HVX-200 Dropouts on dolly shots

[Izoneguy]

How are you recording???
P2 – Firestore – Computer???

[Jeff Carson]

Are you referring to “skipped” frames? This would be a symptom of the “OIS” (Optical Image Stabilization) being turned ON. You will get the same thing with jib arm shots. The camera misunderstands the fluid dolly or jib move and will “jump” the image to try to keep it stable.

[Bill Marcellus]

We are recording to P2 cards. And I am not referring to skipped frames. The image is partially breaking up into digital noise at random times during each take.

Still scratching our heads?

Bill

[Izoneguy]

How are you importing the footage?
If you are going direct from P2 to the edit
system that could be a problem.
Try copying the P2 card to the HD first
and then import.

[Chris Li]

Does rate of dolly speed aggravate the problem? Are you dollying too fast for 24p shooting?

[Daniel E]

Bill,
Do you see these drop outs on live video or only on playback? Have you tried replacing the dolly? I had an experience like this way back when I was seeing sparkles on live video when I used an Ikegami Tube camera on a dolly. The movement of the dolly was creating transient electrical spikes which the camera couldn’t deal with creating sparks in the picture. They looked like drop out but actually were not. Problems like this are often hard to duplicate but my guess is something is wrong with the wheel bearings on the dolly which is creating electrical static which the camera can’t handle. One test to try is take the camera off the dolly but walk with the dolly as it moves and see if you get the problem. If you can walk next to the dolly without the effect then maybe you can isolate the camera from the dolly while it is mounted with a rubber pad under the plate. You can also try grounding the the dolly with a grounding strap so it doesn’t build up static and grounding the camera to the dolly as well. The problem could also be in the shielding of the camera although in my experience problems like this are model specific and hard to rectify. HTH

Daniel Epstein
Gold Teleproductions, Inc
New York, NY
http://www.goldtele.com

[Barry Green]

Does the digital breakup happen during playback from the camera?

Or, far more likely, is it only when it’s been imported on a Mac?

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[Bill Marcellus]

To answer the several questions that have been asked:

We are not importing directly from P2 cards- we are going through the P2 store, copying to a hard drive, then importing to FCP via MacBook Pro to check the footage on set.

We ARE seeing the digital breakup when playing back in the camera.

The shots are very slow dollies so the speed of the move should not be a factor.

We are using a professional dolly/track, i.e. rubber wheels, grounded track, etc.

We have not seen this problem when operating handheld or via Steadicam.

For what it is worth we are seeing this problem occurring on only one of our P2 cards. We believe that the P2 card has somehow gone “bad”. We did have a similar issue a couple of months ago and got another card from our rental house which seemingly solved the problem.

At this point I guess the answer is that P2 cards can go bad- seemingly for no reason?

Thanks for everyone’s help. Still interested if anyone else has encountered this issue?

Bill

[Chris Li]

Check card for current firmware version also.

[Mitch Ives]

Bill,

Have done a ton of dolly shots with both of our 200’s… usually in 24pN. Haven’t had a single drop out. Sorry, I can’t shed any light on your issue…

Mitch Ives
Insight Productions Corp.
mitch@insightproductions.com

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