SOMEONE POST JVCHD100 Footage!!!!

[Michael Pappas]

SOMEONE POST JVCHD100 Footage!!!!

[Dave Ferdinand]

You mean, straight off the HD100U? The camera isn't even available yet...

[Chris Hurd]

Sorry, not possible. All of the HD100 cams on display at NAB are MT samples, meaning pre-production, and not quite finished. The menus are locked and they will not open the tape transports. Perhaps at DV Expo East in July when we're closer to the shipping date and the actual production samples are in the booth.

[Ben Cole]

Does anyone know the truth about this report on the prism:

Checked this camera out at NAB yesterday - we got kicked out of their booth because we found a SEVERE flaw with this camera. The prism isnt aligned right and when any bright spots hit it it distorts - making a red and green offset on the image. their set had no visible lights to test this on but focusing on reflection on a wineglass they had revealed it. It happened on both lenses they had set up to test. I mentioned it to a sales rep and he brought out an engineer - who sheepishly admitted it was a problem with the prism that they knew about - and that it would not be fixed before release. They then asked us to leave their booth.

A shame cause i really wanted to like this camera, but it is embarassing that a company woudl release a product whose main component - the ccds - dont function.

[Chris Hurd]

Out of thousands and thousands of industry professionals who visited the JVC booth during NAB, doesn't it strike you as the least bit strange that there's this one single "report" someone put on the internet? Don't you think that if there was any validity at all to this, that more videographers and professional camerapersons would have noticed such an issue, and that we'd be reading more about it than this one anonymous post you found? Don't believe everything you read on the internet, my friend.

[Douglas Spotted Eagle]

C'mon, how can ANYONE view a camera at NAB under the worst possible conditions (lots of people craning necks, weird lighting, and most of all, A DEMO CAM) and expect to make such a specific report.
I don't care for JVC at all. I think they are a very weird company, and have had bad experiences with many of their people and products. But I'm also willing to give them a chance, because this new cam is on a different factory line, and it's a very important rollout for them after having failed miserably with the previous HDV outing. So, it's important to try to keep an objective mind. The person that posted the information you refer to was either someone with a fairly transparent agenda, or they simply had too much caffeine that morning. I saw the cam, and under the conditions in which I saw it, it was impressive. Only time will tell the true tale.

[Ben Cole]

It seems to be an issue with these HDV cameras that 24P really means scan at 30fps and throw 6 frames away. Hence the expression cine like which stinks in my book. The lens on this camera is not a high def lens and serious testing needs to be done to find out why it's so cheap! But thanks guys for the advice.
Ben Cole
DP on One Giant leap

[Greg Boston]

Originally Posted by Douglas Spotted Eagle

C'mon, how can ANYONE view a camera at NAB under the worst possible conditions (lots of people craning necks, weird lighting, and most of all, A DEMO CAM) and expect to make such a specific report.
I don't care for JVC at all. I think they are a very weird company, and have had bad experiences with many of their people and products. But I'm also willing to give them a chance, because this new cam is on a different factory line, and it's a very important rollout for them after having failed miserably with the previous HDV outing. So, it's important to try to keep an objective mind. The person that posted the information you refer to was either someone with a fairly transparent agenda, or they simply had too much caffeine that morning. I saw the cam, and under the conditions in which I saw it, it was impressive. Only time will tell the true tale.

DSE:
Yeah, interesting. I saw the camera and really liked many of its features. Although it lacks a wide/zoom toggle on the top handle, it's otherwise nice. The worst part of the JVC booth were the people working it. Not very friendly or accomodating at all. Seemed very defensive when asked any questions, especially of legitimate concerns.

ALL:
Time will tell as always. Everyone should remember that we've been through this 'rumored flaw' mill with just about every pending camera introduction I can remember over the past couple years. Wait until the production models are shipping and the footage has been looked at before making any conclusions.

=gb=

[Joe Carney]

Ben, according to their literature, it's true 24p recorded to tape, or true 30p, nothing stating about frames being thrown away.
Why are YOU spreading unfounded rumors around?

