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Flanders Scientific Monitor and Kona 3
Well, Walter Biscardi was right. I saw the Flanders Scientific 17″ and 24″ LCD monitor at an AJA Kona 3 client today. They had a LOT of standard def media, and they had an old Sony PVM-20M4U in the room, so we hooked it up, right next to the PVM CRT monitor. I was floored. The standard def image looks as good or better on the Flanders LCD monitor as it did on the old CRT monitor. And the off axis issues usually associated with LCD monitors is minimal (compared to Panasonic, etc.). For hi def, the image quality is stunning. This monitor is in the same league as Cinetal and TV Logic, for thousands less. It has full very very good quality waveform/vectorscope/audio meters as well.
I never heard of Flanders Scientific, other than Walter, and ads on Creative Cow. But I was truly impressed.
Bob Zelin
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17 Replies
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Coming from Walter and now Bob, that’s impressive kudos!
Thanks for the 411 boys
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[Bob Zelin] “I never heard of Flanders Scientific, other than Walter, and ads on Creative Cow. But I was truly impressed. “
Glad you finally got a chance to see them. I was wondering what you would think on a first hand analysis.
Yep, it’s the SD replication that floors me, especially at 2:1 looking almost identical in quality to 1:1.
Walter Biscardi, Jr.
Biscardi Creative Media
HD and SD Production for Broadcast and Independent Productions.STOP STARING AND START GRADING WITH APPLE COLOR Apple Color Training DVD available now!
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I was VERY impressed with the Flanders monitors and was very VERY reluctant to return it (after borrowing it for a week). And the fact that SD looked great on it was very surprising. I wish I could afford one, or the COMPANY could, but alas…they bought the WRONG monitor (Sony LMD) and we are stuck with it. And they won’t rent it from me if I bought it.
I want one.
Shane
GETTING ORGANIZED WITH FINAL CUT PRO DVD…don’t miss it.
Read my blog, Little Frog in High Def -
Their new video manual went live today. The thing has so many features, who wants to READ a manual? So they launched the video manual now.
https://www.flandersscientific.com/index/videomanual
Mighty darn handy!
Walter Biscardi, Jr.
Biscardi Creative Media
HD and SD Production for Broadcast and Independent Productions.STOP STARING AND START GRADING WITH APPLE COLOR Apple Color Training DVD available now!
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Anything that has imbedded scopes makes me reluctant — and punching graphics into what you’re supposed to be grading makes me even more skeptical. Its the equivalent of dropping wasabi paste (or ketchup) onto your filet. Or maybe it just wasn’t Alberta Grade A to start with…. 😉
Glad to see that an LCD is at least perceptually starting to draw even with an old industrial-grade CRT.
Or is this “faint praise”?
I still can’t see a reason to replace my e-Cinema.
jPo
This IS my blog!
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the eCinema is a fine monitor. However, if you were one of the “old guys” that was still insisting that you could not work without a CRT (like a Sony BVM series), well, I would have to kill you.
Never tell me about the “good old days”. I lived thru them – the entire linear period. All the hi end GVG and Tektronix equipment. The good old days were not that good. Today, things are cool.
If IVC Helical was better than Quad, and Quad was better than 1″, and 1″ was better than Beta, etc, etc, etc. we would still be using IVC Helical. And to that one guy that says “IVC Helical looks better than Sony SRW” – well, he needs to be killed as well.
bob Zelin
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[Joseph Owens] “Glad to see that an LCD is at least perceptually starting to draw even with an old industrial-grade CRT.”
It’s beyond “draw even” with CRT. It’s full replacement for CRT.
If you don’t want scopes on screen, don’t turn them on. Pretty simple.
Walter Biscardi, Jr.
Biscardi Creative Media
HD and SD Production for Broadcast and Independent Productions.STOP STARING AND START GRADING WITH APPLE COLOR Apple Color Training DVD available now!
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As a general observation to Bob’s first comment, I would never put TV Logic and Cine-tal in the same sentence other than to compare polar opposites when it comes to the quality of the image.
I hate it when I have to agree with you, Walter, and this time I do agree with you, but not completely. The FSI monitors are good for the money but not as a complete and total CRT replacement.
I think for a CRT replacement, we’ll have to shift our monitoring paradigm of what is good and what isn’t, perhaps when I don’t have too look through a monitor’s ND screen to see decent gamma and black. Perhaps the paradigm of quality imaging in broadcast/cable tv has changed completely and in that rodeo quality doesn’t matter anymore?
