FX1: Black Levels through S-Video not correct.

[Matt Trubac]

Here is the deal. I am working in a DV Anamorphic sequence. I want to preview my work on my new JVC TM-H150CG monitor by playing back from Final Cut Pro 5.0.4 through firewire to my FX1 and then outputting from the FX1 to the monitor with S-Video.

So it seems to be working fine until I bring up the NTSC Bars in FCP to calibrate my new monitor. Switch the color off and start setting the black level (brightness) but even when I turn the brightness on my JVC monitor all the way up I see no difference between the 3.5 IRE bar and 7.5 IRE bar. I get the same thing if I try the FX1's bars.

I was always able to turn the brightness up on the consumer televisions I was using until I saw a difference between the 3.5 IRE and 7.5 IRE bars and then bring it back down until they merged back together. The only difference between that time and now is I was using a VX2100 for the D>A conversion.

So I borrowed a vx2100 to try. Hooked it up, brought up the FCP NTSC bars, turned the brightness up on the JVC monitor, and it worked as expected.

It seems to me that there may be something wrong with the way the FX1 is converting digital levels to analog, or is there a setting I am missing somewhere on the FX1? Has anyone else experienced this problem? I haven't tried any of the other analog outputs yet.

[Boyd Ostroff]

Interesting, I haven't compared my VX-2000 and Z1. However I'm guessing that you have this backwards. The VX and PD series cameras had an incorrect amount of setup via the s-video outputs; has been discussed here extensively in the past. If you're seeing a difference then it's probably because the FX1 is actually using the correct levels.

http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/showthread.php?t=35420
http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/showthread.php?t=45073

[Matt Trubac]

Even if the FX1 is putting out the correct levels... shouldn't I be able to see a difference between the 3.5 IRE and 7.5 IRE pluge bars if I turn the brightness of my monitor all the way up?

Could someone else try this with their FX1/Z1 and let me know what they find. I wish I had an external waveform monitor to measure the levels coming out of my FX1. I guess I could hook my FX1 to my PC's Matrox RT.x100 S-Vid input and see what type of levels I'm getting with the Matrox waveform monitor.