[Ben Cole]

Excuse my confusion I was talking about the HDV codec the JVC HD100 is we hope true 24p. Sony HDVZ1 cameras are claiming 24 feeling cinema style but are in fact 30 NTSC interlaced frames with 6 thrown away that is I belive misleading to their literature.

[Graeme Nattress]

Ben, the HD100 is true 24p. Each frame is 1/24th a second apart in time, and only the 24 frames per second get recorded to tape. The MPEG2 stream is a 720p60 stream, with the 24p frames layed down in a 2:3 pattern (just like the Varicam does) but the dupe frames are not recorded as whole frames, but flagged as repeats of previous frames so that NO extra image data is recorded on tape, and hence the full 19mbps is used to store the 24 images per second. It's not cheating.

As for what the image looks like - great. Looks better than the Z1 as far as I can see, comparing footage side by side, but not quite as good as Varicam, but a lot closer than any other HDV camera. It should be really good.

Graeme

[Jiri Bakala]

Originally Posted by Greg Boston

DSE:
Yeah, interesting. I saw the camera and really liked many of its features. Although it lacks a wide/zoom toggle on the top handle, it's otherwise nice.
=gb=

Greg, you need to give up the notion of the 'zoom toggle on the handle' ...you are getting a real broadcast-level lens. What you can do is to buy a zoom controller ($600-1,000) and mount it wherever you want. If you want a toggle, get Canon or Sony...

[Philip Williams]

Originally Posted by Ben Cole

Excuse my confusion I was talking about the HDV codec the JVC HD100 is we hope true 24p. Sony HDVZ1 cameras are claiming 24 feeling cinema style but are in fact 30 NTSC interlaced frames with 6 thrown away that is I belive misleading to their literature.

Hi Ben, not to sound mean, but have you made any effort to research this before posting the question? Until someone uses a production version of the camera, JVC documentation is pretty much going to be definitive. I found these quotes at www.jvc.com after 3 clicks:
"WORLD’S FIRST AFFORDABLE 24P PRO HIGH DEFINITION CAMERA"
And
"Its true 24 frame per second capability enables recordings to be transferred to 16mm or 35mm film with full HD fidelity, without frame rate conversion."
And:
"true progressive 24 P superior quality recordings"

I'm not sure they could have been any clearer...

Good luck,

Philip Williams
www.philipwilliams.com

[Ken Hodson]

Douglas Spotted Eagle -"having failed miserably with the previous HDV outing."

My appologies for having to go OT but I have to take exception with this comment Douglas. What did they fail so miserably with? JVC has stated that the cam has sold higher then their expectations. The cam hit the market in 2003! 2003! one more time : 2003! Revitalized the concept of a single-chip cam. Pioneered and defined HDV as a viable future format. Sure it won't go down in history as being the greatest HD cam ever, but please wether you are anti JVC or not, get a grip.

[Douglas Spotted Eagle]

So sales determine whether the camera is good or not? Sorry, I don't buy that.
The camera wasn't the correct colorspace, it embarassed the HDV format in the eyes of most shooters. It was a flimsily made camera with poor quality output. It sounded terrible. It had no NLE support.
If that camera "defined" HDV, then I'm a monkey's uncle. It set HDV backwards more than anything, IMO. First rarely means "best" but rather a benchmark for others to shoot at, and usually do better than.
Great, they put out the first camera. It was not what the world was waiting for. Great that it sold well. Maybe JVC should have waited, and if they had, I'd wager we'd be seeing a lot less resistance or negative commentary on the HDV format.
I'm not anti-JVC by any stretch. They *have* had some serious challenges that *most* people who bought midlevel products suffered with, including me and my company. They've also had some great products.

I've defended the HD100 more than anything else, because it looks like JVC has really made strides with it. Since I've only seen it on the tradeshow floor like most folks, I'm excited to actually see it in real world use, outside of a tradeshow environment. It will probably do well. For the sake of the format, I hope it does.