Can a Panasonic HVX 200 Record HD & capture to FCP Simultainously?

[Rusherific]

Anyone who has not checked out Serious Magic’s DV rack (which will be HVX compatible any day now) is missing out on the killer solution for about 5 of the short comings of this camera. A killer calibrated monitor (flip-able for the prime lens mounts), meters up the wazoo, recording right to internal or external hardisk where you can name the clips, etc etc. all operating on a fast laptop, hence portable. All of this including a fast PC for less than the cost of a firestore. No brainer. Check it out and wait for the release.

[Rusherific]

Anyone who has not checked out Serious Magic’s DV rack (which will be HVX compatible any day now) is missing out on the killer solution for about 5 of the short comings of this camera. A killer calibrated monitor (flip-able for the prime lens mounts), meters up the wazoo, recording right to internal or external hardisk where you can name the clips, etc etc. all operating on a fast laptop, hence portable. All of this including a fast PC for less than the cost of a firestore. No brainer. Check it out and wait for the release.

[Frank Nolan]

Hmmm, did someone get out of bed on the wrong side this morning?
Going back to your original post and reading all the responses I think both your questions were answered. Yes you can capture now and the length of firewire cable that could be used was about 12 ft. So I dont see the need for you to get snippy with people that are trying to offer different solutions.
If you need a longer run of cable, another solution would be to run a cable from the HD component out of the camera to a kona or decklink card in a G5 and then you can capture now at whatever codec you choose. The only thing there is you would have to feed audio directly out of the mixer to the card as well. Just be sure to set the component out to the same resolution you are capturing in 720p or 1080i.

[Jeremy Garchow]

Yikes, Russell, no need to get defensive, asinine and rude. Humor is good and Fischtale is not that far off. There’s a reason Panasonic calls their SPX800 a ‘camputer’. If you have actually read the posts, people are doing what you are trying to do, and they have told you the shortcomings of that method. Whether or not you want to remain in denial is up to you. I guarantee that whatever was used to capture from a Viper camera was more than a feeble laptop with a FW800 drive. You wanna bet your shoot on a series of unproven firewire repeaters? You yourself say you have no time to test a workflow, well what that means to me is use the workflow that is the system was designed on, and that’s recording to P2 and transferring to either a laptop or a P2 store. Even then, you still have to test until you get it right. You can most definitely capture live video into FCP. It works, but you have to have someone there monitoring it. WIth the current p2 workflow, filling up the cards fast and offloading them fast is the way it is. If you have three cards (which I find is a minimum) you can constantly have two in the camera and one offloading, whether that’s to a P2 store, a laptop or whatever. If you’re shooting 720p24N, that’s about 40 minutes in the camera at any given time. Another opinion of mine is that if you’re shooting HD, 720p24N is what this camera is optimized for given the amount of space on today’s P2 cards. If your are planning on shooting 1080 then you’re going to need more cards.

There’s my 2 pennies, whatever you want to glean from this is up to you.

Jeremy

[Frank Nolan]

[FischTale] “Now…does anyone else find this conversation ironic?
We are just starting to get great productivity from this P2 card technology and it’s arguably much more efficient than tape, but yet, some people are already complaining about offloading cards, etc. and trying to find an even faster work flow.”

Agreed and I think one of the bigest problems it has created is insecurity. Not so much in the workflow but in the directors/producers themselves. Did I get the shot? Was that performance good? Let me rewind and have a look! People that have been working with film for years have never had the luxury of hitting rewind or in this case, play on a computer to see if they “have it”.
It is something a good director would know when he saw it happening, check with camera and sound to see if they got it, then move on. I find it amusing how on such a tight budget and schedule that one cant find time to offload P2 cards, (which can be done while the camera is still recording to a 2nd or 3rd card) but have time to sit around on set, editing and watching a performance.

[Noah Kadner]

Well that’s a seperate issue. Any seasoned director knows there is little point in reviewing a shot unless it’s a super complex camera move, effects shot or stunt. If you’re unsure- why rob yourself of just shooting another take and making progress? Every second on a set costs you money…

Noah

[Barry Green]

[Rusherific] “No brainer. Check it out and wait for the release.”

YOu don’t have to wait… https://www.seriousmagic.com/products/dvRack/newIn2_dtd.cfm

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[Jstakeman]

I’m looking into getting on the HVX200 band wagon, and while I don’t have an answer to the orginal posters question exactly, I will second the notion of working with DV rack and fast harddrives or RAID arrays… back up straight of the camera and more reliable than an array of little flash cards on a P2, I can’t wait to try it with this new camera.

I find the reaction to this camera fascinating. I’ve been in the world of photography for the past 7 years, and have seen the rise of digital photography produce the exact same reponses in that industry as people are having in this forum. From insecurities and re-checking shots, to new posisitions of dedicated digital techs, to fear of not having tape or film to hold in your hands as reassurance.

The change has come with the still image, and the world didn’t end… I think it will be okay with this camera too…

I’m all for shooting tethered to a laptop, made all the difference in the world on the last project I worked on.