NEW Digital Cinema Camera - Operational and showing at NAB

[Serge Victorovich]

Originally Posted by Marco Leavitt

I think there would be lots of people already doing it.

Drake Team done this a year ago. Just with another CMOS imager IBIS5A,
limited 720p24 and recorded RAW direct to HDD by utilise of fpga.
http://www.xilinx.com/esp/dvt/cdv/co..._camcorder.pdf
SI and RED only second and third but first was Drake and Kinetta.
I predict, cost of these tapeless camcorders with cmos 1/3" and 2/3" imager and fpga based will by leaps and bounds fall.

[Heath McKnight]

Kinetta is stalled out.

hwm

[Joe Carney]

I wondering about non PremierPro users, lots of us prefer other tools.

[Steve Nordhauser]

Originally Posted by Serge Victorovich

Drake Team done this a year ago. Just with another CMOS imager IBIS5A,
limited 720p24 and recorded RAW direct to HDD by utilise of fpga.
http://www.xilinx.com/esp/dvt/cdv/co..._camcorder.pdf
SI and RED only second and third but first was Drake and Kinetta.
I predict, cost of these tapeless camcorders with cmos 1/3" and 2/3" imager and fpga based will by leaps and bounds fall.

Serge,
No offense because I am very impressed by the Drake but I don't think you can compare an IBIS-5A 720p camera with an Altasens 3570. Also, our camera is about the Cineform workflow and is bundled with Prospect HD and Premiere Pro. We also have had an IBIS-5A camera for years, just don't consider it a real cinema camera.
Regards,
Steve

[Ari Presler]

Falls Church, VA - TV Technology has announced Silicon Imaging SI-1920HDVR Camcorder the winner for the coveted Mario Award at NAB2006.

Organized in 1993, the Mario Awards were established to recognize manufacturers whose products represent significant technical breakthroughs -- many of these products have gone on to significantly impact the future of video technology.

The awards are named after Mario Orazio, a pseudonym for a nameless engineer and a renowned technology columnist for TV Technology who pens the industry's most widely read column "The Masked Engineer." The awards are given out annually at the NAB convention to companies that demonstrate forward thinking and technical excellence in their products.

[Serge Victorovich]

Originally Posted by Steve Nordhauser

Serge,
No offense because I am very impressed by the Drake but I don't think you can compare an IBIS-5A 720p camera with an Altasens 3570. Also, our camera is about the Cineform workflow and is bundled with Prospect HD and Premiere Pro. We also have had an IBIS-5A camera for years, just don't consider it a real cinema camera.
Regards,
Steve

Hello Steve! I've reading your old discussion with Rai Orz in tread dedicated to
Drake camera and IBIS5A sensor. Drake was developed as sensor agnostic camera. http://www.drachenfeder.com/aktuelles/drake_hd_en.htm
A 15 months ago Altasens 3570 was just non exist on market.
What is really nice in yours SI's project is CineformRAW and Cineform workflow.
Price of Elphel camera model 333 with 1/3" cmos imager 1280x1024p30 is only $800. Why price of SI-1920 camera head is $10K ?
Yes, this camera head have 2/3" cmos imager, which cost less than $1K from Altasens. How much better SI-1920 than Sony HDCX300 ?
http://www.ggvideo.com/sny_hdcx300k.htm
When you sell camera body (actually PC with dual core CPU) at $7k,
what you thinking about potential buyers?
Imo, this DIY project overpriced at least two times:D

[Paul Curtis]

Is the body design fixed? Will it be weather sealed (up to a certain point)? It certainly looks robust enough which i like. Im a bit worried about cooling for the PC inside and needing big vents prone to collecting all matter of exterior sand, dust and god knows what...

Is the PC inside running windows or something custom? I would hope custom although a full colour correctable 2k blue screen of death on the output could be amusing the first time you see it instead of your shot...

Looking forward to full res examples.

>Imo, this DIY project overpriced at least two times:D

i wouldn't call this a DIY project and i don't think you can over estimate the man hours that go into getting something like this up and running (especially the software). So maybe the various components are under 10k but the time certainly isn't. Afterall a copy of premier pro only phsyically costs a few bucks to make, so why do we pay so much more? :)

cheers
paul

[Brian Drysdale]

To be successful a camera has to able to withstand vibration, G forces, salt water, cold, heat, humidity and technicians who don't really care how they treat the kit.

None of this comes cheap.

As been already been said, it's not just the cost of the components, it's whole ranch of extra elements (support, distribution etc) plus the profits that a company needs in order to invest in it's future projects.

Volume of sales are another factor, there will be less demand for this sort of camera than consumer cameras that people want to use for family events etc.

[Marco Leavitt]

Congratulations Ari! That's great. I'm glad you guys are getting recognition for this.

[Bill Anderson]

Brilliant! Congratulations to the SI... team. And thanks again for this significant contribution to the Digital Arts.

[Greg Boston]

Originally Posted by Ari Presler

Falls Church, VA - TV Technology has announced Silicon Imaging SI-1920HDVR Camcorder the winner for the coveted Mario Award at NAB2006.

Organized in 1993, the Mario Awards were established to recognize manufacturers whose products represent significant technical breakthroughs -- many of these products have gone on to significantly impact the future of video technology.

