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Great news…now you just have to wait six months!
I’m happy for all of those who dislike Sony and HDV that Panasonic plan to deliver what on paper at least is an incredible product. Once P2 cards reach the 32GB mark at less than $ 500 this will definitely be the technology of choice of many filmmakers. If Panasonic can get HD over firewire to any HDD, this will overcome the prohibitive cost of P2 storage, if you’re comfortable shooting to HDD, and can live with losing all of your footage if a grain of dust results in the HDD crashing on location 🙁 I really envy you guys – I wish I was in a position to wait 6 months before adopting HD – but I’m in a very competative market which has already bought into the Sony Z1’s, so I’m already shooting HDV every day now on one of those.
Derek Antonio Serra
Filmmaker
http://www.controversifilms.co.za
http://www.indv.co.za -
15 Replies
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Derek,
Uh, no one’s waiting 6 months before adoptiong HD. A lot of people here use HD now. And they, like myself, like DVCPROHD but find it pricey, and are unhappy with mpeg2 compressed HD and all its various problems. You’re acting like Sony invented HD with their HDV cameras. I’m sorry if that’s the first time you’ve heard of it, but it’s been here for a while, here, buddy.
I’m happy that your “very competitive market’ has embraced $5,000 prosumers cameras that shoot interlaced footage. Have fun with that.
jeremiah black
dual 2 gig G5
2.5 gigs of RAM
Decklink Extreme capture card -
[Derek Antonio Serra] “Once P2 cards reach the 32GB mark at less than $ 500 this will definitely be the technology of choice of many filmmakers.”
Is there somewhere kind of definitive proof that p2’s prices will act totally differently in the future than all the other memory products?
So far solid state memory in a long run has doubled its capasity and halved its price in 18 months.
So if 8GB is $2k at fall2005, it might be that 32GB is $500 at fall2008. -
I Don’t dislike HDV. HDV had its use in being the first product to bring HD to the masses at an affordable price. And for that alone it should be commended.
Right now I can get away with shooting SD for my clients’ work. HD has been something I’ve thought best to sit back a few months and see how it develops; and I’m glad I have.
I have in planning a feature film that is mainly handheld (not ready to go just yet anyway) – hence all the posts I had on the HDV forum about motion artifacts. Most people advised me against it and some even elected to say that no-one should dare film hand held anyway as that was amateurish and HDV would ‘teach’ people how to film properly. Granted Derek, you were always very supportive – but it was clear that HDV wouldn’t cut it for me.
So, the Panasonic has been announced at the right time and it sounds like a dream of a camera. I’m lucky in that my own projects have the luxury of being at my own deadlines. I dont want to wait 6 months, but I guess I’ll have to. My DVX100 will serve me well until then.
The proof will be in the picture quality, but frankly Im amazed at what Panasonic are offering. A while ago I asked in the HDV forum how long it would be until we got variable speed recording on an affordable camera, and the idea seemed too ‘high end’ to be even considered. Panasonic have not just raised the bar – they have blown the roof off. This is the biggest development in video for a long time IMHO, and is the revolution that HDV was meant to be. The key things are 1080p and all the frame rates/codecs, variable speed, tapeless, no motion artifacts. On top of this you get digibeta quality in SD mode,(plus DV if u want it)… 2 months ago no-one would have dared ask for that on a sub $10,000 camera.
But they say don’t count your chickens, I’d like to hear more on the CCD’s. I dont understand people with brand loyalty anyway – if this camera was Sony I would have been pleased. I’m happy it’s Pana though because I’m used to my DVX (I love the cine-gamma look) and the operation seems similar also.
Look at it this way, there is no doubt that this camera will make all the other maufacturers think very hard about their future products. Sony, JVC and Canon will be forced to up the anti – and thats no bad thing for the market. Panasonic seem to be delivering a Porche in a family-wagon market, so the others have no choice but to step up.
Karl
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Your “competitive market” certainly isn’t in competition for QUALITY.
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[toke lahti] “So far solid state memory in a long run has doubled its capasity and halved its price in 18 months. “
Actually more than that at least for the SD memory that is at the heart of P2 cards. One year ago 1GB SD cards came out at $499. Today you can get one on sale for $65.
Bob Hudson
Consultant & Writer
Video, DVD and
Multimedia Production
Overland Park, Kansas USA
https://www.bobhudson.com/ -
[Derek Antonio Serra] “I’m happy for all of those who dislike Sony and HDV …”
Wow. Now that was unexpected from such a nice fellow such as yourself, Derek. 😉
Speaking for myself, I don’t hate Sony or HDV. I am, however, disapointed with Sony from time to time, especially given its leadership position in the video market. Also, what’s with the defensive attitude? It’s not as if Sony is some kind of 90 pound weakling who requires defending by outsiders.
