HPX300 Announced

[Jeff Regan]

Speaking of 1080/60i, XDCAM HD or XDCAM EX in interlace mode really show the limitations of the codec. If 1080/60i were a format needed often, DVCPRO HD and AVC Intra would be preferable, IMO.

The difference between the various versions of HDV based codecs, such as Sony, JVC, Canon, vs. AVC Intra is big. I just can't see anyone choosing a higher end HDV Long GOP 4:2:0 based camera when a Panasonic camera is available for $9K or under street price with
broadcast form factor and 10-Bit, I-Frame 4:2:2 full raster codec. P2 cards would be extra, of course, but a 16Gb P2 card has a similar price to an SxS card for XDCAM EX.

Jeff Regan
Shooting Star Video

[Dan Brockett]

Originally Posted by Chris Hurd

Off topic, perhaps, but it's not just Panasonic. JVC's new
HM700 is also shipping next month, well in advance of NAB.

Guess since trade shows are kind of withering away in importance, and the economy is so pathetic, perhaps we will continue to see companies releasing their new products on their schedule, not showing at NAB and then all of us having to wait 6 months before our dealers get the new models in. This could be a good trend IMHO.

Apple dropping MacWorld, numerous companies shining NAB, we live in unprecedented times.

Dan

[Andy Shipsides]

Hey guys,

Wasn't sure if you've seen this yet, but here are my video tours of the new camera. I had a good week with the camera so feel free to ask any questions.

Panasonic AG-HPX300 1/3" 3MOS P2 HD Camcorder - DEPOSIT ONLY :: HD 24p Cameras :: SD, HD 24p Cameras :: Cameras :: Equipment Sales :: Abel Cine Tech

Abel Cine Tech - Video: A First Look at Panasonic's HPX300

Edit: Oops sorry for the repost... didn't see the thread change.

[Jan Crittenden Livingston]

Originally Posted by Chris Hurd

Indeed it does, thanks Jan -- sorry I didn't have a chance to speak to you yesterday, but I had to immediately bail out of the press conference and cab it to Penn Station in order to catch a 2:45pm train, though it was definitely nice to (briefly) see you there. Hope to catch up with you in April. Thanks again,

Hi Chris,

I was sorry you couldn't stay as well, was hoping to catch up. But it was a bit of a "rock star" environment around the camera afterward and I realized about an hour or so after the briefing finished that I hadn't seen you. Went out to see Pat in the lobby and asked; she said you had an appointment and had to leave. Figured we'd catch up sooner or later.

Thanks so much for coming.

Best,

Jan

[Andy Shipsides]

This is a double post but...

Here is some HPX300 footage in P2 format. Only a couple of different shots in different frame rates but it'll give you an idea. This is all in AVC-I 100 1080.

HPX300-AVCI100.zip

Some footage and stills can also be seen on my Vimeo site - Andy Shipsides on Vimeo

Andy

[TingSern Wong]

Gosh - that's really mighty fast for you to get that camera! Our Singapore Panasonic (not dealers, mind you) only have ONE camera - and it is not for sale either ... Just one or two coming in end of this month.

Do you see any problems with the CMOS usage? Rolling shutter, use in camera flash environment, low light noise level? What is the low light sensitivity like? Similar to HPX170? Or is it equal to HPX500 (2/3" CCD)? They managed to cram 2 Megapixels into 1/3" CMOS - so I am wondering.

[Andy Shipsides]

Hey TingSern

Jan from Panasonic lent AbelCineTech the pre-production model for some testing. Which was extremely nice of her.

The camera has the same read out as a CMOS camera. That means it has a rolling shutter and everything that goes along with that. I was amazed how well it did in low light, with all the pixels stuffed in there. It is around the same sensitivity as the HPX170. The HPX500 is still more sensitive, which makes sense because the 500 is a larger chip with less pixels.

Just in case you were wondering all the footage I listed is at 0 db except for the shot of the boat which is +3db.

[Robert Lane]

Unfortunately all the footage you've shared is under-exposed and in some areas badly and needs a little color correction. I've taken the liberty of getting a full-size screen grab from one of the clips you posted (thank you!) and cleaned it up a bit so the image can be more accurately critiqued.