The awards are named after Mario Orazio, a pseudonym for a nameless engineer and a renowned technology columnist for TV Technology who pens the industry's most widely read column "The Masked Engineer." The awards are given out annually at the NAB convention to companies that demonstrate forward thinking and technical excellence in their products.

Thanks again Ari for taking time to appear on camera for DVINFO.NET at NAB. For you and the others who haven't seen the clip from NAB, here is the link I posted a few days ago.

http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/showpost....31&postcount=1

regards,

-gb-

[Steve Nordhauser]

Thanks all.
Serge: A 15 months ago Altasens 3570 was just non exist on market.
Steve: True enough. We work closely with Altasens and get pre-release sensors. We worked with the 3560 before it was released and have been selling industrial cameras with this sensor. Now we have the 3570 for cinema.

Serge: Price of Elphel camera model 333 with 1/3" cmos imager 1280x1024p30 is only $800. Why price of SI-1920 camera head is $10K ?
Steve: The camera head without software can be much cheaper if you use a cheap sensor. You can use our SI-3300 if you want to do 1080p (or 720p) with a gigabit interface and SDK for $2795. Of course then you write your own software. The Altasens 3570 is a premium chip that took a long time to design in and is very expensive.

Serge: Yes, this camera head have 2/3" cmos imager, which cost less than $1K from Altasens. How much better SI-1920 than Sony HDCX300 ?
Steve: You clearly don't know the cost of a 3570. We sell the camera link head for the 3560 for $3995. Also, the 'kit' includes our recording software.
For comparisons, we are going to post lots of video on our site. You can do the comparisons - it isn't proper for me to do them for you.

Serge: When you sell camera body (actually PC with dual core CPU) at $7k,
what you thinking about potential buyers?
Steve: I am thinking that they are cinematographers who want a working tool, not IT hackers. That price includes the machined case, display and touchscreen, media, software, lens mounts, pelican case and some other stuff. Oh yeah, some engineering.

One more thought on price and then I will be dropping the discussion since the price is what it is. As Brian and Paul said, there is a cost for development. If it is a consumer product that sells 100,000 units, that cost is amortized over the total. Our market is much smaller - who knows, maybe a couple of 100 per year? We have some pretty big bucks invested in this project for a small company. I'm sure RED spent more on advertising so far than we have on development, but we have a lot invested without knowing the return. At NAB, I didn't hear one comment that the price was too high after doing the pitch. At least 5 asked if I left off a zero. Maybe it seems expensive because we are being totally honest about what we have in hardware. The head (sensor to gigabit) is our rocket science - what we really do best. The rest is completely understandable, upgradable and straightforward which might be why some may think it is an expensive PC. We are not selling a PC, we are selling a camera.

-Steve

[Jason Rodriguez]

We are insuring that you never see a blue screen :)

Thanks,

Jason
Silicon Imaging

[Wayne Morellini]

Originally Posted by Jason Rodriguez

We are insuring that you never see a blue screen :)

It has been a long time since I have seen a Blue screen of death, since using Windows XP, it may freeze rarely, but no Blue. If it worries people, you could simply change the Blue screens colour to pink (Reds already taken) ;)

Originally Posted by Steve Nordhauser

Serge,
No offense because I am very impressed by the Drake but I don't think you can compare an IBIS-5A 720p camera with an Altasens 3570. Also, our camera is about the Cineform workflow and is bundled with Prospect HD and Premiere Pro. We also have had an IBIS-5A camera for years, just don't consider it a real cinema camera.
Regards,
Steve

The Ibis did have some features over the competition, minor ones, relatively to Altasens, were the fill-factor allowing faster lens and less fly screening and the global shutter, but one that really did matter was the extra latitude from the large well capacity and multislope.

If you look at the Altasens compared to the Red (from what we can tell) you may likely get better Signal to Noise ratio, better sensitivity, and latitude with the Altasens. As There is a trade off for the extra resolution, and Altasens is one of the best performers for it's cell size.

Originally Posted by Marco Leavitt

I think it's a shame that RED is sucking so much of the limelight away from this awesome camera. I'm not knocking RED, but Silicone Imaging has pretty much everything I need right now. I can't help but wondering if the true cost of ownership for the RED camera is going to be higher in the end too. By the way, something I can't tell from SI's Web site -- does the $20,000 package include a lens?

Red also has the Red codec, so unless you are goign to record RAW, the cost is not as significant as it seems.

With all these cameras it should be possible to construct a simple SLR lens adaptor using a suitable triplet condenser, if cost id of a prime concern. I have suggested to Steve, in times past, that this would be nice to include with the cameras as standard, because they probably could get them designed and done in batch fro $50 each. It would be good to see how much a basic package without lens and capture computer, but with cineform (and guide to setting up own capture computer) and SLR lens adaptor, as described, would cost.

[Ari Presler]

Originally Posted by Wayne Morellini

It would be good to see how much a basic package without lens and capture computer, but with cineform (and guide to setting up own capture computer) and SLR lens adaptor, as described, would cost.

Hi Wayne,

This is basically our remote head camera package (SI-1920GE-S) for $12.5K!