I recently saw the Sony PVM lcd monitors and quite honestly, much better than the FSI, but true to Sony form, these monitors come with big dollar signs and then if you actually want to use them, you have to shell out more big dollars for the input cards.
I recently had to work with 3 TV Logic monitors again, shading 7 Thomson LDK6000 Worldcams. The only lcd monitor WORSE on the market is a Sony LMD. I hate the TV Logic line of monitors.
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[Craig Sommerer] “I hate it when I have to agree with you, Walter, and this time I do agree with you, but not completely. The FSI monitors are good for the money but not as a complete and total CRT replacement.
“That’s funny Craig. There’s a lot of people who don’t agree with me. That’s why we all have opinions.
Since we all have to replace CRTs now anyway, for all intents and purposes, anything you purchase now will be a CRT replacement. It’s the quality of the product you’re buying and how good it stacks up to an old broadcast CRT that will be the standard for now. In a few years some folks won’t even know what a CRT was.
So we have to judge the monitors as the best for the environment being used and how they are going to be used. We’re doing almost 100% broadcast HD and independent feature Post work here in our three suites and needed very accurate color monitors for all our color enhancement work. In my opinion and spending my own money, FSI is the best monitor you can purchase for under $10,000 and it is the best LCD monitor I have personally used and tested.
Of course the main reason why I feel so comfortable recommending them to folks is the unconditional 30 day money back guarantee. So if they don’t serve your needs for your particular situation, you’re not out any money or hard feelings. Take the money and go purchase something else to truly suit your needs. That might be a CineTAL or other higher priced monitor, but at least you have the opportunity to test drive the FSI in your own viewing situation. That’s a pretty cool concept and one I wish more manufacturers would consider.
Walter Biscardi, Jr.
Biscardi Creative Media
HD and SD Production for Broadcast and Independent Productions.STOP STARING AND START GRADING WITH APPLE COLOR Apple Color Training DVD available now!
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Craig writes –
I recently saw the Sony PVM lcd monitors and quite honestly, much better than the FSI, but true to Sony form, these monitors come with big dollar signs and then if you actually want to use them, you have to shell out more big dollars for the input cards.I recently had to work with 3 TV Logic monitors again, shading 7 Thomson LDK6000 Worldcams. The only lcd monitor WORSE on the market is a Sony LMD. I hate the TV Logic line of monitors.
REPLY –
hi Craig. I want to bash you, but you seem to contradict your self in your above statements. First you say “I recently saw the Sony PVM LCD monitors and quite honestly, much better than the FSI”. This is where I was going to tell you want an idiot you were. But then you say “the only lcd monitor WORSE on the market is a Sony LMD”. So in one sentence you say the Sony’s are great, but in the next, you berate the Sony LMD.I am no monitor expert. I started my career with Conrac, then Barco, then Asaca/Shibasoku, then Ikegami, and for the bulk of it – Sony BVM and PVM CRT monitors. It is an outrage that the company that was the standard for me for the bulk of my career (Sony) makes the WORST PIECE OF @#$% LCD monitor. The entire LMD series is an embarassment to the Sony Broadcast division, and has allowed historically inferior companies like Panasonic and JVC to blow the doors off of them. If you feel that the Sony LMD series is a superior monitor (maybe you don’t – your response is very confusing to me) – then I do not value your opinions here. The LMD series is widely considered a joke, and even the most novice user can see it’s complete inability to handle signals properly – most well known is it’s inablility to handle a SD-SDI signal. A post like this is appropriate for an AJA forum, because the local cable company called me in to complain about their new AJA Kona LHe card (last year), and the only problem was the LMD-2450. Their was a sony PVM-20M4U in the same room, and by simply looping the signal from the LMD into the PVM, the client instantly saw that the problem was the LMD monitor and not the AJA product.
So, you are welcome to your opinions of FSI, TV Logic, CineTal, eCinema and other fine hi end monitors (of what you like and don’t like) and are certainly welcome to make comparisons to the wonderful, now antequted Sony BVM CRT series. But don’t you dare compare any of these monitors to the Sony LMD line, because it shows your inability to make judgements about these products. (Perhaps I have misinterpreted what you said).
BobZelin
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