-
How do I use this camera in HD when I need to record 40h?
Hi there
I am prepping for a documentary with a 5 week shoot in the US and Asia and I would like to use this camera as I love its predecessor. This doc has to be HD for sales reasons and will also go to cinema so it has to be shot in 25p for esthetic reasons and also forht e 35mm transfer.
The problem is that I estimate and average shooting ratio of about 40x60min. In Dvcpro HD that would mean 2400gigabytes of footage. Right now I have available 2 firestore Harddrives with each 120gb and two P2 cards with 8gb plus a ps store harddrive with 60gb. How can I possibly get all this footage with that equipment? I have to buy of course at least 2 lassie drives with each 1200gb (expensive) but I also have to take them on the trip in order to always make copies and format the firestore drives for the next shooting day. Now the problem I see even if I would do that is that I need to wait hours to dub a 120gb harddrive. I have seen that the copy time from an 8gb P2card to a hard drive is about 14min. Now I expect it to be 15times that for a 120gb firestore drive.That equals 3,5hourse per drive, 7 hours for both drives, so that means all night. As this doesn’t seem very practical to me I have been researching to rent external HD Recorders so I could record the image from Component out to an HD tape.There are some good field recorders that seem suitable. I was thinking that I could at least use those recorders for interviews where you shoot most of your footage anyway and then leave the rest for the firestores. but they are also expensive as hell. I might aswell rent a Panasonic 400 camera or Varicam for that price.So to come to an end. Does anybody out there have an idea how this camera can be used in a good and practical way for such a project? If not my only choice will be to look for altervative cameras like the canon or JVC which I don’t like too much. The camera needs to be small and not very noticable as we don’t have shooting permits and want to appear as tourists.
Feedback very welcome.
Thanks
Richard from Munich -
18 Replies
-
Well I’d suggest a couple more P2 cards and a dedicated assistant whose job is solely to dump to hard drives. In theory you cannot shoot faster than you can ingest so it should not be a problem as long as the assistant knows the process.
Noah
-
PS- if you are doing a film transfer you should shoot in 24p for an easier transfer. The aesthetic difference of 24p vs. 25p IMHO are minimal but add a whole new layer of complexity and expense in post especially with audio transfers when it comes time for a filmout.
Noah
-
Hey Richard,
other than extra drive or P2 space there isnt a whole lot you can do…welcome to tapeless workflow :-0
by the way just checked out your site – you have done some fantastic work….the devils miner in particular. are your full length docos available anywhere?
again great work!
G5 DP 2.0
4.0G RAM
OS 10.4.6
QT 7.0.4
FCP 5.0.4
BMD Decklink Extreme 5.5.1
PAL Land -
-
If you need HD and really want to look like tourists, why not use the Sony HVR-A1U or its consumer brother that really looks like a cheap tourist camera, the HDR-HC3? You can always convert the HDV interlaced footage to 24p later. By the way, the Devil’s Miner trailer is impressive.
-
Yeah but it’s much lower image quality compared to the HVX…
Noah
-
It is lower image quality, but sometimes when you’re doing a doc that requires unobtrusiveness and stealth to get the footage you need, you have no choice. An audience will forgive a drop in quality if the “content” is there. I’d go so far as to say that the average viewer won’t even consciously notice the drop in quality.
-
Hi there
Thanks for all your replies. I am happy to hear that some of you like my website too:) I have been working quite alot I guess. One of you asked about buying “The Devil’s Miner”. It will be available through our website starting next week or you can buy it on amazon. It was shot on the DVX100 by the way in 25p. Went to cinemas around the world and looked great. No problems shooting 25p and not 24p.
Back to the initial question. Has anybody got any experience with recording to an external tape recorder? Is there any other external digital device I can record to maybe from firestore? Having a dubbing assistant on our shoot is not realistic by the way. Costs would be too high. If its that what it takes the HVX option is out the window for sure and I have to get cosy with the canon I guess. What about recording in 720p instead of 1080p. Will I get double the recording time and still be in an HD terrain? I tested the camera recently for its slowmotion and it looked fantastic by the way. I shot in 720pn mode with 50p. Even when dubbed to mini dv it still looked great.
More feedback welcome
Thanks
Richard -
True enough but then again not everyone is shooting just to please the average viewer.
-
For anything that doesn’t require you to move around a lot (interviews for instance), you could just record directly to a hard drive, or through a laptop to a hard drive using a NLE on the laptop. Then save the P2 and Firestore for run and gun. But realistically, if you don’t have budget for an assistant, you’re probably going to work all day shooting and then several hours in the evening backing up footage. As much as I like the HVX, if this were my project I’d shoot tape.
Joe Murray
Reply to this Discussion! Login or Sign Up