Hard Drive Camera for Final Cut Pro

[Walter Biscardi]

Firestore

Walter Biscardi, Jr.
https://www.biscardicreative.com
HD Editorial & Animation for Food Network’s “Good Eats”
HD Editorial for “Assignment Earth”

“I reject your reality and substitute my own!” – Adam Savage, Mythbusters

[Jeremy Garchow]

[walter biscardi] “Firestore” …attached to a Panasonic P2 camera (there are many different flavors of P2 cameras at the moment) Or you can shoot on to P2 cards and skip the firestore all together.

Jeremy

[Sean Oneil]

Yeah the cards suck. That’s why their first suggestion was Firestor.

There’s also XDCam.

[Dean Sensui]

Cade…

My reservation about the Firestore is the 4-pin connector at the camera. It’s a real potential problem unless there’s a way to secure it. Also, I’ve had instances where the Firestore either wouldn’t start recording or it wouldn’t stop recording. That would be a serious problem for news work.

I would suggest trying out the P2 system and seeing if it’s a good fit for what you’re planning to do. A lot of people have had good results with them, and there are also a number of people who have reported problems. But there isn’t a single complex system that doesn’t have its share of issues.

One of the nice things about shooting with the P2 card (and the Firestore) is the record-ahead feature. Imagine covering baseball and, rather than shoot every swing in hopes of catching that record-breaking at-bat, just wait until the bat actually connects before hitting the record button — and capturing the whole sequence from the pitch to the hit.

And then imagine hitting the record button and the Firestore failing to start running as it should…!

Dean Sensui — Imagination Media Hawaii

[Jeremy Garchow]

Dave, did I offend you in some way?

We shoot tons of video all day with p2 and 3-8 gig cards. There’s many products out there now to aid in p2 production, especially in the news arena. With 16 and 32 Gig cards on the way, this will all be a non issue and the whining will stop.

Also, If you are talking about many people, many cameras, many locations, you are spending many dollars anyway. $120,000? A drop in the bucket. I wonder how much is spent on tape per year?

FCP isn’t Avid and P2 cards aren’t tape.

Jeremy

[Jeremy Garchow]

[Sean ONeil] “Yeah the cards suck.”

I find them to work quite well.

[Cade Cruickshank]

We have a couple different uses of video at the University. One is the University TV station where we do news. The other application is student video projects and web video.

I have been looking at P2 which would be helpful on the news gathering side where there are far fewer students & (P2 cards) involved Of course this is all student work and they can be particularly hard on equipment. The initial cost of the cards would be expensive. Does anyone know of anything else coming down the pipe. We currently use Canon XL’s.

Thanks for all the info so far!
Cade

[Jeremy Garchow]

[Dave LaRonde] “In smaller markets, managers tend to throw around nickels like they were manhole covers (Ditka or Butkus once said that of George Halas).”

OT: Bearsssssss.

OnT: Well, I know all about what it means to be on an extremely limited budget, but it seems that the way that P2 works, it’d save time and you know the old cliche, time is money. Especially if you are doing cuts only stuff, that p2 briefcase editor thing would be just what a news dude would need. Yes, P2 is pricey, but so is ‘video qualified’ solid state memory in general in any amount that you would need to shoot video. I bet PD170s and dv tape are wicked cheap, but no one talks about those anymore. The SDX900 is cheap at the moment if you want that (and a fantastic camera at that, but then you need a DV50 deck….oh yeah, decks, got factor in those costs as well). It just seems to me that people don’t think everything all the way through, all they care about is that first nut they drop on p2 technology. They haven’t used it, say it sucks and immediately look to spend more money on something else before even seeing the possibilities. It’s definitely not for everyone, but it’ seems well suited for news especially.

Jeremy

[Mark Maness]

Let me jump in here…

Ok, Jeremy… what do you use for backup of your P2 media? We use XDCAM HD and I find that paying $30 for a 23 gig disc (that can go onto a shelf after it is used) much better than what $800 for an 8 gig P2 card that has to be reused? I’m not starting any flaming wars… Please understand that. I’m just talking about the cost of P2 that doesn’t make any sense when you put it to paper.

_______________________________

Wayne Carey
Schazam Productions
http://www.schazamproductions.com

[Mark Maness]

Cade…

As for your needs and uses for the cameras… P2 would be a viable option for you. BUT I would suggest you looking into a few Blu-Ray disc drives for media backup. I say this because hard drives DO fail. I have one sitting on my desk right now that is only 6 months old. P2 is a neat concept but it can be expensive to run. You might want to look at the possibility of the JVC cameras. They are lower in costs and use tape. Along with the Sony HDV series.

Just do me a favor… Stay away from the expensive Canon HDV cameras. You have to use their cameras as a deck since they don’t have a deck for their tapes.

_______________________________

Wayne Carey
Schazam Productions
http://www.schazamproductions.com