For those who use/own HD/HDV Cameras...

[Tim Polster]

Hello,

I just wanted to ask what you using them for compared to SD cameras.

Since we are a way away from Blu-Ray or HD-DVD being very common, how are you delivering your product?

Is the web a main outlet?

Or do a lot of your projects go out on a SD DVD?

These cameras have been on the market in an affordable price bracket for a couple of years now and I have held off from buying one due to the lack of delivery media.

Just thought I would check in and see how the extra resolution is being utilized.

Thanks for your input.

[Adam Grunseth]

Why I went with HDV....

First- Transcoding HDV to DVCpro 50 gives you much better color, pretty close to 4:2:2 SD because of the initial higher number of pixels.

Second- DV uses 4:1:1 chroma sampling, DVD uses 4:2:0 sampling. When you burn DV to DVD you get 4:1:0, this is only half the color information DVD is capable of. HDV is natively 4:2:0, same as DVD, which allows you to take full advantage of the DVD format.

Third- Some clients do want HD. For example, just a few weeks ago I shot a video for the Oregon Bach festival. The video was to be projected onto a big screen and they specifically wanted it in HD.

Fourth- Even with wedding videos, more and more clients are asking about HD. And with the Playstation three expecting to have a price drop before Christmas this year I expect we will be seeing alot more clients with HD playback abilities.

[Jon McGuffin]

Tim, I asked myself the *very* same question about 8 months ago when I was in the market to buy two camera's. I actually placed an order for two Panasonic DVX100b camera's because I figured I'd use 24p and didn't need the HD resolution. There was a hickup in the order on the company side so I just cancelled it altogether.

My father in law insisted that I buy the Sony HDR-FX1's even though they were a little more expensive and I did.

THANK GOODNESS!!!!!!!!

I am *SO* happy with going 16x9 HD and despite the lack of delivery formats, the reality is that this is coming and the image quality is far superior to that of an SD picture. Working in HD allows a lot of flexability. I very highly recommend you take the dive and go HD....

Jon

[Chris Barcellos]

Asked the same questions when I started thinking HDV a two years ago. Went with FX1, have rarely shot SD since. Simply shoot everything in HDV, and edit in HDV, then render to SD when I need a DVD. Near second nature...

[Malameel Shawky]

I have shoot only twice with my SD equipment when I went HD. The only reason I shoot those two times was because my HD equipment was tied to a computer bacause it is all straight to raid.

Now that I invested to HDV, I wish that I made this move earlier. It allows for more freedom to gun and go (Like DV) but with teh added benefits that were mentioned before. Also, with progressive HD (when you know the final is SD) you can shoot lose and play with the extra resolution in post.

The only worry is matching the frame rates, but once you get that own, its all good.

M

[Serena Steuart]

The more interesting question is "why would you shoot DV if you had HDV?" Delivery isn't an issue; DVDs rendered from HDV are superior to those originated in DV.

[John Moon]

So if you shot in HD what is the best workflow to render out to SD? I suppose you could render one DVD in SD and another in HD for the client.

Thanks

[Kevin Shaw]

HDV yields better better widescreen DVDs than you can get from most DV cameras, so even without HD delivery there's some benefit now for customers with widescreen HDTVs. Plus HD delivery is starting to become a reality: I'm getting more inquiries about it and recently sold a Blu-ray upgrade to someone who doesn't even own a player yet.

I now shoot and deliver widescreen format for most projects and figure that will become the de facto standard aspect ratio of the future, since people are buying HDTVs in droves and it's getting harder to find 4:3 TVs.

[Jamie Allan]

The more interesting question is "why would you shoot DV if you had HDV?" Delivery isn't an issue; DVDs rendered from HDV are superior to those originated in DV.

Storage issues? Workflow problems?

[Steven Gotz]

The simple solution for me was to purchase HD capable DVD players for my corporate customer's training rooms to attach to their 42" up to 65" HDTVs.

I bought the IOData AVeL Linkplayer2 for myself only a few weeks after I bought my Sony FX1 (before the Z1 was even released). Then I convinced my corporate customers that I could do a better job for more money, and they went for it like sharks after chum.

The ability to use higher resolution shots to get more detail made my cideos superior to the competition, and since I am the subject matter expert as well as the videographer, my price for HDV is the same as their SD.

I know of event videographers who just included the price of the player in the event costs. Sure, SD DVDs are provided to the masses, but the person paying got HD! Or they play the HD WM9 files on their PC.

[Kevin Shaw]

Originally Posted by Jamie Allan

Storage issues? Workflow problems?

Storage issues are the same with HDV as with DV unless you convert your source footage to an intermediate editing format, but even then hard drives are so cheap these days it hardly matters. Workflow can be more challenging if you edit in the native HDV format, but to solve that you can either convert to an intermediate editing format or downsample to widescreen DV when you capture out of the camera. So as Serena said, once you have HDV cameras there's little reason to shoot DV any more. I will occasionally still shoot DV if I want to run the tapes in LP mode for longer recording time, or if I'm delivering them to someone who can't play HDV, but that's it.

[James Harring]

I faced this choice last year.
First, I was going to places to shoot wildlife and was in the mode to get higher quality than with a consumercam. I realized I would likely see things I would never see again and in looking back at previous years stills and video realized doing it cheap produced dissappointing results, especially in the final render to DVD. They looked inferior to a blockbuster title, despite looking good on the PC. Considering the trip was not cheap, I felt I should upgrade.

Now with HDV and Vegas, I can say the quality is as good as a commercial DVD. I bought the Sony A1u as I wanted small unobtrusive cam, but option to put some good natural sound with the video using higher grade mics, as that was a missing piece of my videos.

The only negative I can find is with the 16:9 widescreen is jerking, such as on horseback, can make the viewer queasy. I can reduce it somewhat by slowing down to 80%, but I noticed w/ the HD cam, you have to be more aware of your camera's motion.

I capture and edit in 1080i up to the final render to DVD Architect. Format is letterbox all the way. This way, there will be no re-editing, just re-rendering to the HD-DVD/bluray format when the time comes.

PS I don't even have an HDTV yet. I felt I would rather get the video first then the tv to watch it on would follow.

[Serena Steuart]

Running the footage through DeShaker will do wonders. Can't cure blurred frames, so advisable to use higher shutter speed when shooting such scenes.

[Steven Gotz]

Originally Posted by James Harring

PS I don't even have an HDTV yet. I felt I would rather get the video first then the tv to watch it on would follow.

I bought my Sony FX-1, took it to Hawaii (Kauai), got some great footage, came back and took the camera to the better TV stores in town and picked my TV based on my best footage. I was not particularly shocked that a Sony HDTV showed my Sony camera off the best.

[Stu Holmes]

Originally Posted by Steven Gotz

I bought my Sony FX-1, took it to Hawaii (Kauai), got some great footage, came back and took the camera to the better TV stores in town and picked my TV based on my best footage. I was not particularly shocked that a Sony HDTV showed my Sony camera off the best.

Out of interest Steven, which HDTV model did you settle for in the end ?

thanks