Overall it's a superbly clean chipset, very little noise when compared to the HVX200 (original, not the "A" revision). It would be interesting to see how it performs in progressive.

For those that want to preview Andy's AVC-Intra footage you'll need the AVC-I decoder from Panasonic, and it's free:

https://eww.pavc.panasonic.co.jp/pro....htm#quicktime

[Andy Shipsides]

If you look through the footage I posted there are a couple clips in 24p. I posted this to give everyone a basic idea of the look of the camera. Also many people wanted to play with AVC-I footage as well. You may find it under-exposed but I feel that it serves those two purposes well. It is far from a true camera test with noted parameters, which is something that I plan on doing in the future, but take from it what you can.

[TingSern Wong]

I downloaded your HPX300 clips into my workstation to test.

Basically, after reading some posts about the high CPU usage to decode AVC-I in this forum and elsewhere, I got a bit worried ... but, without any real world AVC-I data, I could not test it out myself (until now).

I am using a powerful workstation - Intel dual Xeon, quad core (3.2Ghz) with 24GB RAM - running Vista 64. EDIUS 5.01 is what I am using - and is able to playback and write AVC-I format without using Panasonic's free decoder/encoder.

To my surprise and relief, I found that I could play back AVC-I (this one) on the timeline in real time (1920 x 1080) with the CPU averaging about 30%. About the same CPU loading as playing back DVCProHD.

Hence, I am astonished that Sony could claim that their XDCAM's MPEG2 is "better" than AVC-I in terms of lower CPU usage. If I use DVCProHD as the baseline - I see little difference between that and AVC-I in terms of CPU usage.

However, playing back AVCHD is a different thing altogether - I see CPU usage going up to 95% - and the playback shutters badly. I observe no such thing when I play back this AVC-I.

[Illya Friedman]

Originally Posted by Andy Shipsides

The camera has the same read out as a CMOS camera. That means it has a rolling shutter and everything that goes along with that. I was amazed how well it did in low light

You mention in your video the "high fill factor" of the sensor. What % is that fill factor?

I.

[Barry Green]

Here's a link to Kevin's footage that we got in Africa with the HPX300. The first clip is HPX170, then the rest are clips that were shot with the stock lens (some) and a Canon 21x 2/3" lens with the 1/3" to 2/3" adapter (the majority of the shots).

(right-click and save-as, please)
http://www.silverphoenixllc.com/Africa2.mov

[Brian Ladue]

Originally Posted by Barry Green

Here's a link to Kevin's footage that we got in Africa with the HPX300. The first clip is HPX170, then the rest are clips that were shot with the stock lens (some) and a Canon 21x 2/3" lens with the 1/3" to 2/3" adapter (the majority of the shots).

(right-click and save-as, please)
http://www.silverphoenixllc.com/Africa2.mov

Wow! That is amazing!

[Steve Phillipps]

Don't know how anyone can ever make any judgements by looking at something they've downloaded. Lots of jitter in the pans, but is that just because it's compressed for uploading to web. You need see the camera and footage in the flesh to make any sensible judgement.
But it does have a pleasing look (very Panasonic, smooth and gentle).
Steve

[Brian Rhodes]

Originally Posted by Jeff Regan

Speaking of 1080/60i, XDCAM HD or XDCAM EX in interlace mode really show the limitations of the codec. If 1080/60i were a format needed often, DVCPRO HD and AVC Intra would be preferable, IMO.

The difference between the various versions of HDV based codecs, such as Sony, JVC, Canon, vs. AVC Intra is big. I just can't see anyone choosing a higher end HDV Long GOP 4:2:0 based camera when a Panasonic camera is available for $9K or under street price with
broadcast form factor and 10-Bit, I-Frame 4:2:2 full raster codec. P2 cards would be extra, of course, but a 16Gb P2 card has a similar price to an SxS card for XDCAM EX.

Jeff Regan
Shooting Star Video

The XDCAM EX CAMS can also use SDHC cards and the 32GB SDHC are only $149.00