVCs are not about resolution.

Thanks a lot
Gabriele

[Petr Marusek]

Originally Posted by Gabriele Sartori

Now a question since I have an HD1. What is the resolution of the HD10 in your opinion?

If I understand the question right, the resolution on HD1 and HD10 is 600Hx450V, judging from a hand-held chart shoot. It could be more with a tripod mounted camera, but resolution is not everything.

[Ash Greyson]

For film out resolution is the top priority, that is why you see just about everyone with film dreams choose an F900 over a Varicam



ash =o)