DVX vs. HD100 Clips
 

Since the last three years I've been an avid proponent of the DVX, and that one of my beliefs is that the HD100 fills all the jobs of the DVX and more, I decided the next logical step would be to compare the two.

On Sunday, myself and my friend Brian Hodge (DVX owner) decided we'd set up a shot or two and compare the two side-by-side. The tests would be:

1-DVX100A vs. HD100, both shooting DV 24PA

2-DVX vs. HD100, HD100 shooting HDV 24P then downconverted to SD res.

3-DVX resolution chart vs. HD100 res chart in DV 24PA

4-DVX res chart vs HD100 res chart (downconverted to SD from HDV)

I compiled the results into a DVD image that can be downloaded, burned, and then viewed on NTSC or your computer. While you can definitely see differences on a computer monitor, I feel these sorts of things are best judged on NTSC.

The link:

Mac: http://www.hdvinfo.net/media/nweaver/DVX-HD100.img
PC: http://www.hdvinfo.net/media/nweaver/HD100-DVX.iso

I'll wait until I get some responses to post what I feel the results were...you know, to keep up the suspense and all :-)

Hi Nate

How did you do the down conversion from HDV 24p to SD?
Through NLE means or component out of the camera into a DVCAM/DV VTR?

Sorry, no Mac to appreciate your efforts.

Nate, thanks for the effort. Unfortunately an img file will not work with Windows. We'll need an iso file to be able to burn it.

Yeah, I would like to watch it too, but I'm also wintel based.
May I ask you an off topic question on the HD100?
Is the tripod plate really a standard sony and does the camera come with the tripod shoe or the shoe comes with the plate when you buy it? I have a sony plate laying around, but I don't have a shoe.

Thanks Nate.

Link to ISO added above.

The JVC plate is the same as a Sony. Just mounted a 709 on it no problem.
But the camera does not come standard with the tripod shoe. The tripod shoe comes with the tripod plate.

You'll need to see if JVC offer the tripod shoe as a part.

You can't use a Sony tripod shoe either, the holes don't line up (but not by much). Which I guess means Chrosziel will have to release a new light weight support(rail mount).

Link to ISO added above.

Nate: since you apparently have access to both cameras, how about comparing a resolution chart shot on the HD100 at full HDV quality to the same chart shot on the DVX100? We've seen plenty of comparisons between HDV and DV cameras where the HDV footage is downsampled to SD resolution; time to take the gloves off and let HDV show its full value!

Hi,

@Kevin, you know the rez for HDV is better and will mop the floor with the DVX100a. The problem is, there is no delivery method for HDV unless you're going straight to HDTV broadcast or to the web (DivX, WMV or QT-H264). You can't burn an HD DVD on any device so the HDV must be downsampled to SD in order to deliver a DVD. If Toshiba ever get's their act together then maybe we'll be able to deliver HD-DVD, until then it's downsample and archive or transfer to film hombre...

@Nate, The ISO burned and played. Thanks for doing that. They looked comparable to me. I didn't check the waveform or do a histomatch but to my eye they looked pretty close. Do you know of any clips on line that were shot in 30P?

Thanks for posting that comparison Nate. What I'm seeing is a lot more resolution from the HD100 than on the DVX, even in SD mode, which suprised me. The place to see this is on the stones between the railroad tracks, and the resolution charts attest to this, hard to argue with that. However on the color front, I find the DVX picture much more pleasing all round I have to say.
I'd want to do a lot of color correction on the JVC pics for my taste, but just a bit of saturation on the DVX. I wonder how well the HDV from the HD100 holds up to any color correction? I'd probably want to transcode to DVCPRO HD or better uncompressed to attempt that.

Thanks again

Paul

I agree with the assertion that the HD100 footage looks sharper, but the res charts I think I messed up. The downconverted HD100 chart is sharper on the vertical resolution, but worse on the horizontal. I pulled the full frame stills using Quicktime Player, and then made the enlargements using Photoshop...using the scale tool inside a 720x480 document. I think maybe the scale tool was not the way to do this.

Also, somebody asked how I did the footage downconversion...all footage was pulled into a DVCPRO 50 timeline and then the MPEG-2s were encoded directly off of that. The idea was to preserve to chroma resolution gain you get when downconverting HDV.

FCP 4.5 did a lousy job of scaling down footage, but 5 seems to do a great job.

Hi Nate,

thanks for the great comparison. I am following the discussion about the HD 100 for some months now but finally I got a few visual arguments to decide. The downconverted material looks pretty good and I think I will sell my GY 5000 soon. Maybe the experts still have good arguments against it but my pics just have to look good on TV and with a little adjustments the cam permits the results must be (nearly) perfect.

Markus

If I could sell my DV500 for a half reasonable price I would. I love it, but would like to move to a HD100 for the obvious HD option but also native 16:9 DV. I would still have my DV301 for low light 4:3 SD (about the same as the DV500).

What I would like to see is a comparison between footage from the DVX that has been upconverted to 720p and native 720p footage from the HD100.

Why? You want to see just how much softer the DVX footage would be? I'm sure the DVX uprezes pretty nicely for a DV camera, but trust me, there's a lot more real resolution the HD100 puts out.