Specifically, to the best of my knowledge, this week’s NAB brings no significant HDV hardware announcements from Sony. For example, given that Sony has probably been working on HDV for at least a couple of years, you’d think they might have announced even a _schedule_ for the arrival of full-performance HDV tape decks with analog component _inputs_ and standard or optional SDI or HD-SDI _inputs_, as well as support for fullsize cassettes. No new technology needs to be developed for such decks; it’s already in their existing HDV cams & other pro decks. So what’s the hold-up?
Another glaring omission is public word on fullsize shoulder-mount 1/2″ and 2/3″ image sensor HDV camcorders (plural). I would have at least expected by now an approximate _schedule_ of when we can expect such products. Again, no new tech required for at least some obvious variations in this product category. What’s the hold-up?
As far as I know there has been no public _official_ word from Sony on these and other HDV-related products. I can think of several similar examples of how Sony is dragging its feet concerning HDV.
However, of course, if I’m wrong about this, please set me straight.
And before someone starts whining about how Panasonic or JVC don’t give out their schedule months in advance: Um, at least Panasonic has done this with the new HVX200. And JVC has indicated for quite some time what it intends concerning a fullsize HDV camcorder. Besides, Panasonic JVC don’t “lead” the market the way Sony does. Sony needs to act more like a responsible leader and less like a detached autocrat — and “partner” with _all_ its customers, not just big TV networks.
For example, given how “big” Sony is, why the $@#%^& don’t they have _identified_ Sony employees working in public forums like the COW, similar to what Panasonic pays Jan C. to do? What’s up with that? Sony’s non-presence in the online forum world is insulting, counterproductive and just plain stupid.
Don’t get me wrong: I recognize the cool tech in Sony products such as the FX1 & Z1 cams and the current small Sony HDV deck. For the most part, these products are All Good(TM).
But Sony is an industry leader, and as such they should give their customers and potential customers a better idea where they’re headed with HDV. As it is, their “comission by omission” is odd, more than a bit confounding, and is partly to blame for the swelling sales of their competitors’ products.
All the best,
– Peter
P.S.: Oh, and concerning the new Panasonic HVX200: It’s pretty cool, and I think it’s obvious most early adopters will use harddisk drives quite a bit more than P2 cards, at least at first. Portable harddrives are fairly reliable. Millions of laptop user have relatively few problems with them, and knock-about TV news crews running Ikegami’s harddrive-based pro camcorders seem to do well with them, too. So, recognize the HVX200 will be a cool tool. Also be assured Sony will probably have something new and just as cool around the same time the HVX200 ships. Same as it ever was, same as it ever, was. Cheers. -P.
Just a friendly reminder to all: Please consider filling-in your COW user profile information so we have a better idea who you are, where you’re from, and so forth. It’s the friendly thing to do. Thanks!
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Sony have NEVER been very interested in their users or keeping them informed about what they are doing. I love the kit but don’t like the company very much. Same is pretty much true of Apple as well. JVC and Panasonic have a much better idea about how to treat their customers.
Steve Connor
Cardinal HD -
I have a lot of Sony gear, but, on the whole, Sony is a disappointment to me as a company. Sony’s policy is simply not to go after the prosumer market aggressively, but to stick to major broadcasters and high end equipment. They don’t hang out on the forums to help. They announce products 18 months ahead of their release date. They’ve stated many times that they have no intention of offering true 24p to the masses, their innovations such as HDV are innovations only in protecting their high end market. And they insist on making their own proprietary formats for everything and do not work with other companies to create cross platform formats, (betamax, blu-ray, QSDI, the PSP, the list goes on and on). And, unlike Panasonic, they refuse to release their 1080i codec to editing systems such as FCP.
I used to be incredibly loyal to Sony for years. But the last two years I’ve begun to shift over to Panasonic, because they pay more attention to me. But don’t weep for Sony. The company is huge, they’re the big boys on the block, and they’ll stay that way for a while because they (1) primarily go after the big money, and (2) they aggressivly seek to dominate every corner they touch.
jeremiah black
dual 2 gig G5
2.5 gigs of RAM
Decklink Extreme capture card -
Yep,
but one year ago 512MB SD costed $120 per piece.
So the price has dropped to less than 1/3rd in one year, but if you take 5 average of all sizes of cards
that has been available, the drop isn’t so dramatic.And I think that price of SD is not going to drop so much in the future, because consumers don’t
need any bigger cards to their still cameras than what are already caoming to market.
Next big rush will be when consumer videocameras turn to use memory cards.
That might take some years… -
“5 average” = 5 years average
(How an earth every other forum has ability to edit your posts afterwards?
Cows are not creative?)
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